How to cite a piece of software in MLA 9
Research software or a code repository. Standard in literature, languages, and the humanities. 9th edition published 2021.
Quick answer
To cite a piece of software in MLA 9, include the author(s), year, title, and container or publisher details. A concrete example is below.
Example
Willighagen, L.. "citation-js." , 2024. https://github.com/citation-js/citation-js
This example is rendered with the official CSL definition for MLA 9. For the exact style required by your journal, paste your references into DEEPNOTIS and pick that style from the dropdown — the app covers 2,800+ variants.
What you need
For a piece of software, MLA 9 expects these fields at minimum:
- Author(s) / maintainers
- Year
- Software name
- Version or commit hash
- Repository URL
- DOI (Zenodo if released)
Common mistakes
- Abbreviating author names. MLA spells out the first author's full name.
- Using parentheses around the year — that's APA. MLA puts the year inside the container description.
- Forgetting the DOI. When a DOI exists, most styles now require it (usually as a full https://doi.org/… URL).
- Inconsistent capitalization. APA uses sentence case for titles; MLA and Chicago use title case. Mixing them is the single most common style error.
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Last updated: 5 May 2026