APA Reference Page | Example & Format
APA Style has specific guidelines for the format of the reference page, which is where you list all the sources you’ve cited in your paper. The guidelines here are for the most recent edition, the 7th edition, of the APA Publication Manual.
Your reference page should begin on a new page immediately after the main text, and the references should be listed in alphabetical order.
QuillBot’s free Citation Generator can help you order your references automatically. Additionally, our free Plagiarism Checker can help you avoid accidental plagiarism.
APA reference page format
You should follow these guidelines for formatting your APA reference page:
- Begin the reference page on a new page
- Center and bold the section label “References” at the top of the page
- Order references alphabetically
- Double-space all text (as in the main body of the paper)
- Use a hanging indent of 0.5 inches
The video below shows how to implement these formatting guidelines in Google Docs.
Which sources to include
On the reference page, list only those sources that you have cited in the body of the text with an in-text citation. You should not include references for:
- Sources that you only used for planning purposes (e.g., encyclopedia entries, textbook overviews)
- Brief mentions of software, websites, or periodical titles
- Personal communications (e.g., phone calls, emails)
APA alphabetization guidelines
References should be ordered alphabetically by the first author’s last name. For sources with an unknown author, use the first important word of the title (excluding articles: “a,” “an,” or “the”).
Works by the same author should be listed chronologically by publication date, with the oldest source coming first.
Annotated bibliography
For some assignments, you may be asked to include an annotation (a short summary and evaluation) for each reference.
Each annotation should be placed on a new line under its reference entry. The annotation should be indented 0.5 inches. If the annotation is longer than one paragraph, the second and following paragraphs should be indented an additional 0.5 inches.
Creating APA references
APA references have different formats depending on the type of source. In general, they include the author’s name, the publication date, the title of the work, and information about the source (e.g., journal title and volume, publisher, website, etc.). For certain types of sources, other information is also required.
QuillBot’s Citation Generator can automatically create APA Style references for all types of sources.
| Source type | Format | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Journal article | Last Name, First Initial. (Date). Article title. Journal Title, Vol. (Issue), page range. URL/DOI | Ferrand, C. (2002, December). Harmonics-to-noise ratio. Journal of Voice, 16(4), 480–487. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0892-1997(02)00123-6 |
| Book | Last Name, First Initial. (Date). Title. Publisher. | Ferrand, C. (2007). Speech science: an integrated approach to theory and clinical practice. Pearson. |
| Website | Author. (Date). Title. URL. | American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA). (n.d.). Value-based care: Alternative payment models. https://www.asha.org/advocacy/Value-Based-Care/ |
Frequently asked questions about an APA reference page
- How do you cite page numbers in an APA reference list?
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In an APA reference list, page numbers are typically included for journal articles and chapters in edited works. APA book citations and APA website citations typically do not include page numbers.
APA reference entry examples Journal article Ferrand, C. (2002, December). Harmonics-to-noise ratio. Journal of Voice, 16(4), 480–487. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0892-1997(02)00123-6 Chapter in an edited book Dillard, J. P. (2020). Currents in the study of persuasion. In M. B. Oliver, A. A. Raney, & J. Bryant (Eds.), Media effects: Advances in theory and research (4th ed., pp. 115–129). Routledge. The two numbers in a page range are connected using an en dash (–) rather than a hyphen (-).
QuillBot’s free Citation Generator can automatically create APA Style references for you.
- What should be italicized in APA 7th edition references?
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In APA references, the titles of books, webpages, and reports are italicized, as are the titles and volume numbers of journals and other periodicals.
The titles of articles or book chapters are not italicized.
QuillBot’s free Citation Generator can automatically create APA Style references for you.
- What do you capitalize in article titles in APA references?
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APA Style uses sentence-style capitalization for article titles in the reference list, which means only the first word and any proper nouns are capitalized (e.g., “Language production and serial order”).
Sentence-style capitalization is also used for book and webpage titles.
However, for the titles of journals, headline-style capitalization is used. This means all words except prepositions, conjunctions, and articles are capitalized (e.g., Journal of Communications Technology and Electronics).
QuillBot’s free Citation Generator can automatically create APA Style references for you.
