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Harvard to Chicago N-B converter

Paste Harvard references, get Chicago N-B. Free, no sign-up.

Paste references written in Harvard and get them back in Chicago N-B, ready to copy into Word or Google Docs. The main changes: author–date in-text citations become footnotes, your “Reference list” list becomes “Bibliography” and titles switch to title case. CiteSwap looks each reference up in the open Crossref catalogue, so authors, years and page numbers come from the publisher’s record rather than being rewritten by hand.

Harvard vs Chicago N-B: the same sources side by side

Each example below was formatted by CiteSwap’s engine, exactly as the converter outputs it.

Journal article

Harvard

Suri, T. and Jack, W. (2016) ‘The long-run poverty and gender impacts of mobile money’, Science, 354(6317), pp. 1288–1292. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aah5309.

In-text: (Suri and Jack, 2016, p. 1290)

Chicago N-B

Suri, Tavneet, and William Jack. “The Long-Run Poverty and Gender Impacts of Mobile Money.” Science 354, no. 6317 (2016): 1288–92. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aah5309.

Footnote: Tavneet Suri and William Jack, “The Long-Run Poverty and Gender Impacts of Mobile Money,” Science 354, no. 6317 (2016): 1290, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aah5309.

Book

Harvard

Achebe, C. (1958) Things fall apart. London: Heinemann.

In-text: (Achebe, 1958, p. 1290)

Chicago N-B

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. Heinemann, 1958.

Footnote: Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart (Heinemann, 1958), 1290.

Web page

Harvard

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, p. 1290)

Chicago N-B

World Health Organization. “Malaria.” December 4, 2023. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/malaria.

Footnote: World Health Organization, “Malaria,” December 4, 2023, 1290, https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/malaria.

Key differences between Harvard and Chicago N-B

11 of 12 rules differ; they are listed first.

RuleHarvardChicago N-B
Reference list headingReference listBibliography
In-text citationsauthor and year in parentheses, e.g. (Suri and Jack, 2016)superscript note numbers linked to footnotes or endnotes that give the source
Author namesSurname and initials, joined with “and”, e.g. Suri, T. and Jack, W.First author inverted with full names, the rest in normal order, e.g. Suri, Tavneet, and William Jack
Many authorsFour or more authors: first author followed by “et al.”List up to six authors; for seven or more, the first three followed by “et al.”
DateStraight after the authors, in parentheses, with no full stop: (2016)Near the end: in parentheses after the issue for journals, after the publisher for books
Title capitalisationSentence caseTitle case
Article titlesIn single quotation marks, sentence caseIn quotation marks, title case
ItalicsJournal names and book titlesJournal and book titles
Journal namesFull journal name in title caseFull journal name, volume, then “no.” for the issue
Page rangesFull page range with “pp.”, e.g. pp. 1288–1292Shortened range after a colon, e.g. 1288–92
DOIs and links“Available at:” before the DOI or URL, and “(Accessed: date)” for web pagesDOI as a link: https://doi.org/…
List order(same)Alphabetical by first author’s surnameAlphabetical by first author’s surname

When to use Chicago N-B

Chicago notes and bibliography is the standard in history and much of the humanities, where footnotes let you comment on sources as well as cite them. It is published by the University of Chicago Press; CiteSwap follows the 18th edition (2024).

Harvard is more common in business, economics, the social sciences, while Chicago N-B is usual in history, the arts, philosophy. If your department or journal names a style, always follow it.

Harvard to Chicago N-B: frequently asked questions

How do I convert Harvard citations to Chicago N-B?

Paste your Harvard reference list into the box above (one reference per line, numbered, or separated by blank lines), check that “From” says Harvard or Auto-detect and “To” says Chicago N-B, then press Convert. You can also paste DOIs, BibTeX or RIS. Copy the result or download it for Word.

How do in-text citations change from Harvard to Chicago N-B?

Harvard uses author and year in parentheses, e.g. (Suri and Jack, 2016). Chicago N-B uses superscript note numbers linked to footnotes or endnotes that give the source. A first footnote for the Suri and Jack article reads: Tavneet Suri and William Jack, “The Long-Run Poverty and Gender Impacts of Mobile Money,” Science 354, no. 6317 (2016): 1290, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aah5309.

What is the reference list called in Chicago N-B?

In Harvard the list is headed “Reference list”; in Chicago N-B it is “Bibliography”. Change the heading when you paste the converted list into your document.

Do titles need different capitalisation in Chicago N-B?

Yes. Chicago N-B uses title case for article and book titles, so words like “Poverty” and “Gender” are capitalised. CiteSwap applies this automatically.

How are author names written in Chicago N-B?

Chicago N-B: First author inverted with full names, the rest in normal order, e.g. Suri, Tavneet, and William Jack. Harvard: Surname and initials, joined with “and”, e.g. Suri, T. and Jack, W. When a reference is matched in Crossref, CiteSwap uses full first names from the publisher’s record, so it can produce either form.

Is the Harvard to Chicago N-B converter accurate?

Each reference is matched against the Crossref catalogue (over 150 million records) and only accepted automatically when the title, year and first author agree. Anything uncertain is marked “Needs review” so you can pick the right match, and references that aren’t in the catalogue, like websites or local journals, are parsed from your text and marked so you can check them.