How to cite a website in Chicago Author-Date

The Chicago AD format for citing a website is:

Last Name, First Name. Year. "Title of Webpage." Website Name. Month Day. URL.

Examples

Reference list: Karlsson, Erik. 2022. "What Rural Broadband Data Actually Shows." Rural Policy Institute. August 22. https://www.ruralpolicy.org/broadband-data.

In-text: (Karlsson 2022)

The standard case: surname-first author, year, page title in title case and quotation marks, website name in plain text, full date with month spelled out, URL.

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Tip: Always double-check your citation against the Chicago (author-date) guidelines.

Other Chicago AD source types

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Chicago AD citation fields explained

Author

Format the author's name with surname first: Bhatt, Reuben. For two authors, list both with the first inverted: Bhatt, Reuben, and Camila Iturbe. For three to ten authors, list all separated by commas with "and" before the last. For more than ten authors, list the first seven followed by "et al." Chicago AD's threshold matches Chicago NB's bibliography convention; in-text citations use "et al." for three or more authors.
Year

The publication or last-modified year sits immediately after the author, with no parentheses around it (a difference from APA, where the year is in parentheses). The year placement enables Chicago AD's parenthetical in-text format (Author Year). For pages with no date, use "n.d." (no date).
Title of webpage

The page title in title case and quotation marks. Capitalize all major words. Use the title as displayed at the top of the page.
Website name

The website's name in plain text (not italicized) in title case. Chicago AD does not italicize website names - the same convention as Chicago NB. Newspapers, magazines, and journals are italicized when they appear as websites; general websites are not.
Date

The full publication or last-modified date in month-day format with the full month name spelled out: March 14. The year already appeared in the second slot, so it does not repeat in the date.
URL

The full URL of the page. End the entry with the URL.
Access date (when no other date is available)

If the page has no publication or modification date, add the access date with the prefix "Accessed": Accessed March 14, 2024. The access date follows the website name when used as the only available date.

Examples of website citations in Chicago AD

Page with named author and date

Reference list: Karlsson, Erik. 2022. "What Rural Broadband Data Actually Shows." Rural Policy Institute. August 22. https://www.ruralpolicy.org/broadband-data.

In-text: (Karlsson 2022)

The standard case: surname-first author, year, page title in title case and quotation marks, website name in plain text, full date with month spelled out, URL.

Organization as author

Reference list: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 2023. "Tickborne Diseases of the United States." CDC.gov. June 8. https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/diseases.

In-text: (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2023)

For an organizational author, use the organization's full name without inversion. The reference list is alphabetized by the organization's name.

Page with no listed author

Reference list: "The History of Standardized Testing in U.S. Public Schools." 2020. Education Reform Institute. October 12. https://www.edreform.org/history-testing.

In-text: ("History of Standardized Testing" 2020)

With no individual or organizational author identifiable, the page title moves to the author position. The in-text citation uses a shortened form of the title in quotation marks.

Page with no date

Reference list: Merriam-Webster. n.d. "Hermeneutic." Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary. Accessed March 14, 2024. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hermeneutic.

In-text: (Merriam-Webster, n.d.)

For pages with no publication date, use "n.d." in the year slot and add the access date. Note the comma before "n.d." in the in-text citation - Chicago AD's specific convention for no-date sources.

Chicago AD edge cases for Website

Tricky citations don't have to be tricky. Pick a scenario to see the rule and a worked example.

Scenario 01
Chicago AD vs. Chicago NB on the same source

The two Chicago systems share the same data fields for most sources but format them very differently. Chicago AD uses parenthetical in-text citations and surname-first reference list entries; Chicago NB uses footnotes and a separate bibliography with first-name-first footnote authors. Choose one system for your paper and use it consistently - don't mix the two.

Scenario 02
Online news article on a news website

News articles use the newspaper or news periodical template, not the webpage template. The article title is in quotation marks, the news outlet name is italicized as a periodical (not in plain text as for general websites), and the publication date follows. Newspaper articles are a structurally different source type from webpages in both Chicago systems - the periodical-italicization rule applies to newspapers but not to general websites.

Scenario 03
Whole website cited as a source

To cite an entire website rather than a specific page, use the website itself as the work. The website name appears in the title position (not italicized; Chicago does not italicize website names). The author position is filled by the website's editor, sponsoring organization, or the website's name itself if no editor is identifiable.

Scenario 04
Page in a database

For pages accessed through a database, identify the database in the citation: Author. Year. "Title of Webpage." Database Name. URL. The database is identified as the access surface; the URL is the database URL.

Scenario 05
Page with no date and no author

Move the page title to the author position and use "n.d." in the year slot. Add the access date in place of a publication date.

Scenario 06
Wikipedia entry

For Wikipedia entries, use the entry title as the author, write Wikipedia in plain text as the website (Chicago does not italicize Wikipedia), and include a permalink URL pointing to the specific revision. The permalink ensures the citation is reproducible despite continuous editing.

Scenario 07
URL that has changed since access

If the URL has changed since you accessed the page, use the URL where you originally accessed it. Do not silently substitute a new URL. The access date in your citation establishes when that URL pointed to the content you used. If the original URL no longer resolves and you preserved an archived version (Wayback Machine), cite the archived version with the archive URL.

Scenario 08
Multiple webpages from the same author and year

For multiple webpages by the same author cited in the same paper, distinguish them by appending letters: Bhatt, Reuben. 2021a. "Title of First Webpage"... and Bhatt, Reuben. 2021b. "Title of Second Webpage"... The reference list entries are ordered alphabetically by title and assigned letters accordingly. The in-text citations use the year-letter combination: (Bhatt 2021a) and (Bhatt 2021b).

Chicago AD in-text citations

In-text citation format

Chicago AD uses parenthetical in-text citations with the author's surname and the year. Page numbers or paragraph numbers are added when needed for direct quotes.

Paraphrase

Broadband access in rural counties remains uneven across regions (Karlsson 2022).

Direct quote with paragraph reference

Karlsson (2022, para. 8) describes the gap as "a structural underinvestment, not a market signal." Webpages do not have fixed pagination; use paragraph numbers (para.) or section names when navigation is needed for direct quotes.

Author named in the sentence

Karlsson (2022) argues that the rural broadband gap reflects market structure rather than consumer demand.

Multiple sources in one citation

Several recent studies have examined this question (Karlsson 2022; Bhatt 2021).

Organization as author with later abbreviation

(Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2023) - to abbreviate on subsequent citations, introduce the abbreviation in your prose on first reference: "the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)..." Subsequent in-text citations can then use (CDC 2023).

References

Works Cited
  1. <em>The Chicago Manual of Style</em>. 17th ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017.
  2. The University of Chicago Press. "Citation Quick Guide." Chicago Manual of Style Online. https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html.
  3. Purdue Online Writing Lab. "Chicago Manual of Style 17th Edition." Purdue University. https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/chicago_manual_17th_edition/cmos_formatting_and_style_guide/general_format.html.

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