Blog · October 23, 2026

How to Cite a Website in APA 7 (No Author, No Date, With Examples)

Citing a website in APA 7 looks fiddly, but there's one basic pattern. Once you know it, every other case is a small change. Below are the format, the common tricky cases, and the in-text citation for each.

The examples use made-up pages on example.com so you can see the pattern clearly.

The basic APA 7 website format

Example:
Sharma, P. (2025, March 4). How sleep affects memory in teenagers. Study Notes Daily. https://www.example.com/sleep-memory

In-text: (Sharma, 2025) or Sharma (2025) found that...

A few rules to remember:

• Author: surname first, then initials.
• Date: as exact as the page gives. Year only is fine if that's all there is.
• Title: in italics, sentence case (capitalise only the first word, proper nouns, and the first word after a colon).
• Site name: plain text, not italic. Leave it out if it's the same as the author.
• URL: the full link, no full stop after it.

Website with no author

Move the page title to the front, where the author would go.

Example:
Ten tips for exam week. (2024, November 2). Campus Life Blog. https://www.example.com/exam-tips

In-text: use a short version of the title in italics: (Ten Tips for Exam Week, 2024). In the in-text citation, use title case.

Before you decide there's no author, check whether an organisation wrote the page (see below). An organisation counts as an author.

Website with no date

Write n.d. (no date) where the year goes. Don't guess a date, and don't use the copyright year in the footer unless it clearly applies to that page.

Example:
Verma, R. (n.d.). A beginner's guide to the water cycle. Science Corner. https://www.example.com/water-cycle

In-text: (Verma, n.d.)

Pages that change often

For pages designed to change (a live statistics page, a dictionary entry, a social media profile) with no date, add when you looked at it:

Example Statistics Office. (n.d.). Population by state. Retrieved October 23, 2026, from https://www.example.com/population

Website with no author and no date

Combine both rules: title first, then n.d.

Example:
How to write a lab report. (n.d.). Lab Help Online. https://www.example.com/lab-report

In-text: (How to Write a Lab Report, n.d.)

Organisation or company as author

When a page is written by a group (a government body, university, company or charity), the group is the author. If the site name is the same, don't repeat it.

Example:
Green Earth Foundation. (2025, June 10). Why plastic recycling rates are still low. https://www.example.com/recycling

In-text: (Green Earth Foundation, 2025)

Two or more authors

Common mistakes to avoid

• Using "Retrieved from" for every page. APA 7 only uses a retrieval date for pages that change often.
• Title Case in the reference list. Reference titles use sentence case; only in-text titles use title case.
• Citing the homepage instead of the exact page you used.
• Guessing the author from the site name when an individual is clearly credited (or the other way round).
• Forgetting the in-text citation. Every source in your reference list needs at least one in-text citation, and the other way round.

Same page in MLA and Chicago (for comparison)

If your teacher asks for a different style, here's the first example in the other two common styles:

The main differences: MLA uses the full first name, puts the page title in quotation marks and the site in italics, and drops "https://". APA puts the year straight after the author, because APA cares most about how recent a source is.

A quick checklist before you hand in

• ☐ Author (person or organisation) or title in first place
• ☐ Date, or n.d.
• ☐ Page title in italics and sentence case
• ☐ Site name included (unless it's the author)
• ☐ Working URL to the exact page
• ☐ Matching in-text citation in your essay
• ☐ Reference list in alphabetical order, with hanging indents

Is a website even the right source?

Teachers usually prefer books, journal articles and official reports. A website is fine when it's from a trustworthy organisation, clearly dated, and the author or publisher is known. If you can't tell who wrote a page or when, think about whether it belongs in an academic essay at all.

Save time on your reference list

Once you know the pattern, formatting a long reference list is still slow. The EssayWiz Citation Generator (part of EssayWiz Pro) builds APA, MLA or Chicago references from a link, DOI, ISBN or book title. Always check the author, date and title against the page, because websites don't always label these clearly.

FAQ

How do you cite a website with no author in APA 7? Put the page title first (in italics, sentence case), then the date, the site name and the URL. In-text, use a short version of the title in italics with the year, for example (Ten Tips for Exam Week, 2024).

What do I write if a website has no date in APA? Write n.d. (no date) in place of the year, for example (Verma, n.d.). Don't guess a date.

Do I need a retrieval date in APA 7? Only for pages that are designed to change over time and have no date, such as a live statistics page. Most web pages don't need one.

Should the website name be in italics in APA 7? No. The page title is in italics; the site name is plain text. Leave the site name out if it's the same as the author.

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