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How to Cite a Website in APA, MLA, and Chicago

Citation Generator builds a reference entry in all three major styles at once from the details you enter. It's a manual-entry tool, nothing is fetched from a URL automatically, since that would require sending the address to a server, which this site never does.

  1. 1Open the Citation Generator tool.
  2. 2Choose the source type: Website, Book, or Journal Article.
  3. 3Add the author (or authors) if there are any; it's fine to leave this blank for sources without a listed author.
  4. 4Fill in the title, publisher or site name, date, and any other fields relevant to that source type.
  5. 5Copy the APA, MLA, or Chicago citation you need from the cards at the bottom.
Open Citation Generator

Frequently asked questions

Why can't I just paste a URL and have it fill in the details?

Pulling details from a URL automatically means fetching that page's content, which can only be done through a server, something this site deliberately doesn't have. Entering details manually keeps the tool fully private, with nothing about what you're citing ever leaving your browser.

Why didn't my access date show up in the citation?

APA 7 generally doesn't call for an access date on stable web content, so it's left out of the APA citation. For MLA and Chicago, the access date is only used when no publish date is available, since that's when those styles actually call for it.

Does this fix the capitalization of my title?

No. Titles are used exactly as typed, since automatically deciding which words to capitalize risks mangling proper nouns and acronyms. Enter the title the way you want it to appear.

How are more than a few authors handled?

Each style has its own real rule for long author lists (APA lists up to 20 before switching to an ellipsis; MLA and Chicago switch to "et al." sooner), and this tool follows the common, simplified version of those rules rather than every edge case in the full style guides.