Zotero is a research and reference management application that helps students, academics and writers collect, organise and cite information. It provides a central library for books, journal articles, conference papers, web pages and other research material.
The software is designed to support the research process, from discovering sources to preparing a finished document. Its desktop interface combines bibliographic records, attached documents and research notes, making it easier to maintain a consistent collection of references.
Zotero is particularly useful when working on substantial writing projects involving numerous sources. It integrates with word processors and offers tools for collaborating on research without requiring everyone to work on the same computer.
This is free and open source software.
Key Features
- Collect research references from library catalogues, academic databases and websites using Zotero Connector.
- Automatically retrieve bibliographic metadata for PDF documents and other sources.
- Organise references using collections, subcollections, tags and saved searches.
- Built-in PDF reader supporting highlights, underlining, comments and other annotations.
- Create research notes from annotations, retaining links to the original source material.
- Identify and merge duplicate records within a reference library.
- Generate citations and bibliographies using thousands of Citation Style Language styles.
- Insert and update citations directly in LibreOffice Writer, Microsoft Word and Google Docs.
- Import and export bibliographic information in formats including BibTeX, BibLaTeX, RIS and CSL JSON.
- Synchronise reference data and attached files across devices.
- Share research collections through collaborative group libraries.
- Extensible architecture supporting additional functionality through plugins.
- Cross-platform support – runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows.
Website: www.zotero.org
Support:
Developer: Corporation for Digital Scholarship and contributors
License: GNU Affero General Public License v3.0
Zotero is written in JavaScript. Learn JavaScript with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
Related Software
| GUI Bibliography Tools | |
|---|---|
| Zotero | Powerful online/offline research tool |
| KBibTeX | Reference management software primarily for BibTeX |
| JabRef | Graphical frontend to manage BibTeX databases |
| Paperlib | Academic paper management tool |
| cb2Bib | Extract bibliographic references from various sources |
| Citations | Manage your bibliographies using the BibTeX format |
| QuickBib | Fetch BibTeX for DOIs and arXiv identifiers |
| Pybliographer | Tool for manipulating bibliographic databases |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
| Reference Management Tools | |
|---|---|
| KBibTeX | Reference management software primarily for BibTeX |
| Zotero | Powerful online/offline research tool for the Firefox web browser |
| JabRef | Graphical frontend to manage BibTeX databases |
| WIKINDX | Bibliography, notes, and article authoring system |
| BibLaTeX | Programmable bibliographies and citations |
| Docear | Academic literature suite |
| I, Librarian | Build an annotated library of scientific PDF articles |
| Citations | Manage your bibliographies using the BibTeX format |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
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This can now also be used in Chrome and Vivaldi.