How to Cite a PDF in APA Format

By the APACitations Editorial Team · Updated August 2026

Here's the secret about citing PDFs: APA has no "PDF format". A PDF is just a container — what matters is what the document is. A journal article in PDF form is cited as a journal article; a government report as a report. This guide shows you how to identify and cite each type.

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Step 1: Identify what the PDF actually is

Clues	It's probably a…
Volume, issue, page numbers, journal name	Journal article
Government agency or NGO logo, report number	Report
ISBN, chapters, publisher	Book or e-book
Course code, university name, instructor	Lecture notes / course material

PDF of a journal article

Cite it exactly like the article itself — the fact you read a PDF changes nothing:

Rasch, B., & Born, J. (2013). About sleep's role in memory. Physiological Reviews, 93(2), 681–766. https://doi.org/10.1152/physrev.00032.2012

PDF of a report (government, NGO, company)

Reports use the organization as author and italicize the title. Add a report number if one exists:

World Health Organization. (2022). Global status report on physical activity 2022. https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240059153

National Institute of Mental Health. (2021). Depression (NIH Publication No. 21-MH-8079). U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/depression

PDF of a book

Frankl, V. E. (2006). Man's search for meaning. Beacon Press. (Original work published 1946)

PDF with missing information

No author: move the title to the author position.
No date: use (n.d.).
No page numbers for a quote: use a paragraph number or section heading — (Smith, n.d., para. 7).
Found via Google: link to the page hosting the PDF, not a temporary download link.

In-text citations for PDFs

Exactly the same as any source: (World Health Organization, 2022) or, narratively, "the World Health Organization (2022) reported…". PDFs usually keep real page numbers, so direct quotes can cite them normally: (Frankl, 2006, p. 66).

Common mistakes

Writing "[PDF]" or "PDF file" in the reference — APA never labels the file format.
Citing the download URL from your browser's cache instead of the hosting page.
Treating every PDF as a "website" — identify the document type first.

Brochures, fact sheets, and press releases

Short documents follow the report pattern with a bracketed label after the title:

World Health Organization. (2023). Physical activity [Fact sheet]. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/physical-activity

Apple Inc. (2024, September 9). Apple introduces iPhone 16 [Press release]. https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2024/09/

Frequently asked questions

How do I cite a scanned PDF of an old book?

Cite the book itself, adding the republication details if a digital archive republished it. If you used a database like Internet Archive, cite the original book and give the archive URL.

The PDF has two sets of page numbers — which do I use?

Use the printed page numbers that appear on the document's pages, not the PDF viewer's counter — readers with any copy of the document can then follow your citation.

Do lecture slides count as a PDF source?

Cite lecture slides from your course site as: Author, A. (2024). Title of slides [PowerPoint slides]. University Name. URL of the learning platform. If they're not retrievable by your readers, cite them as a personal communication instead.