Book
Author. Title of Book. Publisher, Year.
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. Americanah. Alfred A. Knopf, 2013.
Add an edition (“2nd ed.,”) or editors (“Edited by …,”) after the title. Shorten university presses: Yale UP, U of Chicago P.
MLA Citation Generator
MLA 9th edition citations for books, websites, journal articles and videos. Auto-fill from a link, DOI or ISBN, get the in-text citation, and copy your Works Cited straight into your paper. Free, no sign-up, no ads.
Or choose the source type and type the details yourself.
Works Cited entry
Your citation appears here as you type.
In-text citation
(Author page)
Works Cited
Sources you add appear here in alphabetical order, ready to copy or download as a Word file. They stay saved in this browser.
How to use the MLA citation generator
- Auto-fill or type. Paste a web address, a DOI or a book’s ISBN and press Auto-fill, or choose the source type and fill in the fields.
- Check the details. The entry updates as you type. Notes under it point out anything missing, such as a page range or an upload date, and “Why it looks like this” explains each rule applied.
- Add it to your Works Cited. The list sorts itself alphabetically, the way MLA requires.
- Put it in your paper. “Copy Works Cited” pastes into Word or Google Docs with the italics kept, or download a Word file already set in Times New Roman, double-spaced, with hanging indents.
- Cite in the text. Each source shows its parenthetical citation. Type the page (or a time stamp for a video) to complete it.
MLA 9 format and examples by source type
Every MLA entry uses the same core elements in the same order: Author. Title of source. Title of container, Other contributors, Version, Number, Publisher, Publication date, Location. Leave out any element that does not apply.
Website or web page
Author. “Title of Page.” Website Name, Publisher, Day Month Year, URL.
Bernstein, Mark. “10 Tips on Writing the Living Web.” A List Apart: For People Who Make Websites, 16 Aug. 2002, alistapart.com/article/writeliving.
Leave out the publisher when it matches the website name. No date? End with “Accessed 5 Mar. 2024.”
Journal article
Author. “Title of Article.” Journal, vol. #, no. #, Year, pp. #-#. Database, DOI or URL.
Goldman, Anne. “Questions of Transport: Reading Primo Levi Reading Dante.” The Georgia Review, vol. 64, no. 1, 2010, pp. 69-88. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41403188.
Prefer the DOI (https://doi.org/10.…) to a database URL. Seasons are written as they appear: Spring 2019.
YouTube video
Creator. “Title of Video.” YouTube, uploaded by Channel, Day Month Year, URL.
“Shakespeare: Hamlet Summary.” YouTube, uploaded by Course Hero, 9 May 2017, www.youtube.com/watch?v=...
If the channel is the creator, list it as the author and drop “uploaded by”. In the text, cite a time stamp: (Course Hero 00:02:15).
Authors in MLA 9
| Authors | Works Cited | In-text |
|---|---|---|
| One | Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. | (Adichie 45) |
| Two | Dorris, Michael, and Louise Erdrich. | (Dorris and Erdrich 12) |
| Three or more | Burdick, Anne, et al. | (Burdick et al. 3) |
| Organization | World Health Organization. (Skipped when it is also the publisher.) | (World Health Organization) |
| None | Starts with the title | (“Shortened Title”) |
How to format the Works Cited page
- Start the list on a new page at the end of the paper, titled Works Cited, centered, not bold or underlined.
- Sort entries alphabetically by the first word of each entry, ignoring A, An and The.
- Double-space everything, with no extra space between entries.
- Use a hanging indent: the first line of each entry at the margin, the following lines indented 0.5 inch.
- Use the same font as your paper; Times New Roman 12 pt is the usual choice.
The Word file from “Download Word (.docx)” is already set up this way. In Google Docs, open it with File → Open → Upload, or paste the copied list and set the hanging indent under Format → Align & indent → Indentation options.
In-text citations
Every source in the Works Cited needs to be cited in your text, and every in-text citation must match an entry. The citation starts with the same word the entry starts with, usually the author’s last name, followed by the page: (Adichie 45). If you name the author in your sentence, give only the page: Adichie describes … (45). Sources without page numbers, such as most web pages, need only the name; for videos, give a time stamp.
