How to Cite a Website in Harvard Style

Citing websites

Referencing has become increasingly complex as students are leveraging new sources of information to back and strengthen their academic arguments.

A few decades ago, students would limit their research to books, academic journals and the written press. Nowadays, with the rise and democratization of the online search engines and digital media, Google, Wikipedia and online news outlets have become the first steps in a student’s research process.

Citing websites is now a significant part of referencing.

Students are required to follow Harvard’s traditional author-date structure (link) and are also required to display the website title, an indicator that the article was found online (“[online ]”), the website name and website URL.

We recommend students use the following structure to cite websites.

Website Harvard reference format:

Examples:

• Hasen, R. (2020) “Bring on the 28th Amendment”. [online] New York Times. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/29/opinion/voting-rights.html
• Lowrey, A. (2020) “Close the Racial Gap with Baby Bonds”. [online] The Atlantic. Available at: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/06/close-racial-wealth-gap-baby-bonds/613525/
• Grant, J. (2020) “Powell Has Become the Fed’s Dr. Feelgood” [online] The Wall Street Journal. Available at: https://www.wsj.com/articles/powell-has-become-the-feds-dr-feelgood-11593370222?mod=opinion_lead_pos5