How to put references in apa format in powerpoint presentation

This page contains reference examples for PowerPoint slides or lecture notes, including the following:

  1. PowerPoint slides available online
  2. PowerPoint slides from a classroom website

Use these formats to cite information obtained directly from slides.

If the slides contain citations to information published elsewhere, and you want to cite that information as well, then it is best to find, read, and cite the original source yourself rather than citing the slides as a secondary source.

Writers creating PowerPoint presentations in APA Style should present information clearly and concisely. Many APA Style guidelines can be applied to presentations (e.g., the guidance for crediting sources, using bias-free language, and writing clearly and concisely).

However, decisions about font size, amount of text on a slide, color scheme, use of animations, and so on are up to writers; these details are not specified as part of APA Style.

1. PowerPoint slides available online

  • When the slides are available online to anyone, provide the site name on which they are hosted in the source element of the reference, followed by the URL of the slides.

2. PowerPoint slides from a classroom website

Mack, R., & Spake, G. (2018). Citing open source images and formatting references for presentations [PowerPoint slides]. Canvas@FNU. https://fnu.onelogin.com/login

  • Parenthetical citation: (Mack & Spake, 2018)
  • Narrative citation: Mack and Spake (2018)

  • If the slides come from a classroom website, learning management system (e.g., Canvas, Blackboard, Moodle, Sakai), or company intranet and you are writing for an audience with access to that resource, provide the name of the site and its URL (use the login page URL for sites requiring login).
  • If the audience for which are you writing does not have access to the slides, cite them as a personal communication.

How to put references in apa format in powerpoint presentation

This guidance is new to the 7th edition.

Date created: February 2020

Though written essays are kind of the default format -- or at least, incredibly common -- you do still need to worry about citations when creating presentations, movies, infographics, or other types of works! The only thing that doesn't apply is all the 'Times New Roman size 12 double-space' formatting rules.

You do also have more flexibility in how and where you include citations, too!

Presentations

You can use traditional parenthetical citations, especially if you've used multiple sources on one slide.

How to put references in apa format in powerpoint presentation

You can also go less formal [unless your professor has said otherwise!] by tucking the citation into the corner of the slide (Greene, 2010).

How to put references in apa format in powerpoint presentation

You must also include a References slide! We can use hanging indents, but it's not strictly necessary. A bulleted list might also work in this situation.

Movies

How to put references in apa format in powerpoint presentation
You can add a formal parenthetical citation at the appropriate times in your video in some corner of the video.

Recommendation: wherever you place it, keep it consistent! E.g. if the first one is the bottom-left corner, make all the citations in the bottom-left corner. This helps your reader know where to look as well as to know what that pop-up means each time it appears.

There's no rules about size/font/format! Just pay attention to how it contrasts to your video's background.

While not extensively covered in the APA Style 7th Edition manual, the APA website's page on citing PowerPoint slides does briefly address applying APA Style to a PowerPoint you are making for an assignment.  In general, many rules and guidelines on the citation of sources or writing style can be adapted to make an effective presentation formatted in APA Style, at least as much as PowerPoint can allow given the differences between a slide presentation and an academic paper.  For example, a common element you may be asked to include is a References slide at the end of your presentation, similar to the References section of your academic papers. 

However, since APA Style wasn't developed for PowerPoint, Google Slides, or other slide presentation software, there may be some instances where there isn't a specific rule governing what you want to do.  About this point, APA advises that "decisions about font size, amount of text on a slide, color scheme, use of animations, and so on are up to writers; these details are not specified as part of APA Style."  In general, if you are asked to apply APA Style to your PowerPoint presentation, if a rule can be reasonably adapted you should try to follow it, but there may be some situations where rules are not clear or be cumbersome to follow.  In these cases, it will be up to you to decide how best to proceed and we advise working with your instructor in these instances for their preferences on what to do.  

For an example of how to integrate APA Style 7th Edition rules into your PowerPoint presentation, including how to set up the title slide and a references list slide, see the video below from the PG Writing Center.  

How do you cite references on a PowerPoint slide?

When citing a specific PowerPoint slide, you'll include the slide number in addition to the author and date information. An example of this would look like (Garrett, 2019, slide 10).

Where do APA citations go in PowerPoint?

APA and PowerPoint The main thing is to follow APA format for your citations. You need a References slide at the end of your presentation (or multiple slides, if you have many sources).