Common MLA mistakes and the fix
These are the slips the “Check my Works Cited” tab catches. Paste your list there to find them in seconds.
| Wrong | MLA 9 |
|---|---|
| https://www.bbc.com/news/... | www.bbc.com/news/... (MLA 9 drops http:// and https://) |
| March 5, 2021 | 5 Mar. 2021 (day first; abbreviate months longer than four letters) |
| Sep. 2020 | Sept. 2020 |
| Vol. 12, Issue 3 | vol. 12, no. 3 |
| p. 45-67 / pg. 45 | pp. 45-67 / p. 45 |
| pp. 112-115 | pp. 112-15 (MLA page-range rule) |
| Smith, J., et. al | Smith, Jane, et al. |
| Retrieved from www.site.com | www.site.com. Accessed 5 Mar. 2024. |
| Yale University Press | Yale UP |
| Smith, J. (2020). Title. | Smith, Jane. Title. Publisher, 2020. (the year goes near the end, not after the author) |
Why this generator, not another
- No ads, no sign-up, no pop-ups. Cite, copy and download without an account.
- It shows its work. Each entry lists the rules applied and what is still missing, so you learn the format instead of trusting a black box.
- A checker for the list you already have. Paste a Works Cited from any tool and see what to fix.
- Study your sources. Turn the list into flashcards: who wrote each source, when, and how to cite it, plus the MLA rules themselves, reviewed with spaced repetition.
Need APA instead? Use the APA 7th edition citation generator. Writing about what you read? Make flashcards from your notes, build a study guide for the exam, or test yourself with the quiz maker.
Rule sources
The formats here follow the MLA Handbook, 9th edition (Modern Language Association of America, 2021), and the examples and guidance published by the MLA on the MLA Style Center. When a source does something unusual, the Handbook’s principle applies: give the core elements that exist, in order, so a reader can find the source. Always follow your instructor if their requirements differ.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is this MLA citation generator free?
Yes. Citing sources, auto-fill, in-text citations, copying entries or the whole Works Cited list, the checker and the flashcards are free with no account. A free Word download holds up to 10 sources. Pro adds a separate list for each paper, Word downloads of any size and exporting every list at once.
Does it follow the MLA 9th edition?
Yes. Entries are built from the MLA core elements in the order the MLA Handbook (9th edition, 2021) sets out, with its rules for authors (two authors, et al.), quotation marks and italics, abbreviated months, “vol.”, “no.”, “p.” and “pp.”, the MLA page-range rule, URLs without https://, DOIs, “UP” for university presses and the optional access date.
How do I cite a website in MLA 9?
Author. “Title of the Page.” Website Name, Publisher (if different), Day Month Year, URL. For example: Bernstein, Mark. “10 Tips on Writing the Living Web.” A List Apart, 16 Aug. 2002, alistapart.com/article/writeliving. The website name is italicized. If the page has no date, add “Accessed” and the date you read it at the end.
Do I still need “Accessed” dates in MLA 9?
They are optional. MLA recommends an access date when a web source has no publication date or may change. This generator adds one automatically for websites with no date, and you can switch it on or off for any source.
Should the URL include https://?
No. MLA 9 drops http:// and https:// from URLs (www.example.com/page). The exception is a DOI, which is written as https://doi.org/ followed by the DOI. The generator does both, and removes tracking parameters such as utm_source.
How do I write the in-text citation?
Put the author’s last name and the page number in parentheses with no comma: (Adichie 45). Two authors: (Dorris and Erdrich 12). Three or more: (Burdick et al. 3). With no author, use a shortened title in quotation marks or italics. The generator shows the in-text citation for every source; type a page or time stamp to complete it.
What does the Works Cited checker check?
Paste your list and it flags the mistakes visible in plain text: https:// in URLs, unabbreviated months, “Mar. 5, 2021” instead of “5 Mar. 2021”, “Retrieved from”, capitalized “Vol.” or “Issue”, “pg.”, “p.” with a range, “et. al”, APA-style years in parentheses, a heading other than “Works Cited”, entries out of alphabetical order and duplicates. It cannot see italics or indentation in pasted text.
Are my citations saved?
Your list is saved in this browser, so it is still there when you come back on the same device. Nothing is uploaded unless you look up a URL, DOI or ISBN, which is sent to our server only to fetch the source details.