BibTeX to APA Converter
Free. No signup. Runs in your browser.
Paste or upload your .bib file and get an APA 7 reference list, sorted by author, with LaTeX accents turned back into letters. Copy it into Word or Google Docs and the italics and hanging indent come with it.
How to convert BibTeX to APA
Step 1
Add your BibTeX
Use Upload file, drop the .bib on the box, or paste the entries. One entry or a whole library both work.
Step 2
Convert
APA is already selected on this page. You get the reference list for the end of your paper, sorted by first author.
Step 3
Copy
Copy all puts the whole list on your clipboard with its formatting, ready to paste. Copy on a single reference takes just that one. A download saves the list as plain text, without italics.
If you paste RIS, NBIB or an EndNote export by mistake, the converter says so and offers to switch the input.
What the converter does with your .bib
- Accents and special characters:
Kr{\"a}merbecomes Krämer andCell \& Molecular Biologybecomes Cell & Molecular Biology. - @string abbreviations such as
journal = natare expanded. - Authors: listed as APA 7 wants, up to 20. With 21 or more, the first 19, an ellipsis, then the last author.
- DOIs become
https://doi.org/...links. - Order: sorted alphabetically by first author. Two papers by the same authors in the same year get 2015a and 2015b.
Check these before you paste the list
APA has rules a converter cannot apply from a .bib file alone. A quick look at these saves a round of corrections:
- Titles in Title Case. APA wants article and book titles in sentence case: "Deep learning for natural language processing", not "Deep Learning for Natural Language Processing". The converter keeps titles exactly as your .bib has them, because no tool can reliably tell a name such as "Bayesian" or "English" from an ordinary word. Write the titles in sentence case in the .bib, with names and acronyms in braces,
{Bayesian},{DNA}, so every style keeps them; or fix them after pasting. - Journal names in full. If your .bib uses abbreviations like
Phys. Rev. Lett., the reference will too. APA uses the full name: Physical Review Letters. - Missing DOIs. APA 7 includes a DOI whenever the work has one. If an entry has no
doifield, look it up with the DOI to BibTeX converter or on the publisher's page and add it. - Conference papers and book chapters. Make sure the .bib has the editors, page range and publisher. APA prints them when they are there.
APA 7 vs APA 6
This converter produces APA 7, the current edition since 2019. If your old references look different, these are the usual reasons:
| What changes | APA 6 | APA 7 |
|---|---|---|
| Authors in the reference list | Up to 7, then the first 6, an ellipsis and the last | Up to 20, then the first 19, an ellipsis and the last |
| In-text, 3 or more authors | All names the first time, then et al. (et al. from the start for 6 or more) | et al. from the first citation |
| DOI | doi:10.1038/nature14539 | https://doi.org/10.1038/nature14539 |
| Book publisher | City and publisher | Publisher only |
| Web sources | "Retrieved from" before the URL | The URL alone |
Frequently asked questions
APA 7, the current edition. If your university still asks for APA 6, use the table above to adjust the few places that differ.
No. Titles come out exactly as your .bib has them, because a converter cannot reliably tell names from ordinary words. APA wants sentence case, so write the titles that way in the .bib, with names and acronyms in braces ({Bayesian}, {DNA}), or fix them after pasting.
If an entry has a syntax error, the result lists it with its line number and the reason, and the other entries still convert. The usual cause is a missing closing brace or a missing comma between fields. If the file is really RIS, NBIB or an EndNote export, the converter offers to switch the input.
Yes. Copy all copies the list with italics and the hanging indent, for Word and Google Docs. The downloaded .txt file is plain text, so italics are lost there.
Yes, with the APA in-text citation generator. Switch its input to BibTeX, paste the same entries, and you get the parenthetical form (LeCun et al., 2015) and the narrative form LeCun et al. (2015) for each one.
Not from formatted text. If the reference has a DOI, paste the DOI into the DOI to BibTeX converter for a clean entry.
It is free and needs no signup. Your .bib is read and formatted in your browser and never sent to our server.
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