Check your references before you submit

Free reference checking tool: it verifies every reference in your thesis or paper against open academic databases, catches AI-fabricated citations and unresolvable DOIs, finds the real record, and reformats it to the style you need (APA, Vancouver, IEEE and more).

How to use this tool

Paste a reference list (or upload a .txt/.docx/.pdf) and we verify each entry against scholarly databases — catching fabricated, mismatched, retracted or wrongly-formatted citations.

  1. Paste your references, or upload a file — from a full paper we auto-detect the bibliography section. .bib/.ris imports are also supported.
  2. Pick a citation style (APA 7, IEEE, Vancouver, MLA or a CSL style).
  3. Click “Check”. Each reference is checked for reality (DOI / year / authors / journal), for formatting, and against the retraction database.
  4. Read the result: a colored badge (verified / suspicious / not found) and a 0–100 confidence score per entry.
  5. Click any citation to see the matched source record and where it was found.
  6. Copy the “Repaired bibliography” (complete, in-order list — verified entries rewritten, the rest kept as-is and numbered for manual checking) or download it as Word.
  7. About to submit? Use the “Pre-submission check” card: enter the target journal and get a single Word report combining bibliography health, retractions and the journal's reliability.
Full guide & PDF →

Check your bibliography

Put each reference on its own line, or upload a .txt / .docx / .pdf file — you can also drag and drop it onto the box below. Guest: 5 searches/day · Member: first use unlimited, then 20 references/day · Pro: unlimited.

Try:

The selected style determines the corrected bibliography below and the copied/downloaded output.

Sources: CrossRef · OpenAlex · PubMed · DBLP · Semantic Scholar · TR Dizin · Google Books. Your text is processed in your browser and not stored.

How the tool judges a reference

#1Suspicious / fabricated

Ozdemir, C. (2023). A novel approach to early cancer diagnosis with deep learning. Journal of AI in Medicine, 12(3), 45-60. https://doi.org/10.1234/jaim.2023.045

No match in CrossRef, OpenAlex, PubMed or other academic indexes; the cited DOI could not be resolved in any database — most likely fabricated.
#2Verified

Vaswani, A., et al. (2017). Attention is all you need. Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, 30.

Verified against the DBLP record (2017). The record is real and was auto-formatted to your chosen style.

How it works?

Reliable bibliography in three steps.

1

Paste or upload

Paste your bibliography as text or upload a Word/PDF file. The file never leaves your device.

2

Verify

References are searched in CrossRef, OpenAlex, PubMed, Semantic Scholar and DBLP; Turkish national journal articles are verified in TR Dizin, book citations against the Google Books and OpenLibrary catalogs, and web sources (institutional pages, press releases) are confirmed by visiting the cited address; DOIs and ISSNs are validated, and the CORE open-access archive is checked when needed. Results are classified using match strength and risk signals.

3

Fix & download

Correct metadata is formatted to your chosen style; copy or download as CSV.

Let us keep watch for you

Free weekly email alerts for signed-in members — set them up on My activity.

Citation alert (ORCID)

Get an email when your publications receive new citations. Unlike Google Scholar, every citation is vetted: citing journal's SJR quartile, predatory-journal signals and self-citations are flagged.

Topic alert

Follow a research topic; we'll email you when new publications appear in that area.

Retraction watch

If a source in your saved reports — or an article citing your work — is later retracted, you get a separate notice.

Set up alerts

Used by institutions

Siirt ÜniversitesiKütahya Sağlık Bilimleri Üniversitesi