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No Author, Date, or Title in APA Style | Formats & Examples

Published on November 6, 2020 by Bas Swaen.

This article reflects the APA 6th edition guidelines. Click here for APA 7th edition guidelines.

Web resources form a separate category in APA Style. They consist of four components: author, publication date, title and URL.

Unfortunately, some of these components are often missing. For instance, there may be no author or publication date. What should you do if this is the case?

What’s missing? Solution
Nothing –
No author Use title in place of author.
No date Use “n.d.” (“no date”) in place of year.
No title Describe the source in brackets.
No author or date Combine no author and no date.
No author or title Combine no author and no title.
No date or title Combine no date and no title.
No author, date or title Combine no author, no date and no title.

All information available

Online article
Format Author Last Name, Initials. (Year, Month Day). Article Title [Type]. Retrieved from http://WebAddress
Reference list Worland, J. (2015, July 27). U.S. flood risk could be worse than we thought. Retrieved from http://time.com/3973256/flooding-risk-coastal-cities/
In-text citation
  • An article on Time suggests that … (Worland, 2015).
  • In a news article, Worland (2015) suggests that … .

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No author

Online article: No author
Format Article Title. [Type] (Year, Month Day). Retrieved from http://WebAddress
Reference list U.S. flood risk could be worse than we thought. (2015, July 27). Retrieved from http://time.com/3973256/flooding-risk-coastal-cities/
In-text citation
  • An article on Time suggests that … (“U.S. flood risk,” 2015).

No date

Online article: No date
Format Author Last Name, Initials. (n.d.). Article Title [Type]. Retrieved from http://WebAddress
Reference list Worland, J. (n.d.). U.S. flood risk could be worse than we thought. Retrieved from http://time.com/3973256/flooding-risk-coastal-cities/
In-text citation
  • An article on Time suggests that … (Worland, n.d.).
  • In a news article Worland (n.d.) suggests that … .

No title

Online article: No title
Format Author Last Name, Initials. (Year, Month Day). [Description of document]. Retrieved from http://WebAddress
Reference list Worland, J. (2015, July 27). [Flood risk in the US]. Retrieved from http://time.com/3973256/flooding-risk-coastal-cities/
In-text citation
  • An article on Time suggests that … (Worland, 2015).
  • In a news article Worland (2015) suggests that … .

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No author or date

Online article: No author or date
Format Article Title. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://WebAddress
Reference list U.S. flood risk could be worse than we thought. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://time.com/3973256/flooding-risk-coastal-cities/
In-text citation
  • In an article from Time,…(“U.S. flood risk,” n.d.).
  • In an article from Time entitled “U.S. flood risk could be worse than we thought” (n.d.),…

No author or title

Online article: No author or title
Format [Description of article]. (Year, Month Day). Retrieved from http://WebAddress
Reference list  [Flood risk in the US]. (2015, July 27). Retrieved from http://time.com/3973256/flooding-risk-coastal-cities/
In-text citation
  • In an article from Time,… ([Flood risk in the US], 2015).
  • An article from Time describing flood risk in the US (2015) suggests that…

No date or title

Online article: No date or title
Format Author Last Name, Initials. (n.d.). [Description of document]. Retrieved from http://WebAddress
Reference list Worland, J. (n.d.). [Flood risk in the US]. Retrieved from http://time.com/3973256/flooding-risk-coastal-cities/
In-text citation
  • In an article from Time,… (Worland, n.d.).
  • In an article from Time, Worland (n.d.) suggests that…

No author, date or title

Online article: No author, date or title
Format [Description of article]. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://WebAddress
Reference list [Flood risk in the US]. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://time.com/3973256/flooding-risk-coastal-cities/
In-text citation
  • In an article from Time,… ([Flood Risk in the US], n.d.).
  • An article from Time discussing flood risk in the US (n.d.) suggests that…

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Swaen, B. (2020, November 06). No Author, Date, or Title in APA Style | Formats & Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved November 3, 2023, from https://www.scribbr.com/apa-style/6th-edition/archived-citing-online-sources-no-author-date-title/

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Bas Swaen

Bas is co-founder of Scribbr. Bas is an experienced academic writer and loves to teach. He helps students by writing clear, simple articles about difficult topics.