How to Cite a Book in APA 7 — Free Generator with Examples

To cite a book in APA 7, use: Author, A. A. (Year). Title in sentence case (Edition). Publisher. Example: Smith, J. A. (2023). The complete guide to research writing (3rd ed.). Oxford University Press.

The free citation generator handles formatting when you pick the Book source type. Below is the walkthrough with edge cases: no edition, multiple authors, edited volumes, e-books, and textbooks.

APA 7 book format — element by element

Author, A. A. (Year). Title in sentence case (Edition). Publisher.

• Author: Last, First initial(s). "Smith, J. A." for John Alan Smith. Two authors: "Smith, J. A., & Jones, R. B."
• Year: (2023) — publication year in parentheses.
• Title: Sentence case (first word and proper nouns capitalized), italicized. No quotation marks.
• Edition: In parentheses right after the title. (3rd ed.) for third edition. (2nd ed., rev.) for revised second edition. Skip for first editions.
• Publisher: Full publisher name. "Oxford University Press" — not "OUP," not abbreviated.
• NO publisher location in APA 7. APA 6 required "New York, NY: Oxford University Press." APA 7 dropped the city.

The "no city" change is the most common APA 6 → APA 7 conversion error. If you see a book citation with a city before the publisher, that's APA 6 or Chicago format — not APA 7.

How to use the generator for books

1. Open the citation generator.
2. Click "Book" in the source row.
3. Enter author last name and first initial(s).
4. Enter the year.
5. Enter the book title.
6. Enter the publisher. Leave the city field blank for APA output (it's only used by Chicago).
7. Enter edition if the book is 2nd edition or later (e.g., "3rd"). Leave blank for first editions.
8. Click Generate. Copy the APA version.

Output: Smith, J. A. (2023). The complete guide to research writing (3rd ed.). Oxford University Press.

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Books with multiple authors

APA 7 rules:

• 1 author: Smith, J. A. (2023). Title. Publisher.
• 2 authors: Smith, J. A., & Jones, R. B. (2023). Title. Publisher.
• 3–20 authors: List all separated by commas with "&" before the last. Smith, J. A., Jones, R. B., & Brown, K. M. (2023). Title. Publisher. In-text: "Smith et al., 2023."
• 21+ authors: First 19, ellipsis, last author. Rare for books.

The generator handles one author. For multi-author books, generate the base citation and manually add subsequent authors after the first.

Edited books and chapters in edited books

Two distinct citations depending on what you're citing.

Citing a whole edited book:

Editor, A. A. (Ed.). (Year). Title of book (Edition). Publisher.

Example: Brown, K. M. (Ed.). (2023). Handbook of research methods. Oxford University Press.

Generate using author fields for the editor's name. Manually add "(Ed.)" after the initials.

Citing a chapter within an edited book:

Author, A. A. (Year). Title of chapter. In E. E. Editor (Ed.), Title of book (pp. XX–XX). Publisher.

Example: Lee, S. J. (2023). Sleep deprivation in students. In K. M. Brown (Ed.), Handbook of research methods (pp. 45–62). Oxford University Press.

Not directly supported by the generator — create a book citation and manually adapt. The chapter citation includes the chapter author, chapter title, "In [editor] (Ed.)," book title, page range, publisher.

E-books, textbooks, and special cases

E-books accessed via URL (publisher's website, Google Books): Include the URL at the end. Smith, J. A. (2023). The complete guide to research writing. Oxford University Press. https://books.oxford.com/research-writing

E-books with DOI: Include DOI instead of URL. Format: https://doi.org/[DOI]. Preferred over URL when available.

Kindle editions: Cite as the print version. APA 7 does not require noting Kindle format specifically. If using a Kindle location instead of a page number for a quote, use (Author, Year, loc. XXX) in-text.

Textbooks: Same as any book. If the textbook has multiple authors (common), list per the rules above. Textbook "editions" are important — always include edition number.

Self-published books: Use the author's name as the publisher, or "Self-published" if that's how the book describes itself. Some journals explicitly reject self-published sources; check assignment guidelines.

Classics / translated works: Include translator and original publication year. Format: Author. (Original year/Translation year). Title (Translator, Trans.). Publisher.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why doesn't APA 7 include the publisher's city anymore?

APA 7 dropped the city to reduce redundancy and simplify citations — with the internet, a book's origin city is rarely useful to readers. APA 6 required it; APA 7 (published 2019) explicitly removed it. If you see "New York, NY: Publisher" in a citation, that's APA 6 formatting.

How do I cite a book chapter I got from a photocopied reading packet?

Cite as a chapter in an edited book if the packet reproduces the original chapter. If the reading is unique to the class (e.g., lecture notes compiled into a packet), treat as a personal communication or unpublished work — more complex, check with your instructor.

What if the book is by a corporation like Pearson or CDC?

Use the organization as the author. "Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2023). Vaccine recommendations. Author." (When author and publisher are the same, write "Author" as the publisher.)

Do I italicize the title of a chapter or just the book?

Book titles are italicized. Chapter titles are NOT italicized — they're in sentence case plain text. Format: Chapter title. In Editor (Ed.), Book title.