MLA Citation Maker

Make accurate MLA citations within seconds using our free citation maker.

Free MLA Citation Generator: What It Does

This free MLA citation maker creates accurate MLA 9th edition citations for your Works Cited page and your in-text citations. Paste a source URL and the tool pulls the author names, title, container, publisher and date for you - or switch to manual entry and fill the fields yourself. Either way, you get a correctly punctuated, correctly italicized MLA entry you can paste straight into your paper. No signup, no account, no limits.

MLA style is the default citation format for English, literature, languages and most humanities courses. The 9th edition of the MLA Handbook is the current standard, and it is what this tool follows.

How to Use the MLA Citation Maker

  1. Paste the URL of your source - an article, ebook page, video or webpage - into the box above and generate.
  2. Check the fields the tool filled in, and correct anything the page did not expose, such as page numbers.
  3. Or use manual entry for print books, PDFs and other sources without a readable URL.
  4. Copy the entry into your Works Cited list, keep entries in alphabetical order, and add the matching in-text citation wherever you quote or paraphrase.

MLA 9 Works Cited Format Guide with Examples

MLA 9 builds every entry from "core elements": Author. Title of source. Title of container, contributors, version, number, publisher, date, location. Here is how that looks for the sources students cite most:

Book

Format: Author. Title of Book. Publisher, Year.

Example: Tan, Amy. The Joy Luck Club. Putnam, 1989.

Journal Article

Format: Author. "Title of Article." Journal Name, vol. x, no. x, Year, pp. xx-xx.

Example: Rivera, Maria, and James Okonkwo. "Narrative Voice in Contemporary Short Fiction." Modern Language Studies, vol. 52, no. 1, 2023, pp. 45-61.

Website

Format: Author. "Page Title." Site Name, Day Month Year, URL.

Example: Hollis, Sam. "The Rise of Microcredentials." Inside Higher Ed, 4 Feb. 2024, www.insidehighered.com/example.

Chapter in an Edited Book

Format: Author. "Chapter Title." Book Title, edited by Editor Name, Publisher, Year, pp. xx-xx.

Example: Osei, Kwame. "Postcolonial Readings." New Essays on the Novel, edited by Linda Marsh, Routledge, 2022, pp. 88-104.

MLA In-Text Citations

MLA uses the author-page system: the author's last name and the page number in parentheses, with no comma between them.

  • Paraphrase: Romantic poetry often blurred the line between nature and imagination (Burke 112).
  • Author named in the sentence: Burke argues that nature and imagination overlap (112).
  • Two authors: (Rivera and Okonkwo 47).
  • Three or more authors: (Smith et al. 45).
  • No page numbers (websites, films): use the author alone - (Hollis).

Common MLA Formatting Mistakes to Avoid

  • Commas inside the in-text citation. MLA uses (Smith 24), not (Smith, 24) - that comma is APA style.
  • Wrong container italics. The container - the journal, site or book that holds the source - is italicized; the article or chapter title stays in quotation marks.
  • Forgetting "et al." rules. Three or more authors means first author + et al., everywhere.
  • Numbering the Works Cited list. MLA entries are alphabetical, never numbered - that is what IEEE and Vancouver do.
  • Full URLs with https://. MLA 9 drops the protocol: write www.example.com/page.

MLA vs Other Citation Styles

MLA's author-page system suits close reading, where page numbers matter. If your paper is in the social sciences, your instructor probably wants APA instead; engineers should use the numbered IEEE citation generator; history and publishing often prefer Chicago style; and nursing programs commonly require Vancouver or APA. For general author-date work, try the Harvard referencing generator. Building a title page for your MLA paper? Use the free MLA title page generator.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is this MLA citation generator free to use?

Yes, it is 100% free with no account and no limits. Paste a URL or fill in the source details manually and copy a formatted MLA 9 Works Cited entry.

Which MLA edition does the generator use?

The generator formats citations to the MLA Handbook, 9th edition - the current standard required by most schools and universities since 2021.

How do I write an MLA in-text citation?

MLA in-text citations use the author's last name and the page number in parentheses, with no comma between them: (Smith 24). If you name the author in the sentence, only the page goes in parentheses: Smith argues that... (24).

How do I cite a website in MLA 9?

MLA 9 website entries list the author, page title in quotation marks, the italicized site name, publication date and URL: Smith, John. "Page Title." Site Name, 15 Mar. 2024, www.example.com/page. Paste the URL into the generator to build this automatically.

What if my source has no author?

Start the Works Cited entry with the title instead, and use a shortened version of the title in your in-text citation: ("Shortened Title" 12). Alphabetize the entry under its first main word.

How do I cite three or more authors in MLA?

For three or more authors, list only the first author followed by et al. in both the Works Cited entry and the in-text citation: Smith, John, et al. and (Smith et al. 45).

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