How To Create a Works Cited in Microsoft Word

This article was co-authored by wikiHow staff writer, Jennifer Mueller, JD. Jennifer Mueller is a wikiHow Content Creator. She specializes in reviewing, fact-checking, and evaluating wikiHow's content to ensure thoroughness and accuracy. Jennifer holds a JD from Indiana University Maurer School of Law in 2006.

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Microsoft Word has many automatic features that can help you write a report or academic paper. Among these, you can keep a list of sources and citations to automatically generate a bibliography (also called a "Reference List" or "Works Cited") at the end of your paper. If you need footnotes or endnotes, Word has features that can help you format those as well.

Things You Should Know Method 1 of 3:

Inserting In-Text Citations

Step 1 Choose a citation style on the

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Step 2 Click

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Tip: If you don't have all the information for the source, or if you don't want to interrupt your train of thought to add a new source, you can click "Add New Placeholder" instead. This alerts you that you need to add a citation there.

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Step 3 Continue to insert citations as you write your paper.

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Step 4 Use the

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Using Footnotes or Endnotes

Step 1 Select the footnote or endnote option on the

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Keyboard shortcuts:

Insert Footnote: Alt+Ctrl+F (PC); Command+Option+F (Mac)
Insert Endnote: Alt+Ctrl+D (PC); Command+Option+E (Mac)

Step 2 Use the

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If you need to convert footnotes to endnotes, click on the "Insert" menu, then "Footnote," then "Options." Select "Convert" from the menu, then click on "Endnotes."

Step 3 Type your footnote or endnote into your document.

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Step 4 Double-click the footnote number to go back to the document.

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To delete a footnote or endnote, highlight the footnote or endnote number in your text and press the delete key. Word will automatically renumber your other footnotes or endnotes to accommodate for the deletion.

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Creating Your Bibliography

Step 1 Choose the format for your bibliography.

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Step 2 Generate your bibliography with a click.

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Tip: You don't have to wait until you've finished writing your paper to create your bibliography. Word will auto-populate your bibliography with any new sources you add after the bibliography has been generated.

Step 3 Proofread your bibliography carefully.

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The steps and information in this article are accurate for Word for Office 365, Word 2019, Word 2016, Word 2013, Word 2010, and Word 2007. If you have a different edition of Word, your menu options may differ slightly. [10] X Research source

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