How to Cite a Journal Article
Journal articles are the backbone of academic citation, and they carry the most metadata: authors, article title, journal name, volume, issue, page range, and DOI. The good news: the DOI makes them the easiest source to cite — paste it into the generator and the publisher's own record fills every field.
One article, five styles
Rasch, B., & Born, J. (2013). About sleep's role in memory. Physiological Reviews, 93(2), 681-766. https://doi.org/10.1152/physrev.00032.2012
Rasch, Björn, and Jan Born. "About sleep's role in memory." Physiological Reviews, vol. 93, no. 2, 2013, pp. 681-766, https://doi.org/10.1152/physrev.00032.2012.
Rasch, Björn, and Jan Born. "About sleep's role in memory." Physiological Reviews 93, no. 2 (2013): 681-766. https://doi.org/10.1152/physrev.00032.2012.
Rasch, B. and Born, J. (2013) 'About sleep's role in memory', Physiological Reviews, 93(2), pp. 681-766.
B. Rasch and J. Born, "About sleep's role in memory," Physiological Reviews, vol. 93, no. 2, pp. 681-766, 2013. doi: 10.1152/physrev.00032.2012.
The pieces, decoded
Volume and issue: the volume is the year's bound set, the issue the installment — 93(2) in APA means volume 93, issue 2; MLA spells it vol. 93, no. 2. Page range: the article's full span in the journal (681–766), not the pages you quoted — those go in the in-text citation. The DOI ends the entry in every modern style: as a link (APA/MLA), after the pages (Chicago), or as doi: 10.xxxx (IEEE).
Italics and casing rules
Universal pattern: the article title is not italicized (quotes in MLA/Chicago/IEEE, plain in APA), the journal name is always italicized. Casing splits by style: APA uses sentence case for the article but Title Case for the journal; MLA and Chicago use Title Case for both.
Special cases
- Online-only articles with no pages — use the article number (e.g., *Article e0285) where the pages would go.
- Preprints (arXiv, bioRxiv) — cite the repository as the source; prefer the journal version once published.
- Articles in press — APA marks them (in press) in place of the year.
- Accessed through a database (JSTOR, EBSCO) — cite the article normally with its DOI; the database usually isn't mentioned in current styles.
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Go Premium — $5/monthFrequently asked questions
- Do I cite the database (JSTOR, ProQuest) I used?
- Generally no in current APA/Chicago — the DOI suffices. MLA 9 permits the database as a second container for items only available there. When the article has a DOI, the DOI wins.
- What if the article has no DOI?
- Common for pre-2000 articles. Use the journal's URL or cite the print form (authors, title, journal, volume, issue, pages) without a link.
- Which pages go in the citation — the whole article or what I quoted?
- The reference entry carries the full article range. The specific page you quote goes in the in-text citation: (Rasch & Born, 2013, p. 685).
- How do I cite an abstract?
- Avoid it — cite the full article you actually read. If you genuinely only used the abstract, APA wants [Abstract] noted after the title, but most instructors prefer you to access the full text.