Harvard referencing is a generic term used to refer to author-date referencing. The examples below conform to the version of Harvard provided by Cite Them Right, which is recommended.
Whilst Harvard referencing is the most commonly used approach in the university, there are exceptions, so please check with your course.
The following guidance is provided to introduce the underlying principles of Harvard and answer some frequently asked questions.
There is a PDF version of this page. Additional support is available on Cite Them Right.
With the Harvard approach, the in-text reference (sometimes called a citation) uses the author and date of publication to refer the reader to a list of references. There is an example below:
You might also look at the sample text and reference list using Harvard on Cite Them Right.
Below are some examples of in-text references. You should note there are several different ways to present these.
When referring to a specific section, the in-text references (citations) should normally include page numbers or other location information (for single pages, use 'p.', and for a page range, use 'pp.'). You should always provide location information when quoting from a source unless the source is very short.
The list of references should always:
Below are some examples of entries in a list of references:
Pears, R. and Shields, G. (2022) Cite them right: the essential guide to referencing, 12th ed. London: Macmillan.
Reference ebooks as if using the print version if the page numbering is the same. Otherwise, use a DOI (Digital Object Identifier) if available (no date accessed required) or a URL with the date accessed (as shown).
Pears, R. and Shields, G. (2022) Cite them right: the essential guide to referencing, 12th ed. London: Macmillan. Available at: http://www.amazon.co.uk/kindle-ebooks (Accessed: 12 February 2024).
Edwards, E. (2020) ‘The thingness of photographs’, in S. Bull (ed.) (2020) A companion to photography. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley‐Blackwell, pp. 97-112.
Freud, S. (1915) The unconscious. Translated by Graham Frankland. London: Penguin, 2015.
LaRochelle, J. M. and King, A. R. (2011) ‘Avoiding plagiarism’, Hospital Pharmacy, 46 (12), pp. 917-919. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1310/hpj4612-917.
Yetikyel, G. (2024) 'What is vegan leather?' Vogue, (6 April). Available at: https://www.vogue.co.uk/article/what-is-vegan-leather (Accessed: 8 April 2024) [if an issue number is available, include this before the date (1123; 6 April)]
Petridis, A. (2015) ‘Rocking the casbah: the gig of a lifetime back on stage’, The Guardian, 16 March. Available at: http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/ mar/16/no-lands-songs-sara-najafi-iranwomen-concert (Accessed: 16 March 2024).
Dörk, M., Carpendale, A. and Williamson, C. (2011) ‘The information flaneur: a fresh look at information seeking’, Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '11), New York, Association for Computing Machinery, 7-12 May, pp. 1215–1224. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1145/1978942.1979124.
Goldacre, B. (2015) ‘I did a Newsnight thing about how politics needs better data,’ Bad Science, 15 February. Available at: https://www.badscience.net/2015/02/i-did-a-newsnight-thing-about-how-politics-needs-better-data/ (Accessed: 12 March 2024).
Race, P. (no date) How to do uni: ten points for prospective students. Available at: https://phil-race.co.uk/how-to-do-uni-ten-points-for-prospective-students (Accessed: 12 February 2024). Use 'no date' only when it is not clear what the publication date of the webpage is.
TED (2013) How to escape education’s death valley. 10 May. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wX78iKhInsc (Accessed: 12 February 2024).
MINTEL (2024) Menswear - UK - 2024, 29 April. Available at: https://www.mintel.com (Accessed: 20 May 2024) [day/month can be omitted if not available].
Saltburn (2023) Directed by E. Fennell. Available from: Amazon Prime Video (Accessed: 5 February 2024).
For other sources, please consult Cite Them Right.
If there is no date, use 'no date' instead of the date.
You would typically use the organisation name (e.g. BBC) if there is no author. If there is no organisation, you could use the title and if there is no title, you could use the URL.
When referring to a specific section, the in-text reference should include page numbers or other location information (for single pages, use 'p.' and for a page range, use 'pp.'). You should provide location information when quoting from a source unless the source is very short (i.e. a short webpage).
Quotations of up to three lines should be in quotation marks (CTR suggests single quotation marks). For quotations longer than this, use a separate indented paragraph with single-line spacing instead of quotation marks.
If a source has four or more authors, use the first author followed by 'et al' in the citation and list of references. Some lecturers may specify using all authors in the list of references, but the first author and 'et al' is generally accepted.
Use 'cited in' or 'quoted in' for a source you have read about in another source: (Smith, 2020, cited in Jones, 2021) or Smith states "x x" (2020, quoted in Jones, 2021). In CTR Harvard, only the source you have read is included in the list of references (i.e. Jones, 2021). It is preferable to read and reference the original source if possible.
A DOI (digital object identifier) should be used in preference to standard URLs. You should preface this with https://doi.org/. Do not use a date accessed with a DOI.
Use letters to distinguish between sources with the same author and date: Smith (2024a), followed by Smith (2024b).
Only include the edition if it is not the first edition.
If there is more than one place of publication, use wherever is closest to your current location.
For reprints, use the date of the original publication after the author and the date of reprint after the publisher. If the book is in translation, include a note on the translator. There is an example in the Harvard references.
For non-English sources, it is advisable to provide a translation in square brackets after the title. If you use books that use a non-Roman script, you can use the original or transliterate the title. You should always transliterate the author.
The format for a journal article is Surname, Initial. (date of publication) ‘Title of article’, Title of Publication, volume number (issue number), the page range of the article. Available at: DOI or URL (Accessed: day month year). Use Title Text for publication titles (e.g. Hospital Pharmacy rather than Hospital pharmacy).
The use of footnotes and endnotes is not typical when using Harvard referencing. However, there are examples, such as the article Bouncing on a huge inflatable Stonehenge. Note that endnotes and footnotes are not used for the references but only for authorial notes. The endnotes appear before the list of references.
The list of references is not included in the word count, but in-text references are. Therefore, the use of Harvard referencing does increase your word count compared to numeric referencing styles. This is not ordinarily significant unless an excessive number of references are used. You should check whether there is any allowance for the word count - allowing up to ten per cent above the set amount is quite common.
