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HTML Reference 

HTML <cite> Tag

The <cite> tag describes a reference to a creative work.

This includes the title of the work, and a link to the source of the work.

Example

#

This <cite> element marks Harry Potter as a book citation.

The book Harry Potter was written by J. K. Rowling. 

<p>
  The book 
  <cite><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Potter">Harry Potter</a></cite> 
  was written by J. K. Rowling.
</p>
cite = citation

Using <cite>

The <cite> element defines a citation source for creative content.

This element can be used to cite any of the following:

  • Book or research paper
  • Written literature (e.g. poem, myths)
  • Musical score
  • Song
  • Play or video films
  • Game
  • Sculpture or painting
  • Software or another website
  • Blog, forum, or social media posts
  • And more.

The <cite> content is displayed in italic by default.

Note: The <cite> element is in-line and can be placed inside a line of text without wrapping.

Attributes for <cite>

The <cite> tag has no attributes, but it does support global attributes.
They are rarely, if ever, used on <cite>.

Did you know?

Did you know?

HTML has a cite attribute and a <cite> tag

Indeed, and the purpose of the cite attribute is similar to the <cite> tag.

The attribute is used on these tags: <blockquote>, <del>, <ins>, and <q>.

The cite attribute is not visible and will only add citation meta data to your page.

Browser support

Here is when <cite> support started for each browser:

Chrome
 1.0 Sep 2008
Firefox
 1.0 Sep 2002
IE/Edge
 1.0 Aug 1995
Opera
 1.0 Jan 2006
Safari
 1.0 Jan 2003

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Author: Jack Poorte
Published: Jun 20 2021
•
Last Reviewed: Sep 30 2023


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