This is how to properly cite a website using the APA standard format. This only applies to websites and not social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and the rest.
Terminologies
- In-text citation – Usually the body of your work
- Reference page – The last page of your project or work.
- Last Page – This is the same with a reference page.
For easier understanding, this post is broken into the part.
How do you cite the whole website in APA?
This APA Format for website citation is according to the APA manual (6th edition), it is not necessary to cite a site in its entirety in a reference list.
Instead, include a reference in the body of your paper. But if you must cite the whole website do it in summary.
To get a better understanding of what I mean read on.
For instance
Example: The Federal Government
has just released a new website called governmentjobs.gov at http://www.govjobs.gov/ to help people find and apply for government jobs.
What you’ve done is have just cited the whole website in APA style. It is simple and clear this way.
How to cite a specific text on a website?
If you include a citation from a webpage in your project, you must include two citations: that is a brief citation in the text and also a full citation on the reference page.
According to APA URLs (web address) should not be written in the body of your project rather you can add it in reference. The URL is long and clucky and somethings can mess up your project when added to the body of your project.
Instead of writing the full address in the text, either uses the last name of the author and the date the source was published, but if there is no author use the title of the individual page and the date.
Check out this in-text citation APA website example with the author:
The problem with Africa is religion and ethnicity (CT, 2020).
Example without author:
The problem with Africa is religion and ethnicity (Towards Africa, 2020)
Here the first one has no author, but the page title is “Towards Africa” then add the date.
That is how you use in-text citation without the author, the format is
– The text you want to cite
– The topic of the article you cited
– Date
Reference page citing
On the reference page make sure the in-text citation corresponds to the information on the final page of the project, that is the reference page.
Here’s how the full APA citation for a web page looks on the final page of the project:
Pew Forum. (2010.) Islam and Christianity in Sub-Saharan Africa: Appendix B (PDF). Https://www.pewforum.org/files/2010/04/sub-saharan-africa-appendix-b.pdf
What we just did is follow this format
– Name of the author or source
– Date
– Topic
– Web address
Some FAQ
1. Can I do APA citation with full dates or just the year?
It depends on what you are citing if it’s from a blog post or a news site, cite the full dates is a must, but if it’s an article or Wiki type of webpages, you include just the year when citing in APA format.
2. What do I do when citing group Authors?
For single authors you can cite them easily, but what about group authors?
For group authors what you need to do is follow this simple format
For an APA website citation, you can use the group’s name in
the author’s position. Type the full names and add a period in the end.
For example
James M. ( December 30, 2019 ). Tragic, deadly, stupid: Australians keep getting into trouble overseas Retrieved from https://www.smh.com.au/world/asia/tragic-deadly-stupid-australians-keep-getting-into-trouble-overseas-20191125-p53dxa.html
The above-quoted example contains the explanation for the two frequently asked questions above.
- How to cite group authors
- How to cite full dates.
It contains the group author name, the full date of the article than the title of the article, and the URL.
Extra important information
Note:
If you are citing a standalone source, that is an entire book, television series, or film, the title
of such sources should be in italics.
If, however, you are citing a piece of a larger source, i.e., a journal article,
a page on a site, or an episode of a movie, the title should be in sentence case and not in italics.
In a nutshell, do not italicize an APA citation for web pages’ titles in the text and on the final page of references.
For full references on the final page of the project, only include capital letters at the beginning of the title, at the beginning of each proper noun, and at the beginning of the first word in the subtitle.
The title is written in the text-only when there isn’t an author listed. So, instead of showing the reference as (Author, Date), use (“Title of Page,” Date) in any APA citation for web pages. Notice the switch from sentence case to title case in the text reference.