Reference Management
Writing a term paper or your thesis and wondering how to keep track of all the literature you have collected, structure your work, store your thoughts and notes in an organized way, collect key passages and quotes, and create a complete and correct bibliography?
Reference management software can support you with these steps and help you organize the progress of your academic work.
What can reference management software do?
Reference management software offers a whole range of features that make it easier to organize academic literature and write your own texts:
- Collect and manage your selected literature
- Organize and access your stored entries, e.g. by creating personal notes, saving quotes and automatically generating a bibliography
- Import references, abstracts and full texts from our search portal bonnus, from databases or directly from a website
- Store references, abstracts and whole articles (full texts)
- Select suitable citation styles (and potentially also download additional citation styles that do not come pre-installed): your footnotes and bibliography are created in the correct format right from the start
- Integrate your work into word processing systems
- Get help with writing your own academic publications
Available reference management software
Citavi is a software package for Windows that requires a license. As a member of the University, you can use our campus license free of charge. You can choose between the tried-and-tested Citavi 6 and the new Citavi 7, including its AI features.
As an alternative to Citavi for Windows, there is Citavi Web, a browser-based version. Whatever your operating system, all you need is an up-to-date browser to work anywhere you have an internet connection. This means that the tried-and-tested features for managing, annotating and structuring references and planning tasks are now available online too.
Citavi’s strengths lie in its extra features for organizing knowledge as well as planning and monitoring work steps.
Interested in our regular training sessions for beginners and users with some prior knowledge of Citavi, which are also offered in English? Then you will find the dates under Training and tutorials.
Individual sessions can be arranged for groups of five or more. To book a session, please e-mail schulung@ulb.uni-bonn.de.
Zotero is a free, open-source reference management application that runs on various operating systems (Windows, Mac, Linux). It helps you collect and manage references and your own notes, and create a bibliography in the word processor of your choice.
Zotero training sessions are held regularly. Individual sessions can be arranged for groups of five or more. To book a session, please e-mail schulung@ulb.uni-bonn.de.
EndNote offers strong search and import features for key databases in medicine and the natural sciences. It also stands out for its seamless integration into Word, with a wide range of citation styles and document templates for publishing in journals.
There is no campus license for EndNote, and the USL does not currently offer any training on it.
Mendeley is a freemium reference management program from Elsevier. In addition to collecting and managing literature and your own notes and creating bibliographies in word processors, Mendeley focuses on networking among researchers, for example through tools for collaborative work or exchange with colleagues in its associated social network. Additional features such as an AI interface are available through a subscription.
There is no campus license for Mendeley, and the USL does not offer any training on it.
You can also find more information on these and other reference management software packages in the reference management wiki (in German).
Citavi and Zotero at the USL
There is a campus license for Citavi. Members of the University of Bonn can download the software free of charge.
Zotero is open-source software and is available free of charge to everyone.
Contact
Office hours “Book a Librarian”
Do you use Citavi or Zotero regularly, but still have the occasional question? Or do you keep running into problems with the software?
With our “Book a Librarian” office hours, you can get expert advice on questions or problems with reference management software. You can request individual appointments via the registration form.
Target group: Citavi/Zotero users who already have some experience
Contact
If you have any questions or are interested in individual group trainings, please contact schulung@ulb.uni-bonn.de.