AMA Website Citation | Guide with Examples
To cite a website or webpage in AMA citation format, you need to include the author’s name, the page title (in sentence case), the website name (title case), the URL, the publication date, and the access date.
An AMA in-text citation for a website just consists of the number of the relevant reference, written in superscript. Make sure to pay attention to punctuation (e.g., commas, periods).
| AMA format | Author last name Initials. Page title. Website Name. Published Month Day, Year. Accessed Month Day, Year. URL. |
|---|---|
| AMA reference | Zarefsky M. What sets back care for transgender students in the exam room. American Medical Association. Published June 24, 2022. Accessed September 9, 2022. https://www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/population-care/what-sets-back-care-transgender-patients-exam-room. |
| AMA in-text citation | Zarefsky1 argues that … |
Citing a website with no author
Sometimes a page won’t clearly indicate a specific author. If the page is attributed to a group or organization, you can treat this group as the author. Write the name out in full rather than trying to initialize and reverse it as you would with a personal name.
| AMA format | Organization Name. Page title. Website Name. Published Month Day, Year. Accessed Month Day, Year. URL. |
|---|---|
| AMA reference | American Cancer Society Medical and Editorial Content Team. What is bone cancer? American Cancer Society. Updated June 17, 2021. Accessed September 9, 2022. https://www.cancer.org/cancer/bone-cancer/about/what-is-bone-cancer.html. |
If there’s no organization to attribute the page to or the organization name is identical to the website name, then you can just skip the author element and start with the page title instead.
| AMA format | Page title. Website Name. Published Month Day, Year. Accessed Month Day, Year. URL. |
|---|---|
| AMA reference | Internal conflict: The one-word oxymoron. Merriam-Webster. Updated June 6, 2022. Accessed September 9, 2022. https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/one-word-oxymorons. |
Citing a website with no title
When the page you’re citing doesn’t show a clear title, AMA recommends replacing it with the name of the organization responsible for the website. If this is identical to the name of the website itself, only write it once.
| AMA format | Author last name Initials. Organization Name. Website Name. Published Month Day, Year. Accessed Month Day, Year. URL. |
|---|---|
| AMA reference | Caulfield J. Scribbr. Published March 15, 2013. Accessed September 9, 2022. https://www.scribbr.com/knowledge-base/not-a-real-url/. |
Access dates and publication dates
AMA citations can include three kinds of date:
- A publication date (the day on which the source was published) is included when one is available and when no more recent update date is indicated: “Published March 30, 2018.”
- An update date (the day on which the page was most recently updated or revised) is included when shown on the page. If both a publication date and an update date are shown, include only the update date: “Updated April 25, 2018.”
- An access date (the day on which you accessed the page) is always included when you cite a source with a URL, regardless of whether another date is included or not. It’s helpful in case the content changes over time: “Accessed September 1, 2022.”
When two dates are included, the publication or update date comes first, followed by the access date, and finally the URL.
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Frequently asked questions about AMA style
- Do I need to include an access date in my AMA website citation?
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Yes, you should normally include an access date in an AMA website citation (or when citing any source with a URL). This is because webpages can change their content over time, so it’s useful for the reader to know when you accessed the page.
When a publication or update date is provided on the page, you should include it in addition to the access date. The access date appears second in this case, e.g., “Published June 19, 2021. Accessed August 29, 2022.”
Don’t include an access date when citing a source with a DOI (such as in an AMA journal article citation).
- How do I create AMA references?
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An AMA reference usually includes the author’s last name and initials, the title of the source, information about the publisher or the publication it’s contained in, and the publication date. The specific details included, and the formatting, depend on the source type.
References in AMA style are presented in numerical order (numbered by the order in which they were first cited in the text) on your reference page. A source that’s cited repeatedly in the text still only appears once on the reference page.
- How do I cite the same source multiple times in AMA style?
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In AMA citation format, if you cite the same source more than once in your paper, it still only has one entry on your AMA reference page, numbered based on the first time you cite it.
This means you’ll always use the same number for the AMA in-text citation for that source, not a different number each time. You can add different page numbers to the citations to talk about specific parts of the source in each case, e.g. 1(pp13–15)
Cite this Scribbr article
If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation to our free Citation Generator.
Caulfield, J. (2023, June 01). AMA Website Citation | Guide with Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved January 8, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/ama/ama-website-citation/
