How to Cite AI in APA, MLA and Chicago (Updated Formats)
Most of the advice online about citing AI is frozen in 2023, and it is wrong now for a specific reason. Back then a chat could not be shared, so the style guides had to invent workarounds for a source your reader could never open. Then the tools added share links, and APA and MLA both rewrote their guidance around them. If your citation looks like the examples that circulated three years ago, it is out of date.
Here is where each of the three stands today, checked at the source, with the changes flagged.
APA
APA now distinguishes two different things you might be citing: one particular chat, or the tool in general.
The reason for the change is stated plainly. APA’s earlier advice was to cite only the tool, “because at the time, it was not possible to retrieve and share specific chats (and retrievability is a core requirement for most APA Style references)”. Now that sharing exists, a specific chat gets an ordinary author-date-title-source reference.
A specific chat. Template: AI Company Name. (year, month day). Title of chat [Generative AI chat]. Tool Name/Model. URL of the chat
APA’s example: OpenAI. (2025, August 21). High school grammar concepts [Generative AI chat]. ChatGPT. https://chatgpt.com/share/68a77b60-0ee4-800c-9acc-cd3fd573c311
The tool in general. Template: AI Company Name. (year). Tool Name/Model [Large language model]. URL of the tool. Use this when citing a specific chat would be unhelpful or inappropriate.
In-text for either: (OpenAI, 2025), or OpenAI (2025) in narrative form.
Note who the author is and why. APA puts the company there, not the tool, and gives its reasoning: “AI itself cannot be an author because it is not a living, conscious human who can give consent and promise to abide by the rights and responsibilities that come with authorship.” The company is responsible for the work, so the company goes in the author slot.
MLA
MLA revised its guidance in August 2025. Two things changed: a stable, shareable URL to the conversation is now preferred over a general link to the tool, and the Version element should name the model.
The rule that has not changed is the one people most often get wrong. MLA states: “We do not recommend treating the AI tool as an author.” It follows the policies of various publishers, including Cambridge University Press, the partner publisher of MLA’s journal PMLA.
What that means mechanically, and the page does not spell this out for you: the Author slot stays empty. You do not put OpenAI there instead. The entry begins with the Title of Source, which is a description of what was generated, usually the prompt.
Works-cited entry, MLA’s own example: “Describe the theme of nature in Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park” prompt. ChatGPT, model GPT-4o, OpenAI, 23 Sept. 2024, chatgpt.com/share/66f1b0a0-d704-8000-be9a-85f53c850607.
In-text, because the prompt is doing the job a title normally does: (“Describe the theme”).
The slots in order: Title of Source (what was generated), Title of Container (the tool), Version (the model), Publisher (the company), Date (when it was generated), Location (the share URL, or the general tool URL if the tool has no share feature).
Chicago
Chicago is the one to be careful with, and not because its advice is complicated.
The public guidance most people find is the Chicago Manual’s FAQ answer, and that page carries its own note: “This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.” The 18th edition came out in 2024 and handles AI-generated content in its own section, which sits behind the manual’s subscription. I have not read that section, so I am not going to print a format from it.
What the public FAQ says is this. For most writing, acknowledging the tool in your text is enough. Where a formal citation is needed it goes in a note, with ChatGPT standing in as author and OpenAI as publisher. And then the rule that surprises people: “don’t cite ChatGPT in a bibliography or reference list unless you provide a publicly available link.” The reasoning is that a login-gated conversation URL makes the chat “like an email, phone, or text conversation,” which is the same starting point as APA’s and the opposite conclusion.
Note: 1. Text generated by ChatGPT, OpenAI, March 7, 2023, https://chat.openai.com/chat.
Or with the prompt in the note instead of the text: 1. ChatGPT, response to “Explain how to make pizza dough from common household ingredients,” OpenAI, March 7, 2023.
Author-date form: (ChatGPT, March 7, 2023). These are alternatives, not a sequence, and you pick one system for the whole paper.
If you edited the generated text, say so, in the text or at the end of the note, for example “edited for style and content”.
If your department works from the 18th edition, look the section up through your library rather than relying on this FAQ.
The three side by side
Where they differ
Who is the author? APA: the company. MLA: nobody, the slot is left empty. Chicago: the tool stands in as author.
Does it go in the reference or works-cited list? APA: yes. MLA: yes. Chicago, per the public FAQ: only if you can supply a public link.
What goes in the location? APA and MLA now both want the share URL for the specific conversation. Chicago’s public FAQ still shows the general tool address.
Other tools
APA’s own examples cover Claude, Gemini and Perplexity as well as ChatGPT, using the same shape: Anthropic, Google or Perplexity AI as author, the chat title, the bracket, then the tool and model. MLA’s updated examples include Copilot and DALL-E, with the model named in the Version slot.
The practical part
Generate the share link at the time, not later. Both APA and MLA now build their reference around a URL that you have to create deliberately by using the share function in the tool. If you close the conversation and come back a month later to write the citation, you may still be able to find it, and you may not.
Record the model too. APA and MLA both want it, and the model name shown in the interface today is not the one that will be shown next quarter.
What your institution may want on top
A citation is often not the whole requirement. Departments commonly ask for a statement describing how AI was used, a copy of the conversation as an appendix, and a declaration that you take responsibility for verifying anything the tool produced. Those sit on top of the style guide rather than inside it, and they are the requirements that cause trouble when they are missed.
If your department has published nothing, ask your instructor in writing and keep the answer.
For the wider picture, including what AI detectors do and do not prove, see the full AI for students guide.
All three style guides were read at the source on that date. APA Style, Citing generative AI in APA Style: Part 1, Reference formats, for both templates, the examples and the reasoning on authorship and retrievability; the older How to cite ChatGPT post from 2023 is what most third-party guides still reproduce. MLA Style Center, How do I cite generative AI in MLA style? (Updated and Revised), published August 2025, for the two changes, the template slots and the example; it supersedes the original post, which now carries a notice to that effect. The Chicago Manual of Style, FAQ on citing ChatGPT, for the note forms and the bibliography rule, including its own statement that it relies on the 17th edition; the 18th edition dates from 2024 and its treatment of AI-generated content is behind the manual’s subscription, which I did not read. Style guidance here is still moving, so treat all of it as a reading taken on a date.
