APA WEBPAGE CITATION GENERATOR

THE IN-DEPTH GUIDE TO APA WEBSITE CITATIONS

This page details all you need to know about how to cite a website in APA style. It has been compiled by experts, and the information comes from the most recent version of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (7th Edition).

THE FUNDAMENTAL ELEMENTS OF A WEBPAGE CITATION

An APA citation for a webpage should include the following information: 

  • The Author Surname followed by their Initial(s). Alternatively, the Name of the Group Author.
  • (The publication date, typically in the form: Year, Month Day).
  • The title of the webpage in italics with the first word capitalized.
  • The Title of the Website with the Important Words Capitalized. 
  • The URL (in the form: https://www.URL) or a DOI if one is provided (in the form: https://doi.org/DOI)

Once you have gathered this information, you should organize the details in the following way for a page with a named author:

Author Surname, Initial(s). (Publication Date). Title of webpage. Title of Website. https://www.URL

For example:

Holland, O. (2020, October 19). Nazca lines: Archaeologists discover 2,000-year-old cat figure in Peru. CNN Style. https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/nazca-lines-peru-cat/index.html

As this shows, you don’t need to add a period at the end of the URL or DOI for online sources. This is different from most print sources, which typically end with a final period after the citation.

WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN AN ONLINE ARTICLE AND A NEWS WEBSITE?

Note that the above example is taken from a page on a news site (CNN). These sites publish online articles but don’t have associated daily or weekly newspapers that are published in print. Some examples of such sites are BBC News, MSNBC, and Vox.

WHY USE AN APA WEBPAGE CITATION GENERATOR

One of the primary advantages of using an APA webpage citation generator is the precision it offers. Manual citation can lead to errors, especially with the intricate details required by APA format. These errors can range from incorrect author formatting to misplaced punctuation. An APA citation generator ensures that each citation adheres strictly to the APA guidelines, thereby enhancing the overall quality of your work. Consistency in citation style across your document not only reflects professionalism but also facilitates the reader’s ability to locate and verify sources.

TIME EFFICIENCY

Crafting citations manually can be a time-consuming process, particularly when dealing with numerous sources. Each source type—books, journal articles, websites—has its own specific formatting rules in APA style. A citation generator automates this process, allowing you to generate citations in seconds. This efficiency is especially beneficial when working on large projects or under tight deadlines. Instead of spending hours formatting each citation, you can allocate more time to research, analysis, and writing.

REDUCING COGNITIVE LOAD

Writing and researching are cognitively demanding tasks. Manually creating citations adds an additional layer of complexity and mental effort. An APA citation generator reduces this cognitive load by handling the tedious aspects of citation formatting. This allows you to focus more on the content and quality of your work rather than the mechanics of citation. By offloading this task, you can work more efficiently and with less stress.

HANDLING COMPLEX CITATIONS

Webpages often present unique challenges when it comes to citation. Unlike books or journal articles, webpages can lack clear authorship, publication dates, and other standard citation elements. An APA webpage citation generator is equipped to handle these complexities, providing guidance on how to format citations for sources that may not fit neatly into traditional categories. This adaptability ensures that even unconventional sources are cited accurately and appropriately.

HOW TO GENERATE AN APA IN-TEXT CITATION FOR A WEBSITE

The above citation, which should appear in your reference list at the end of your paper, is just one part of the overall documentation for a source. The other part is an in-text citation, of which there are two kinds: narrative and parenthetical. The first of these requires you to weave the name of the author into your text and follow it with the publication year in round brackets. The second requires you to place the author’s surname and the publication year in round brackets together. As such, the source mentioned above could be cited in your text in each of the following ways:

Narrative: Holland (2020).

Parenthetical: (Holland, 2020).

As these examples demonstrate, only the publication year (and not the month and day) should appear in your in-text citations. 

SOME QUICK STYLE POINTS FOR TALKING ABOUT ONLINE SOURCES

When discussing online sources in the body of an APA paper, note that the word “Internet” is always capitalized, but words like “website,” “webpage,” and “online” are not. Note also that “webpage” is written as one word, rather than two.

HOW TO CITE AN ENTIRE WEBSITE

If you discuss an entire site in your essay (rather than a specific page), then you don’t need to create a full APA citation for a website in your reference list. You should simply provide the name of the site in your text and include the relevant URL in round brackets afterwards, like so:

An early model for online consumer-to-consumer sales was provided by eBay (www.ebay.com). 

