Vancouver Citation Generator
Vancouver style citations for biomedical and medical research, numbered references with BibTeX export.
Input
Source Details
Fill what you have, leave blank what you don't
Separate authors with semicolons.
Output
Vancouver Citation
Copy-ready citation in your chosen style
Output
BibTeX Equivalent
LaTeX-ready, paste into your .bib file
Need to find sources for your draft?
Underleaf's AI citation finder reads a paragraph of your paper and surfaces relevant arXiv papers with BibTeX entries ready to use.
What is Vancouver?
Vancouver style is the citation format used by virtually all biomedical and medical journals. It was developed by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) and follows the conventions of the US National Library of Medicine (NLM). Like IEEE, Vancouver uses numbered references, but it has its own conventions for author initials, journal abbreviations, and the way page ranges and DOIs are formatted.
Who uses Vancouver?
Required by The Lancet, BMJ, NEJM, JAMA, PLOS Medicine, and the vast majority of journals indexed in PubMed. Used in clinical research, public health, epidemiology, dentistry, nursing, pharmacy, and veterinary medicine. If you're writing for a journal that accepts PubMed-style submissions, Vancouver is almost certainly the required style.
For instructors & researchers
Medical and clinical research faculty: Vancouver is unforgiving, one missed period or comma can flag a manuscript for revisions. This generator follows the NLM/ICMJE conventions precisely, including the no-space-after-author-initial rule and the standard journal abbreviation format. The BibTeX export pairs with the vancouver bibliography style for Elsevier templates and Springer LNCS.
Vancouver examples by source type
Journal article
Ioannidis JPA. Why most published research findings are false. PLoS Med. 2005;2(8):e124.
Book
Hennekens CH, Buring JE. Epidemiology in medicine. Boston: Little, Brown; 1987.
Edited book chapter
Phillips SJ, Whisnant JP. Hypertension and stroke. In: Laragh JH, Brenner BM, editors. Hypertension. 2nd ed. New York: Raven Press; 1995. p. 465-78.
Website
World Health Organization [Internet]. 2024 [cited 2026 May 14]. Available from: who.int/health-topics
Vancouver citation questions
Are journal titles abbreviated in Vancouver?
Yes, use the official PubMed/NLM abbreviation. For example, 'New England Journal of Medicine' becomes 'N Engl J Med'. PubMed lists the abbreviation under each journal's record.
How many authors does Vancouver list?
Vancouver lists the first six authors and then adds 'et al.' if there are more. Some journals list all authors regardless, check the specific journal's instructions.
Should I include DOIs in Vancouver?
Yes. ICMJE recommends including DOIs whenever available, typically appended after the page range as 'doi:10.xxxx/yyyy'.
What's the difference between Vancouver and AMA?
AMA and Vancouver are very similar, AMA italicizes journal titles, Vancouver does not. Many AMA journals will accept Vancouver-formatted references during review.
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