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How to reference a website in Harvard style

Harvard (Cite Them Right) Cite Them Right 12th edition · Updated

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Harvard is an author–date style, like APA, but with its own punctuation. This guide follows Cite Them Right, the version used by most UK, Australian, Nigerian, Ghanaian and South African universities. The key feature for websites is the ending: Available at: the URL, and (Accessed: the date you viewed it**)**.

Format

Author or Organisation (Year) Title of web page. Available at: URL (Accessed: day Month year).

HarvardOrganisation as author

World Health Organization (2023) Malaria. Available at: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/malaria (Accessed: 1 October 2026).

In-text: (World Health Organization, 2023)

The parts, one by one

  1. Author. A person (Surname, Initials) or an organisation written in full.
  2. Year. In brackets, with no full stop after it: (2023). Use the year the page was published or last updated.
  3. Title. In italics. Harvard uses sentence case for titles: capitalise the first word and proper nouns.
  4. Available at: followed by the full URL of the exact page.
  5. Accessed: the date you viewed the page, day–month–year, in brackets, followed by a full stop.

No date

If the page shows no date of publication or update, write (no date):

HarvardNo date

United Nations (no date) The 17 goals. Available at: https://sdgs.un.org/goals (Accessed: 1 October 2026).

In-text: (United Nations, no date)

In the text: (United Nations, no date).

In-text citations

  • At the end of a sentence: Malaria still kills hundreds of thousands of people every year (World Health Organization, 2023).
  • As part of the sentence: The World Health Organization (2023) reports that…
  • With a quotation, add the page or paragraph if the page is numbered: (World Health Organization, 2023, para. 3).

Unlike APA, Harvard joins two authors with and in brackets as well: (Suri and Jack, 2016).

Online newspapers, reports and PDFs

Cite Them Right has separate formats for these:

  • Online newspaper article: Author (Year) ‘Title of article’, Name of Newspaper, day Month. Available at: URL (Accessed: date).
  • Report from an organisation (often a PDF): Organisation (Year) Title of report. Place: Publisher. Available at: URL (Accessed: date).

Use the website format only for ordinary web pages.

Common mistakes

  • Leaving out the accessed date. Harvard always needs it for online sources.
  • Writing the date the American way (October 1, 2026). Cite Them Right uses day–month–year: 1 October 2026.
  • Using the home page URL instead of the exact page.
  • Putting a full stop after the year: in Harvard it’s (2023) with nothing after the bracket.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need the accessed date in Harvard referencing?

Yes. Harvard (Cite Them Right) always ends a web reference with the date you viewed the page, in the form (Accessed: 1 October 2026), because web pages can change or disappear.

What if a website has no author?

Use the organisation responsible for the page as the author, for example World Health Organization. If you can’t identify any author or organisation, start the reference with the page title.

What if there is no date on the web page?

Write (no date) where the year would go, in both the reference and the citation, for example (United Nations, no date).

Is Harvard referencing the same at every university?

Not exactly. Harvard is a family of author–date styles and many universities publish their own version. Cite Them Right is the most widely used one. If your university has its own guide, follow it; differences are usually small, such as punctuation.