If you are writing online, you can simply hyperlink the name of the site in your text. The URL doesn’t need to appear separately:

As a result, eBay became an early success story during the dot-com bubble.

WHAT’S A DOI AND WHEN SHOULD I USE ONE?

DOI stands for Digital Object Identifier. DOIs are considered more stable than URLs and are mainly used for online journal articles and academic sources (for which you should see our other, more detailed guide). If a webpage that is not a journal article does come with a DOI, then you should cite the DOI rather than the URL. 

WHAT’S THE APA CITATION FOR WEBPAGES WITH GROUP AUTHORS?

Many pages that are written by organizations or government departments won’t name a specific author. There are slightly different rules for citing these kinds of sources.

PAGES WRITTEN BY GROUPS OR ORGANIZATIONS

If a webpage for an organization does not name a particular author, then you should use the organization’s name in your citation. If the name of the organization is also the same as the title of the website, then you should omit the title after the webpage to avoid repetition. As such, the layout for this kind of source would be as follows:

Name of Organization or Group. (Publication Date). Title of webpage. https://www.URL

For example:

Planned Parenthood. (2020). Health and wellness. https://www.plannedparenthood.org/learn/health-and-wellness

The name of the organization should also appear in your text:

(Planned Parenthood, 2020)

PAGES BY GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS

For a page written by a government agency or department, use the name of the department in place of the author. If the department is a subsidiary of any larger organizations, then these should also be included after the title of the page, like so:

Name of Department or Agency. (Publication Date). Title of webpage. Parent Organization(s). https://www.URL  

For example:

National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. (2020, September 15). Researchers identify Covid-19 health disparities in Massachusetts. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health. https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/news/2020/researchers-identify-covid-19-health-disparities-massachusetts

In your text, include the name of the department or agency in full (without any parent organizations), like so:

(National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, 2020) 

HOW DO I KNOW WHICH DATE TO USE?

Wherever possible, you should give complete dates for your sources, including the month, day and year the source was published. As the above examples show, however, some sources won’t list a complete date, in which case you should give as much information as possible: either the year and the month or the year alone. 

DO I NEED TO INCLUDE A RETRIEVAL DATE?

As long as you’re able to provide some form of date for the website you want to cite, then generally you don’t also need to include the date that you retrieved the material. However, if you want to cite a page that is designed to change over time but that does not record updates and changes, then you should include a retrieval date. You should also use the abbreviation “n.d.” (for “no date”) where the publication date would normally occur in the citation. As such, the layout for this kind of citation would be as follows:

Author Surname, Initial(s). (n.d.). Title of webpage. Title of Website. Retrieved Date, from https://www.URL

Or, for a page written by an organization or group whose name is the same as the site:

Name of Organization or Group. (n.d.). Title of webpage. Retrieved Date, from https://www.URL

For example:

Goodreads. (n.d.). Most read this week in fantasy. Retrieved October 28, 2020, from https://www.goodreads.com/genres/most_read/fantasy 

For these kinds of sites with no publication date that are cited using a retrieval date, you should also use “n.d.” whenever you cite them in your text:

(Goodreads, n.d.)

UPDATED PAGES AND REVIEWED MATERIAL

Some pages also include dates detailing when they were last updated or reviewed. If this is the case, then you should include the date of the latest update in your citation, but you don’t need to include the date of the most recent review. This is because, even if a source has been reviewed, that does not necessarily mean that it has been changed.

REFERENCES

American Psychological Association. (2020). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.). https://doi.org/10.1037/0000165-000

Goodreads. (n.d.). Most read this week in fantasy. Retrieved October 28, 2020, from https://www.goodreads.com/genres/most_read/fantasy 

Holland, O. (2020, October 19). Nazca lines: Archaeologists discover 2,000-year-old cat figure in Peru. CNN Style. https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/nazca-lines-peru-cat/index.html

National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. (2020, September 15). Researchers identify Covid-19 health disparities in Massachusetts. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health. https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/news/2020/researchers-identify-covid-19-health-disparities-massachusetts

Planned Parenthood. (2020). Health and wellness. https://www.plannedparenthood.org/learn/health-and-wellness

Hannah Berry (Ph.D.)

Hannah Berry has lectured at several colleges and teaches at the WEA. Besides publishing extensively, she has taught citation skills and written multiple style guides.