Citation Generator - APA, MLA & Chicago Formatter

How to use this tool

1. Choose book, journal article, news article, or website, then enter the source details and any cited-page locator.
2. Copy APA or MLA parenthetical/narrative citations, or the Chicago first footnote, alongside the bibliography entries.
3. Add the source to the bibliography, reorder entries with Move up or Move down, select a style, then copy all or download BibTeX.

What this citation generator creates

Enter publication details to create APA 7, MLA 9, or Chicago 17 Notes-Bibliography citations. The source types in the form are books, journal articles, news articles, and websites. Each style produces a full bibliography entry. APA and MLA also provide parenthetical and narrative in-text citations, while Chicago provides a full first footnote to pair with its bibliography entry. You can save a bibliography entry as a snapshot, so later edits to the draft do not silently change a source you already added.

How in-text citations and bibliography entries work

In-text citations identify a source near the claim that uses it; the full entry gives readers the details needed to find that source. APA usually names the author and year, with a page or other locator when quoting or pointing to a specific passage. MLA uses an author and page locator when available. The Chicago footnote output is a first-note form with the author, title, publication details, and the cited locator. This tool does not create note numbers or place notes inside a document, so add the note marker and bibliography entry in your writing software.

Publication pages and cited locators

A journal article's publication page range describes the span of the article in its issue, such as pages 45–60. The separate cited-page field describes the specific page or locator referenced in your own writing, such as page 42 or paragraph 4. Keeping those values separate avoids treating an entire article's pagination as the passage you cited. For a quotation, enter the locator that your instructor or style guide expects; leave it blank when the citation does not need one.

Build, copy, and export a bibliography

After entering one source, add it to the saved bibliography. The list keeps the details and order from that moment; use Move up and Move down to arrange it, remove an entry, or edit the current draft and add another source. Choose APA, MLA, or Chicago to display and copy each entry or copy the entire ordered bibliography. The BibTeX download is generated in your browser from those saved entries, with special characters escaped for field safety. A book with author Smith, title The Art of Testing, publisher TestPress, and year 2020 can be stored alongside a journal article and exported together.

Manual details and privacy

This tool formats the information you provide; it does not look up missing publication data or confirm that a DOI, URL, author, or date is correct. Enter names consistently, include an edition or issue when relevant, and check the generated output against the current manual for unusual sources or institution-specific rules. Saved draft and bibliography data stays in this browser's local storage. Citation fields are not uploaded or sent to a citation database, and BibTeX is assembled on this device.