APA Citation Generator

Full APA citations should be listed on your paper's references page, and their exact content varies depending on the source you're citing. A full APA YouTube video citation will look a bit different from an APA newspaper citation, which won’t be exactly the same as an APA photo citation, and so forth. That said, the APA citations on your references page will all follow the same general APA format. Here’s how that format looks:

The pieces of information you include depend on your source. For example, an APA citation for a book might look like this:

And a website citation in APA might look like this:

Like full citations, in-text APA citations vary depending on the source. However, they’re a bit simpler and include less information. To create an in-text APA citation for a source, you typically put the author’s last name, and the year the source was published in parentheses right after the reference. If you're quoting or directly referencing something, you'll also need to include the relevant page number(s) inside the parentheses. The citation’s contents will change a little depending on factors like multiple authors and if a source is audiovisual or online, but they'll all follow the same general format. Here’s how APA in-text citations would look for the full citation examples from above:

To learn more about how to cite APA for specific sources, check out the links in the section below.

For some assignments, you may be asked to use Chicago-style or MLA-format citations instead of APA-format citations. MLA format is used for the liberal arts and humanities fields, and Chicago style is typically used for history, business, and fine arts. Though these citation styles share similarities with APA, they have a slightly different approach to things like author names, dates, and title capitalization. This can be a bit confusing, but don’t worry! The free citation generator at the top of this page is here to save the day. Use it to quickly and accurately create citations in APA, Chicago, or MLA.