How to Cite Multiple Authors in MLA: Two, Three or More

If you're wondering how to cite multiple authors in MLA, start here. MLA 9 has one author pattern for one person, one for two people, and one for three or more. The pattern is the same for books, journal articles, news stories and web pages, and the in-text citation always starts with the same name as the Works Cited entry. The MLA Citation Maker applies these rules for you when you paste in a source.

Why only the first name is reversed

The Works Cited list is alphabetized by the first word of each entry, so the first author's last name has to come first. The second author isn't used for alphabetizing, so that name stays in normal order. The Purdue OWL's guide to MLA in-text citations shows the same pattern.

Keep the source's order

When citing two authors in MLA, or more, list them in the order they appear on the title page or byline, not alphabetically. Every MLA citation two authors or more share should keep that order.

Citing two authors in MLA means naming both of them, every time, in the Works Cited entry and in the paper.

The Works Cited entry

Reverse the first author's name, add a comma, then "and" and the second author's name as it's printed: Levitt, Steven D., and Stephen J. Dubner. Note the comma after the first author's first name or initial, before "and." Then continue with the title and the rest of the entry as usual. That's all an MLA citation two authors share needs in the Works Cited list.

How to cite a book with two authors in MLA

Levitt, Steven D., and Stephen J. Dubner. Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. William Morrow, 2005.

How to cite an article with two authors

Kahneman, Daniel, and Amos Tversky. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision under Risk." Econometrica, vol. 47, no. 2, 1979, pp. 263–91.

The in-text citation for two authors

For an MLA in-text citation with multiple authors, start with two. In parentheses, give both last names joined by "and," then the page: (Levitt and Dubner 13). Use the word "and," not an ampersand (&); the ampersand belongs to APA style. In a signal phrase, name both: Levitt and Dubner argue that incentives explain much of everyday behavior (13).

When you quote two authors in MLA

For a direct quote, the MLA citation two authors get doesn't change: "Losses loom larger than gains" (Kahneman and Tversky 279). The quoted words belong to both authors, so name both.

Once a source has three or more authors, MLA shortens the list (that's where et al. in MLA comes in) to the first author plus "et al." This applies to three authors just as it does to twenty.

The Works Cited entry

Write the first author's name reversed, a comma, and et al., then a period: Booth, Wayne C., et al. The Craft of Research. 4th ed., U of Chicago P, 2016. That book has five authors, but only Wayne C. Booth appears in the entry.

The in-text citation

An MLA in-text citation with multiple authors uses the first author's last name and et al. in parentheses with no comma between them: (Booth et al. 45). The Works Cited entry has a comma before et al. because it follows a first name; the in-text citation doesn't.

How to cite an article with multiple authors

Science articles often list a dozen authors. Knowing how to cite multiple authors in MLA saves time here: the entry still begins with only the first author and et al., followed by the article title in quotation marks, the journal in italics, volume, issue, year and pages. If the article has a DOI, end with it.

Can you list all the authors?

For three or more authors, the default is et al. in MLA entries. If your instructor wants every name, list them all in the order given, consistently.

"Et al." is short for the Latin et alii, "and others." Using et al. in MLA correctly comes down to two details: punctuation, and where you use it.

Punctuation

"Et" is a whole word, so it has no period. "Al." is an abbreviation, so it does. Don't italicize et al. If the citation includes a page, there's no comma between et al. and the number: (Booth et al. 45).

In your sentence

In a signal phrase, MLA prefers plain English to et al. in MLA prose. Union University's MLA 9 in-text citation examples give two options for three or more authors: name all of them, or name the first author followed by "and others" or "and colleagues." For example: Booth and his colleagues explain that a topic is not yet a research question (45).

In parentheses

Inside parentheses, use et al. in MLA citations every time: (Booth et al. 45). That way the MLA in-text citation with multiple authors still matches the first words of the Works Cited entry exactly.

The basic forms cover most papers. A few situations for an MLA in-text citation with multiple authors need an extra detail so readers can find the right entry.

Two sources by the same authors

When citing two authors in MLA who wrote more than one of your sources, add a shortened title after a comma: (Levitt and Dubner, Freakonomics 13). Use italics for a book title and quotation marks for an article title.

