How to Do an In-Text Citation of a PDF File in APA Format

Citing your sources is a necessary skill to avoid plagiarism, though not always the easiest skill to learn. Sometimes it can be difficult to figure out how to cite obscure items such as PDF files. Luckily, citing PDF files is easier than most people think. Since they are a form of electronic information, you cite them the same way you would cite a web document.

Instructions

    • 1

      Start out by typing in the author's last name followed by a comma and the author's first and middle initials. If the document was written by an organization, write out its name instead.

      The citation so far should look something like this:

      Smith, J.S.

      or

      Citation Experts

    • 2

      Add in the year of publication in parentheses directly after the author's name followed by a period. If no date is available put "n.d." instead of a year.

      The citation becomes

      Smith, J.S. (2011)

      or

      Citation Experts (n.d.).

    • 3

      Put the title of the PDF file in italics after the year of publication. APA style only capitalizes the first word of every title and every word after a colon. Proper nouns such as names and locations are also capitalized. Other than that, lower case the words in a title. Follow the title with another period.

      The citation should now look like this:

      Smith, J.S. (2011). APA citation help: A guide.

      or

      Citation Experts (n.d.). Citations made easy.

      *please note the italics do not show up here*

    • 4

      Put the phrase "Retrieved from" followed by the full URL of the PDF file.

      The final citation should look something like this:

      Smith, J.S. (2011). APA citation help: A guide. Retrieved from http://www.somepage.com/somefile.pdf

      or

      Citation Experts (n.d.). Citations made easy. Retrieved from http://www.anotherpage.com/adifferentfile.pdf .

    • 5

      Give your citation entry a hanging indentation. This is where all lines after the first line of every single entry is indented ½ an inch from the margin.

Learnify Hub © www.0685.com All Rights Reserved