How to cite a website in MLA 8 format
We can cite a website in MLA 8 style for you automatically (and for free) with our citation generator below. Simply paste the page URL into the search box and then click on the result we find. Our tool will locate all the details you need and format the citation correctly, ready for you to copy into your paper.
Information required
First, you need to locate these details for the website:
- Webpage author This can usually be found near the top of the page, but if there isn’t one listed you can use the website name in its place.
- Title of article or page The title is almost always at the top of the page in large or bold text. You can also find it by hovering your mouse over the browser tab.
- Date published This is usually very close to the title.
- Website name The website name can usually be found in the web address or by looking for a logo at the very top of the page.
- Publisher Sometimes a website won’t always have a publisher, but If the website is part of a larger group of websites then use this as the publisher.
- URL (or DOI) This can be copied straight from the address bar of your browser, and will start with either http:// or https://.
- Date accessed or viewed The access date is the date you took information from the article (generally this is today’s date if you are writing your paper right now).
Template
Use this template, replacing the colored placeholders with the information you found on the page:
Author last name, Author first name. “Article title.” Site name, Published date day, month, year, Article URL. Accessed Accessed date day, month, year.
Example
The final formatted citation should look like this:
Casselman, Ben. “G.D.P. Grew at 4.1% Rate in U.S. in Latest Quarter. Here’s What That Means.” NY Times, 27 July 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/27/business/economy/economy-gdp.html. Accessed 27 July 2018.
What to do when there’s no author
No author? No problem. You will need to collect all of the same information found above, except for the author’s name. Instead of beginning the citation with the author’s name, your citation will begin with the title in quotation marks. Adapting the example above would look like this:
“G.D.P. Grew at 4.1% Rate in U.S. in Latest Quarter. Here’s What That Means.” NY Times, 27 July 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/27/business/economy/economy-gdp.html. Accessed 27 July 2018.
What about multiple authors?
If the page has 2 authors then you should append the second one in the usual order (first name followed by last name). For example:
Casselman, Ben, and Julia Dench. “G.D.P. Grew at 4.1% Rate in U.S. in Latest Quarter. Here’s What That Means.” NY Times, 27 July 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/27/business/economy/economy-gdp.html. Accessed 27 July 2018.
If there are more than 2 authors you would simply append ‘et al.’ after the first one. For example:
Casselman, Ben, et. al. “G.D.P. Grew at 4.1% Rate in U.S. in Latest Quarter. Here’s What That Means.” NY Times, 27 July 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/27/business/economy/economy-gdp.html. Accessed 27 July 2018.