Harvard referencing generator
Paste DOIs, PubMed IDs or your existing reference list, up to 100 at a time, and get Harvard references in the Cite Them Right format that many UK universities follow, sorted by author. Each record comes from Crossref or PubMed. The examples below are produced by this tool.
Free · no signup · works instantly. References are looked up, then formatted in your browser; nothing you paste is stored.
The rules this generator applies
- Authors: surname, then initials with no spaces (Murray, P.R.), with "and" before the last author. The generator lists every author.
- The year goes in parentheses after the authors.
- Journal articles: article title in single quotation marks, the journal name in italics, volume(issue), "pp." and the page range, then "Available at:" and the DOI link.
- Books: title in italics, the edition as "4th edn.", then place of publication: publisher.
- Chapters: the chapter title in quotation marks, then "in" and the editors with "(eds)", and the book title in italics.
- The list is sorted alphabetically by the first author’s surname.
Examples from the style guide
Each example is the guide's own reference, entered as data and produced by this generator.
- Journal article with a DOI (APA Style website record, in Cite Them Right Harvard)
- Grady, J.S., Her, M., Moreno, G., Perez, C. and Yelinek, J. (2019) ‘Emotions in storybooks: A comparison of storybooks that represent ethnic and racial groups in the United States’, Psychology of Popular Media Culture, 8(3), pp. 207–217. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1037/ppm0000185.
- Book with an edition (ICMJE sample record, in Cite Them Right Harvard)
- Murray, P.R., Rosenthal, K.S. and Pfaller, M.A. (2002) Medical microbiology. 4th edn. St. Louis: Mosby.
- Chapter in an edited book (ICMJE sample record, in Cite Them Right Harvard)
- Meltzer, P.S., Kallioniemi, A. and Trent, J.M. (2002) ‘Chromosome alterations in human solid tumors’, in Vogelstein, B. and Kinzler, K.W. (eds) The genetic basis of human cancer. New York: McGraw-Hill, pp. 93–113.
Journals that change the style
- Frontiers in Microbiology: Harvard author-date, alphabetical, with the first six authors before et al.
- MNRAS: Harvard-style author-date, set by its own BibTeX style (mnras.bst).
Other styles: AMA citation generator, Vancouver reference generator, IEEE citation generator, Nature reference style generator, APA citation generator, Chicago citation generator. All seven styles are on the Reference Formatter. Checking a list you have not verified? The free Reference Checker finds retracted papers and invented citations.
Paste references
DOIs, PubMed IDs, a plain-text list, BibTeX, RIS or CSL-JSON, up to 100 at a time.
Check the style
The style is already set; switch to any of the seven styles if your journal asks for another.
Copy or download
Copy with italics and bold kept, or download Word (.rtf), plain text, BibTeX or RIS.
What this tool does not do
- • It does not hold journal-specific variants of the style; the journal notes below list the ones we know, and your target journal’s instructions have the rest.
- • Article titles keep the source record’s capitalisation; it does not convert to sentence or title case.
- • A plain-text reference is matched to a Crossref record by title and author. A reference with no confident match is listed, not guessed.
- • It does not check whether a reference is retracted or supports your claim. The Reference Checker and Citation Claim Checker do that.
Frequently asked questions
Which version of Harvard is this?
Cite Them Right, 12th edition, the version many UK universities teach. Harvard has no single official guide, and universities publish their own versions, which differ mainly in punctuation and in when to use et al.
When should I use et al. in Harvard?
It depends on your university’s version. The generator lists every author in the reference list; if your guide shortens long author lists, cut them by hand.
Can I make a Harvard reference from a DOI?
Yes. Paste the DOI and the generator builds the reference from its Crossref record, ending with "Available at:" and the DOI link.
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