How to Cite a Book in APA Format

By the APACitations Editorial Team · Updated August 2026

Books are one of the simplest sources to cite in APA — once you know that the 7th edition removed the publisher location that older guides still show. Here is the current format for every type of book, from a standard paperback to a chapter in an edited volume.

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The basic APA format for a book

Author, A. A. (Year). Title of book: Subtitle in sentence case. Publisher.

Example

Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Key rules: the book title is italicized and in sentence case, the publisher's name is written in full but without terms like "Inc." or "Publishing Co.", and — new in APA 7 — no city or state appears before the publisher.

Editions and multiple volumes

If the book is not a first edition, add the edition in parentheses after the title, not italicized:

American Psychological Association. (2020). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.).

E-books and audiobooks

An e-book from an academic database or with a DOI includes the DOI or URL at the end. The device format (Kindle, EPUB) is no longer mentioned in APA 7:

Sapolsky, R. M. (2017). Behave: The biology of humans at our best and worst. Penguin Press. https://doi.org/10.5555/12345678

Edited books and chapters

To cite a whole edited book, add "(Ed.)" or "(Eds.)" after the editors' names:

Gross, J. J. (Ed.). (2014). Handbook of emotion regulation (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.

To cite one chapter written by different authors, cite the chapter authors first, then the editors and book:

McRae, K., & Mauss, I. B. (2016). Increasing positive emotion in negative contexts. In J. Greene (Ed.), Positive emotion: Integrating the light sides and dark sides (pp. 159–177). Oxford University Press.

Two, three, or twenty authors

List every author up to 20, inverted, separated by commas, with an ampersand before the last:

Rosenzweig, M. R., Breedlove, S. M., & Watson, N. V. (2005). Biological psychology (4th ed.). Sinauer Associates.

The in-text citation shortens automatically: one author (Kahneman, 2011); two authors (Rasch & Born, 2013); three or more (Rosenzweig et al., 2005).

Common mistakes

Including the city ("New York, NY:") — correct in APA 6, wrong in APA 7.
Title case in book titles — APA uses sentence case for reference list titles.
Citing the whole book when you used one chapter of an edited collection — cite the chapter's authors.

Translated, republished, and multivolume books

A translated book credits the translator in parentheses after the title and gives the original publication year at the end:

Freud, S. (2010). The interpretation of dreams (J. Strachey, Trans.). Basic Books. (Original work published 1900)

The in-text citation shows both years: (Freud, 1900/2010). For one volume of a multivolume work, add the volume in parentheses with the edition: Handbook of child psychology (6th ed., Vol. 2).

Audiobooks

Cite an audiobook only when the narration matters to your work or versions differ; otherwise cite the print form. When you do, credit the narrator and label the format:

Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow (P. Egan, Narr.) [Audiobook]. Random House Audio.

Frequently asked questions

Do I include the publisher's city in APA 7?

No. APA 7 removed publisher locations entirely — write just the publisher's name. If a guide tells you to write "New York, NY:", it's describing the old 6th edition.

How do I cite two books by the same author in the same year?

Alphabetize them by title in the reference list and add letters to the years: (2020a) and (2020b). The in-text citations use the matching letter.

How do I cite a book with an editor but no author?

Move the editor into the author position followed by (Ed.): Gross, J. J. (Ed.). (2014). Handbook of emotion regulation (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.