Two authors with the same last name

When two different authors share a last name, add each one's first initial: (H. Green 12) and (J. Green 8). If the initials match too, use full first names.

Several sources in one citation

To credit more than one source for one idea, separate them with a semicolon: (Kahneman and Tversky 279; Booth et al. 45).

Sources with no page numbers

For an MLA in-text citation with multiple authors and no page, give the names alone: (Kahneman and Tversky). The MLA in-text citation guide covers time stamps, paragraph numbers and other locations.

Part of learning how to cite multiple authors in MLA is telling authors from other contributors. Not every name on a book is an author. MLA treats editors and translators differently, depending on whose work you're discussing.

An edited collection

When you cite a whole anthology, the editor goes in the author slot, followed by "editor": Solnit, Rebecca, editor. The Best American Essays 2019. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2019. Two editors follow the two-author pattern with "editors" at the end, and three or more use the first editor, et al., and "editors."

An essay inside a collection

If you quote one essay from an anthology, the essay's author comes first and the editor appears after the book title as "edited by." The guide to the MLA Works Cited page shows the full layout.

A translated book

Usually the original author comes first and the translator follows the title: Homer. The Odyssey. Translated by Emily Wilson, W. W. Norton, 2018. If your paper focuses on the translation itself, such as Wilson's word choices, you can start with the translator instead: Wilson, Emily, translator. The Odyssey. By Homer, W. W. Norton, 2018. Your in-text citation then begins with Wilson.

Authors plus an editor

A novel edited by a scholar keeps the novelist as author: Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. Edited by Maurice Hindle, Penguin Books, 2003.

Some sources are written by an organization rather than a person, and some list no author at all.

Organizations as authors

When an organization wrote the work and a different body published it, the organization is the author: National Research Council. How People Learn. Expanded ed., National Academy Press, 2000. In parentheses, you may abbreviate common words in a long name.

When the organization is also the publisher

If the same organization wrote and published the work, as with many government reports and company web pages, MLA starts the entry with the title and lists the organization only as publisher. The citation then uses a short title.

How to cite with no author in MLA

With no author, the title moves to the front of the entry, and the in-text citation uses a shortened version of it in quotation marks or italics. Don't write "Anonymous" or "Unknown." The guide on how to cite a website in MLA covers web pages with no author, the most common case.

Coauthored works raise one more question about how to cite multiple authors in MLA: where do they go when the same person also wrote something alone?

Solo works come first

When an author appears both alone and with coauthors, list the single-author entries first. So Thinking, Fast and Slow (Kahneman alone) comes before the Kahneman and Tversky article. The Purdue OWL's Works Cited basic format page states the same rule.

Then by coauthor

Coauthored entries with the same first author follow, in alphabetical order by the second author's last name. Entries that begin with the same name and et al. are commonly ordered by title.

Three hyphens are for one author only

Replace a repeated name with three hyphens (---) only when the author is exactly the same, such as a second book by Kahneman alone. Never use hyphens to stand in for a pair or a group; et al. in MLA entries isn't replaced either.

Sort the list automatically

Once your entries are ready, paste them into the alphabetizer to sort the list, then check any entries by the same author by hand.

Most errors when citing two authors in MLA, or more, are small punctuation habits carried over from APA or from older editions of MLA.

A quick self-check

For each source, count the authors, then check the first name in the entry against the first name in your citation. If you'd rather not count and punctuate by hand, the free MLA citation maker builds the entry and the in-text form together.

Once you know how to cite multiple authors in MLA, remember that author names are only one part of an entry. Once they're right, the rest of the paper has its own rules.

Related guides

If your assignment asks for a summary under each source, see the MLA annotated bibliography guide. For quotations long enough to set off, the guide to the MLA block quote covers indenting and citation placement. Every guide is on the student citation guides page.

Let the tool format the names

When a source lists many contributors, let the MLA citation maker format it: paste the link, DOI or title into the MLA citation generator, and it applies the one-author, two-author or et al. in MLA pattern for you. Check the names against the source before you copy the entry.