CitePerfect
Format checker

Citation Checker

Paste your references and see what’s wrong before your marker does. Instant rule-based checks for five styles, and an optional AI review that writes the corrected entry.

40+ style rulesOrder & numberingAI deep checkNothing stored
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How it works. Pick the style your assignment uses, paste your list and press Check. Each entry gets its own report, and list-wide problems such as ordering appear at the top.

The ten most common citation mistakes

  1. Mixing styles. An APA date, an MLA title and a Harvard URL in one list. Pick one style and apply it to every entry.
  2. Wrong author format. APA and Harvard use initials; MLA and Chicago use full first names; IEEE puts initials first.
  3. “et al.” in the wrong place. APA 7 never uses it in the reference list for up to 20 authors, only in the text.
  4. Title Case in APA. APA article and book titles use sentence case; MLA and Chicago use title case.
  5. Missing or misplaced dates. APA and Harvard put the year right after the author; MLA, Chicago and IEEE put it later.
  6. “Retrieved from” in APA 7. It was dropped in the 7th edition. Give the URL on its own.
  7. No access date in Harvard. Cite Them Right needs (Accessed: day month year) after every URL.
  8. Old DOI formats. Use https://doi.org/10.xxxx (IEEE: doi: 10.xxxx).
  9. Hyphens in page ranges. Style guides use an en dash: 45–67.
  10. Out-of-order lists. Alphabetical for author-date and notes styles; citation order for IEEE.

Questions students ask

What does the citation checker look for?
Style-specific rules such as the date position in APA and Harvard, initials versus full names, “&” versus “and”, “et al.” thresholds, “pp.” in journal entries, “Available at:” and access dates in Harvard, and numbering in IEEE. It also checks whole-list problems such as alphabetical order, double periods, hyphens in page ranges and outdated DOI formats.
Can it check italics?
Plain pasted text loses italics, so the rule checker can’t see them. The AI deep check tells you which parts should be italic, marked with *asterisks*.
Is my text stored?
The rule check runs entirely in your browser. The optional AI deep check sends the references you pasted to our AI provider to generate the review; nothing is saved.
Is this an APA format checker for my whole paper?
It checks references and reference lists. For paper layout (title page, headings, margins, running head), use the checklist in our APA format guide.