How to Cite a Website in Harvard Style: Format, Examples and In-Text Citations

To cite a website in Harvard style, give the author (or organisation), the year the page was published or last updated, the page title in italics, then “Available at:” with the URL and “(Accessed: day month year)”. In the text you cite only author and year, for example (Robinson, 2007). Harvard is a family of author-date variants rather than one manual, so the patterns below follow the Cite Them Right variant as shown in two university library guides (Open University and Newcastle University); check your own institution’s or journal’s sheet before you finalise a thesis or manuscript.

The format

A web page reference has five elements, in this order:

1. Author: Surname, Initial. for a named person, or the organisation’s name.
2. Year: the year the page was published or last updated, in round brackets.
3. Title of web page: in italics, with no quotation marks.
4. “Available at:” followed by the full URL.
5. Access date: “(Accessed: 1 August 2024)”, in round brackets, written as day, month, year.

Template for a named author: Surname, Initial. (Year) Title of web page. Available at: URL (Accessed: date).

Template for an organisation: Organisation (Year) Title of web page. Available at: URL (Accessed: date).

Template with no author: Title of web page (Year) Available at: URL (Accessed: date). The page title takes the place of the author, in the text and in the reference list.

Examples

Named author

Real example published by the Open University Library:

Robinson, J. (2007) Social variation across the UK. Available at: https://www.bl.uk/british-accents-and-dialects/articles/social-variation-across-the-uk (Accessed: 21 November 2021).

Organisation as author

Real example published by the Open University Library:

The British Psychological Society (2018) Code of ethics and conduct. Available at: https://www.bps.org.uk/news-and-policy/bps-code-ethics-and-conduct (Accessed: 22 March 2019).

Named author, from a style sheet

Real example from the Newcastle University Library style sheet:

Magee, A. (2023) How to keep your eyes healthy and protect your vision? Available at: https://www.bupa.co.uk/newsroom/ourviews/healthy-eyes (Accessed: 26 March 2025).

No author

Real example from the Newcastle University Library style sheet; the page title leads the entry:

From the ‘Mona Lisa’ to ‘The wedding feast at Cana’: The Salle des Etats (2021) Available at: https://www.louvre.fr/en/explore/the-palace/from-the-mona-lisa-to-the-wedding-feast-at-cana (Accessed: 3 August 2021).

Fictitious example for a thesis

This entry is invented to show the pattern; the author, page and URL do not exist:

Example Research Office (2024) Example page about data policies. Available at: https://example.org/data-policies (Accessed: 1 March 2026).

In-text citation version

The in-text citation is author and year in round brackets, with a comma between them: (Robinson, 2007), or Robinson (2007) when the name is part of your sentence. For an organisation, use the organisation as author: UNESCO (2024). Web pages rarely have page numbers; where you need to point to a place in the text, the Open University guide uses a paragraph number with “para.”, for example (The Open University Library, 2025, para. 3). The Newcastle sheet gives the same author-date form, for example (Jones and Henry, 2011, p. 1150). For the full in-text rules, see our guide to Harvard in-text citations.

Common errors

• Leaving out the access date. The template for web pages ends with the date you viewed the page, in round brackets.
• Using “Available from:”. The Robert Gordon University library notes that “Available at:” replaces “Available from:” in the Cite Them Right variant.
• Leaving “[online]” in the entry. The same page says “[online]” is dropped for most web sources.
• Square brackets around the access date. The access date goes in round brackets, not square ones.
• Dropping the title when there is no author. The page title moves into the author position, in italics; it does not disappear.
• Leaving the date out silently. When a page has no date, write “no date” in the text and in the list rather than guessing a year.

Style-guide edition

Harvard does not have a single current edition in the way APA 7th (2020), MLA 9th (2021) or Chicago 18th (2024) do. Libraries publish their own Harvard guides, and details differ between them. The web page patterns on this page are the ones the Open University Library (quick guide to Harvard referencing, Cite Them Right) and the Newcastle University Library (Cite Them Right Harvard style sheet, 2025) agree on, checked on 2026-10-29. For a thesis, follow your department’s sheet; for a manuscript, follow the journal’s instructions for authors.

For other styles, see our guides to citing a website in APA, citing a website in MLA and citing a website in Chicago style, or the overview of citation styles and referencing formats.

FAQ

How do I cite a website with no author in Harvard?

Use the organisation if the page names one. If it does not, put the title of the page in italics where the author would go, in both the in-text citation and the reference list.

What do I write if the page has no date?

Write “no date” in place of the year, in the text and in the reference list.

How do I cite a specific part of a web page that has no page numbers?

Use the paragraph number with “para.”, as in (The Open University Library, 2025, para. 3).

Sources

• Open University Library, Quick guide to Harvard referencing (Cite Them Right): https://university.open.ac.uk/library/referencing-and-plagiarism/quick-guide-to-harvard-referencing-cite-them-right (checked 2026-10-29).
• Newcastle University Library, Cite Them Right Harvard style sheet (PDF, 2025): https://www.ncl.ac.uk/mediav8/academic-skills-kit/file-downloads/manage-info/2025%20Cite%20Them%20Right%20Harvard%20Style%20Sheet.pdf (checked 2026-10-29).
• Robert Gordon University Library, Harvard changes: https://library.rgu.ac.uk/referencing-updates-staff/harvard-changes (checked 2026-10-29).