Research management systems often include citation management tools, along with collection and organizing functions. See the Save and Organize What I've Found page for more details on research management systems.
These citation management tools often allow you to designate the required citation style (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.) and can either detect the needed bibliographic information or prompt you to input what is expected for each source that you have added to the your collection of resources.
When you are ready to compile your References or Works Cited list, you can click on a "Create a Bibliography" or similarly labeled option and the tool generates an ordered and formatted page which you can save and add to your paper or project.
Some citation management tools provide plug-ins to word processing software so you can use them to insert in-text citations into your paper as you write.
Research management systems that contain citation management tools include:
EndNote: Students, staff, and faculty have free access to a "lite" edition of this tool through Clarivate Analytics. See EndNote Instructions for more information on how to create an account and use it.
Zotero: A freely available and robust tool for research management which includes collection, organization, citation, and note-taking tools plus options for forming shared group libraries in support of collaborative research. For specific instructions, visit the library's Zotero: Organizing Your Research guide.
Microsoft Word and other word processing software programs have added functions such as References, Insert Citation, Insert Footnote, Insert Table or Figures, and more. For Google Docs, Add Ons can be selected to perform similar tasks related to academic writing. Some of these work better than others.
Important Note: When using any kind of automated research management or citation generator/management tool, it is always a good idea to double check citations and other aspects of formatting against the official style manual for the style you are required to use! The automated tools are only as good as their coding and the data imported into them, which allows many chances for mistakes to happen.
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