APA 7 Referencing and Evidence Quality

Journal article with a DOI

APA 7 reference

Altman, E. I. (1968). Financial ratios, discriminant analysis and the prediction of corporate bankruptcy. The Journal of Finance, 23(4), 589–609. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6261.1968.tb00843.x

The journal title and volume number are italicised.
The issue number is placed in parentheses and is not italicised.
The DOI is presented as a live https://doi.org/ link.
No full stop is placed after the DOI.

When should a DOI or URL be included?

Include a DOI when

The work has an assigned and verified DOI.
The work is a journal article, book, book chapter, report or other publication with a DOI.
Both a DOI and an ordinary URL are available; use the DOI and omit the ordinary URL.

Required format: https://doi.org/xxxxx. Do not write “DOI:”, “doi:”, https://dx.doi.org/, or add a publisher URL after the DOI.

Include a URL when

The work is publicly available on a website and has no DOI.
The URL is stable and enables another reader to retrieve the work.
The source is an online report, institutional publication, government document, webpage or openly available dataset without a DOI.

Omit both DOI and URL when

A print book has no DOI.
A print book chapter has no DOI and was not retrieved from a publicly accessible website.
An ordinary journal article has no DOI and was obtained from a conventional academic research database.
The only link is temporary, login-dependent or session-specific.
An unpublished thesis or dissertation has no stable public repository URL.
APA treats the source as requiring in-text citation only, such as a personal communication.

Never invent an identifier: The absence of a DOI does not make a legitimate source non-compliant with APA 7. A DOI should be omitted when none has been assigned. It must never be guessed, constructed from an article title or copied from an unrelated source.

A URL is not required merely because the researcher accessed the material online. For example, a journal article downloaded from Scopus, EBSCOhost, ProQuest or another ordinary academic database does not need the database URL when it has no DOI.

A small DOI and URL decision tool

Does the source have a verified DOI?
Yes: include the DOI and stop. No: continue.
Is it publicly retrievable from a stable webpage?
Yes: include the stable URL where the source type requires it. No: continue.
Is it a conventional book, chapter or journal article from an academic database?
Yes: end after the normal source information. No: follow the APA rule for that source type.

Four contrasting examples

1. Journal article with DOI

2. Journal article without DOI from an academic database

Nissen, L., Pendell, K., Jivanjee, P., & Goodluck, C. (2014). Lifelong learning in social work education: A review of the literature and implications for the future. Journal of Teaching in Social Work, 34(4), 384–400.

No database URL is added. The example is used only where a DOI search confirms that no DOI has been assigned.

3. Institutional report with a stable URL

Miao, F., & Holmes, W. (2023). Guidance for generative AI in education and research. UNESCO. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000386693

4. Print book without DOI or URL

Creswell, J. W., & Creswell, J. D. (2018). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches (5th ed.). SAGE Publications.

Evidence-quality checks before formatting

Open the original source rather than copying a citation from another paper.
Match the author order, year, title, journal, volume, issue and page range to the publication.
Resolve the DOI in a browser and confirm that it opens the intended work.
Distinguish an article title from a journal title and a report title from its issuing body.
Use primary and authoritative sources for central claims where available.
Keep a traceable source library so that every in-text citation has a matching reference entry.

References should be accurate, retrievable and matched to the source.