How to cite a website in Chicago 18

Chicago has two systems, notes and bibliography and author-date, and this page shows both. Use these formats for a page or other content on a website. Chicago’s author-date guide treats the organization that owns the site as the author when no person is named.

Notes and bibliography

Note: “Title of the Page,” Owner of the Site, date, URL.

1. “Borrowing Policy,” Brightwell Public Library, effective January 6, 2025, https://example.org/policy.

Bibliography: Owner. “Title of the Page.” Date. URL.

Brightwell Public Library. “Borrowing Policy.” Effective January 6, 2025. https://example.org/policy.

A shortened note uses the owner and a short title: 4. Brightwell Public Library, “Borrowing Policy.” If the site has its own name that differs from the owner, you may add it after the title.

Author-date

The in-text citation is the author (often the organization) and the year: (Brightwell Public Library 2025). The reference list entry gives the year after the author, and the year isn’t repeated in the date at the end:

Owner. Year. “Title of the Page.” Date. URL.

Brightwell Public Library. 2025. “Borrowing Policy.” Effective January 6. https://example.org/policy.

A page with no date

If a page shows no date of publication, posting or revision, Chicago’s guidance for author-date is to use “n.d.” in place of the year and to add the date you accessed it:

Brightwell Public Library. n.d. “Borrowing Policy.” Accessed March 8, 2025. https://example.org/policy.

In notes and bibliography, a page with no date uses “accessed” (in a note) or “Accessed” (in the bibliography) followed by the date.

If a public archive such as the Wayback Machine has saved a version, you may cite the archived link.

Check before you submit

• The owner is the author when no person is named. Chicago’s examples use the organization.
• “Effective” and “Last modified” are the words Chicago’s examples use for a policy page and a collaboratively edited page. For an ordinary page, give the date the page shows.
• Title in quotation marks, since a web page is part of a larger site. A book or a periodical is italic instead.
• Test the link before you submit.