APA 7th edition referencing: a quick guide with examples
APA (American Psychological Association) style is used in psychology, education, management, nursing and many social sciences. The 7th edition, published in 2019, is the current version. Every source you use needs two parts: a short in-text citation where you use it, and a full reference in the list at the end.
In-text citations
Use the author's surname and the year:
- Paraphrase:
(Sharma, 2021)or "Sharma (2021) found that…" - Direct quote: add the page:
(Sharma, 2021, p. 45) - Two authors:
(Sharma & Verma, 2021); in a sentence, use "and": "Sharma and Verma (2021)…" - Three or more authors: first author plus "et al." from the first citation:
(Gupta et al., 2020)
Reference list examples
Journal article
Sharma, R., & Verma, P. (2021). Mobile learning in rural schools. Journal of Educational Technology, 18(2), 112–125. https://doi.org/10.xxxx/xxxxx
The journal name and volume number are in italics; the issue number in brackets is not. Include the DOI as a link whenever the article has one.
Book
Singh, A. (2019). Research methodology for beginners (2nd ed.). Learning Media Publication.
Only the first word of the title and subtitle, and proper nouns, get capital letters. The publisher's location is no longer needed in APA 7.
Chapter in an edited book
Rao, K. (2020). Assessment in higher education. In M. Iyer (Ed.), Teaching in India (pp. 45–67). Sage.
Web page
University Grants Commission. (2023, March 4). Title of the page. https://www.ugc.gov.in/...
Formatting the reference list
- Title it References, centred and bold.
- List entries in alphabetical order by the first author's surname.
- Use a hanging indent: the second and following lines of each entry are indented.
- Double-space the whole list, like the rest of the paper (unless your institution says otherwise).
Common mistakes
- Writing full first names. APA uses initials: "Sharma, R." not "Sharma, Rahul".
- Title Case For Article Titles. APA uses sentence case for article and book titles.
- Citing a source in the text that isn't in the reference list, or the other way round.
- Leaving out the DOI.
The APA citation generator builds the reference for you from a DOI, ISBN or title using publisher records. Always compare the result with these rules, especially capital letters.