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CiteKit
Open Reference Library

CiteKit Reference Manager: Free vs Premium

The free version of CiteKit covers everything you need to cite sources properly on a single site: a real reference library, inline citations, footnotes and tooltip notes, a formatted bibliography in any of the eight built-in styles, source lookup by DOI, ISBN, PubMed ID or URL, and a full glossary with a page for every term. Premium doesn’t unlock the basics — the basics are already free. What Premium adds is scale and control: your own citation formats, structured data for search engines, citations on custom post types, edit-once-update-everywhere global editing, rich-text notes, deeper glossary tools — and it removes the 500-reference cap.

What both tiers include

Every CiteKit install, free or Premium, comes with the full core toolset:

  • Inline citations and bibliographies — cite sources in your text and generate a formatted reference list.
  • Footnotes and tooltip notes — numbered footnotes and hover-to-read tooltips.
  • All eight built-in citation styles — APA, MLA, Chicago (Author-Date), Chicago (Notes-Bibliography), Harvard, IEEE, Vancouver, and AMA, set site-wide.
  • A real reference library — structured references you reuse across posts, not one-off citation text.
  • Add a source by looking it up — paste a URL, DOI, ISBN, PubMed ID or YouTube link, or search by title, and the details are filled in for you.
  • Import and export — bring a library in from another reference manager, or take yours with you, as BibTeX, RIS or CSL-JSON.
  • Citations that carry their own reference — a [​cite] can include the full source details, and the library record is created when you save.
  • The block editor toolbar and sidebar — insert and manage citations without leaving the editor.

The glossary is free too

Defining your terms doesn’t cost anything. The free plugin gives you the whole glossary, not a taster of it:

  • Glossary terms — a term, a definition, and optional aliases, examples, related terms and a concept to group them under.
  • A page for every term — each term gets its own URL, so a definition can be linked to and found in search rather than living inside one long list.
  • Term links anywhere — link a term with [​term], let a tooltip link it for you, or switch on automatic linking and let the first mention in any post link itself. Every route matches the term, its slug and all of its aliases, so one definition serves every spelling you use.
  • Term pages built for search — each carries its own title, canonical URL and Open Graph tags, appears in your sitemap, and publishes schema.org DefinedTerm markup.
  • Tooltips that join the glossary — turn on “Add to Glossary” while writing a tooltip and the definition becomes a term other content can reuse.
  • Glossary import and export — as JSON, CSV or plain text.

What Premium adds on top

Premium layers the following onto that foundation:

  • Unlimited references — the free library stores up to 500; Premium removes the limit entirely.
  • In-post reference search — search your whole library from inside the editor and insert an existing reference with one click, instead of retyping it.
  • A style per post — every site can choose its citation style; Premium lets a single post or a single bibliography use a different one from the rest of the site.
  • Custom post type support — extend citations beyond posts and pages to any public post type your site registers.
  • Global citation editing — edit a reference once and the change flows to every post, bibliography and structured-data record that uses it.
  • Custom citation style builder — go beyond the eight built-in styles and define your own in-text and bibliography formats, with a live preview.
  • Rich-text footnotes and tooltips — bold, italics, links, lists and images inside your notes, rather than plain text only.
  • Citation schema (JSON-LD) — publish machine-readable structured data describing your cited sources.

And for the glossary

  • More than one glossary — keep product terms, legal terms and a house style guide separate, each with its own page and its own terms. A free install can hold one glossary; extra ones stay in place but aren’t published until you upgrade.
  • Control over automatic linking — choose which post types get linked, keep links out of headings, quotes, code, tables, captions and list items, cap how many links a page may carry, exclude individual pages, and match case exactly.
  • Usage — see which of your terms are actually being used and where, so a glossary that has drifted from your writing is visible rather than assumed.
  • Per-term SEO — give a term its own search title and description instead of taking the generated ones.
  • Richer terms — add an image to a definition and format it properly.
  • Sync from a Google Sheet — edit terms in a sheet, on a schedule, and let the site follow.

The 500-reference limit, explained

The free plugin stores up to 500 references. It’s worth being clear about what that does and doesn’t mean. When you reach 500, every reference you already have keeps working exactly as before — your existing citations, bibliographies and posts are completely unaffected. The only thing the limit stops is adding new references beyond 500; to add more, you either upgrade to Premium or remove some you no longer need.

Existing libraries are grandfathered. If your library was already over 500 references before this limit applied to your install, it keeps working and the cap is not enforced retroactively — you won’t suddenly be blocked. The limit only affects adding brand-new references on a free install that is at or above the threshold.

Glossary terms are not references, and they are not capped.

Upgrading

Activating a Premium licence unlocks every Premium feature and removes the reference cap immediately — there’s no re-import, no data migration, and no rebuilding your library. Your existing references, citations, bibliographies and glossary terms stay exactly as they are; the Premium tools switch on around them. If you later deactivate, your data remains intact and the plugin returns to free behaviour.

What’s next