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How to Cite a Website in MLA 9

Updated May 14, 2026

MLA 9 wants you to cite a website like this: Author Last, First. "Page Title." Website Name, Publisher (if different from site), Day Month Year, URL. Skip any element you genuinely cannot find, and never invent one.

The Container Model in Plain English

MLA 9 treats every source as sitting inside one or more "containers." For a webpage, the website itself is the container. Your job is to fill in the nine core elements in order, separating each with the punctuation MLA assigns to it:

  1. Author.
  2. "Title of source."
  3. Title of container,
  4. Other contributors,
  5. Version,
  6. Number,
  7. Publisher,
  8. Publication date,
  9. Location (URL or DOI).

For most websites you will only use elements 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, and 9. If an element does not exist, leave it out and move on. Do not write "n.p." or "n.d." Those abbreviations belong to MLA 7 and earlier.

Standard Format

Author Last, First. "Title of Web Page." Title of Website, Publisher, Publication Date, URL.

Worked example:

Kingsley, Patrick. "How a Border Town Became a Symbol of the Migration Crisis." The New York Times, 14 Mar. 2024, www.nytimes.com/2024/03/14/world/europe/border-migration.html.

Notes that trip students up:

  • Drop https:// and www. is optional, but be consistent across the works cited page.
  • Use day-month-year with no commas: 14 Mar. 2024, not March 14, 2024.
  • Abbreviate months longer than four letters: Jan., Feb., Mar., Apr., Aug., Sept., Oct., Nov., Dec. May, June, and July stay whole.
  • Italicize the website name. Put the page title in quotation marks.

No Author

If no human author is credited, start with the page title. Do not use "Anonymous" and do not promote the website to the author slot unless the organization clearly authored the page itself.

"Climate Change Indicators: Weather and Climate." EPA, United States Environmental Protection Agency, 21 June 2023, www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/weather-climate.

If the website and the publisher are the same organization, list it once as the website and skip the publisher field.

No Date

If the page has no publication or "last updated" date, omit the date and add an access date at the very end:

"About Us." Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, naturalhistory.si.edu/about. Accessed 4 May 2026.

Access dates are optional when a publication date exists, but always include one when the date is missing or the page seems likely to change.

In-Text Citations

In MLA 9, in-text citations use the first element of the works cited entry. For a webpage with no page numbers, that usually means just the author or just a shortened title:

  • With author: (Kingsley)
  • No author: ("Climate Change Indicators")

Do not include "n. pag." Webpages without page numbers simply get no number. If the source has paragraph or section numbers that the author provided, you can cite them as (Kingsley, par. 4).

Common Edge Cases

Article on a news site vs. a magazine site

Treat them the same. The site is the container, the journalist is the author, and the byline date is the publication date.

Blog post

Same template. The blog name is the container. If the post is on a platform like Medium or Substack, the platform is the container and the publication (if any) sits as the publisher.

Government page

The agency goes in the publisher slot if the website name differs from the agency. Many .gov pages now list a "Last reviewed" or "Page last updated" date. That counts as the publication date.

Social media post

Author. Description or text of the post (in quotation marks, up to the first complete thought). Platform, Day Month Year, URL.

Page behind a paywall

Cite it exactly as you would the public version. Do not append "subscription required."

Quick Checklist Before You Submit

  • Author inverted: Last, First.
  • Page title in quotes, website italicized.
  • Date is day-month-year, month abbreviated if over four letters.
  • URL has no https://.
  • Entry ends with a period after the URL.
  • Hanging indent of 0.5 inches on the works cited page.
  • Entries alphabetized by the first element.

If any of the nine core elements genuinely does not exist, skip it. Do not pad citations with placeholder text.

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Tools mentioned in this guide

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