Template:Cite/doc

{{Cite}} is intended to provide an easy way to format citations. Citations should still be wrapped with the <ref> and </ref> tags.

Usage

{{cite
|source-name    = 
|year           = 
|month          = 
|day            = 
|title          = 
|retrieved-date = 
|source         = 
|archive-url    = 
|archive-date   = 
}}

The archive-url and archive-date parameters are optional but recommended — archiving the source guards against link rot if the original is later removed, privated, or restructured. See the Archived sources example below.

Example

{{cite
|source-name    = Destiny
|year           = 2006
|month          = October
|day            = 31
|title          = This is an example of a title
|retrieved-date = 2024, November 27
|source         = https://destiny.gg/
}}

produces Destiny (October 31, 2006). "This is an example of a title". Retrieved 2024, November 27.

---

The template also supports incomplete citations, though ideally any user adding a citation should add the full citation.

{{cite
|source-name    = Destiny
|year           = 2006
|month          = October
|day            =
|title          = This is an example of a title
|retrieved-date = 2024, November 27
|source         = https://destiny.gg/
}}

produces Destiny (October2006). "This is an example of a title". Retrieved 2024, November 27.

Archived sources

When a source has been deleted, privated, or is otherwise no longer reliably accessible, provide an archived snapshot (e.g. from the Wayback Machine or archive.today) using the archive-url and archive-date parameters. Set url-status to dead so the citation displays the archived copy as the primary link.

{{cite
|source-name    = YouTube
|year           = 2012
|month          = December
|day            = 26
|title          = A conversation with Vaush (Irishladdie): feminism and the revolution
|retrieved-date = 2026, May 26
|source         = https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-JC1voCu54
|archive-url     = https://web.archive.org/web/20250121000946/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-JC1voCu54
|archive-date    = 2025, January 21
|url-status      = dead
}}

produces YouTube (December 26, 2012). "A conversation with Vaush (Irishladdie): feminism and the revolution". Archived from the original on 2025, January 21. Retrieved 2026, May 26.

Parameters

No description.

Template parameters

This template prefers block formatting of parameters.

Parameter		Description	Type	Status
source-name	source-name	The name of the source's origination.	Content	suggested
year	year	The year the material you are citing was posted.	Number	suggested
month	month	The month the material you are citing was posted. Use the full name of the month (i.e. "January", "October", etc.) rather than the abbreviation (i.e. JAN, Sept. etc.) or number of the month (i.e. "1", "06", etc.)	Content	suggested
day	day	The day the material you are citing was posted.	Number	suggested
title	title	The title of the work/post/video/etc. you are citing. The template will automatically italicize the whole title, so do not attempt to italicize it on your own, and do not put the title in quotes (unless the title has quotes within it).	Unknown	optional
retrieved-date	retrieved-date	The date you retrieved the material, use the YEAR, MONTH DAY format, for example: "2024, October 22"	Content	suggested
source	source	The URL source the material is from. You can optionally mask the link with a shorter name.	URL	suggested
archive-url	archive-url	The URL of an archived snapshot of the source (e.g. a Wayback Machine or archive.today capture). Use this when the original source is dead, privated, or at risk of being removed.	URL	optional
archive-date	archive-date	The date the archived snapshot was taken. Use the YEAR, MONTH DAY format, for example: "2025, January 21"	Content	optional
url-status	url-status	The status of the original source link. Set to "dead" if the original is no longer accessible (privated, deleted, 404), or "live" if it still works. Defaults to "live". When "dead", the citation should display the archived version as the primary link.	String	optional