Australian universities set no single referencing style. Each library publishes its own guides, each unit outline names the style, and the unit outline wins. What has changed is Harvard, long the default in Australia: three of the largest universities have stopped supporting it or are about to, while others keep their own versions of it.
Every rule below was read in the university's own guide on 26 and 27 September 2026: ten universities, the Australian Government Style Manual, the regulator TEQSA and one university's conduct policy. EdCitation publishes this guide. Its free Cite a source builds a reference from the publisher's record rather than writing one, and the last section quotes, word for word, what it and Verify references returned on Australian sources, faults included.
Which referencing style does my uni use?
The one your unit outline names. Every guide we read says to check the assessment instructions or ask the lecturer first. Where you do have a choice, APA 7 is the safe one: every guide in the table supports it, and the University of Technology Sydney calls it "the most common style in use at UTS".
| University | Styles its library guides cover | Harvard | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Curtin | APA 7, Chicago 18 author-date, AGLC, IEEE, Vancouver | Not listed | Curtin University Library (n.d.) |
| Deakin | APA 7, Vancouver, AGLC, Oxford, Chicago, IEEE, numbered | "Retired February 2026" | Deakin University (2026) |
| Griffith | AGLC4, APA 7, Chicago 18 and 17, IEEE, AGPS Harvard | Based on the 2002 Style manual | Griffith University Library (n.d.) |
| Melbourne | AGLC, APA 7, Chicago A and B, IEEE, MLA 9, AMA (Vancouver) | No longer supported | University of Melbourne Library (n.d.) |
| Monash | AGLC4, APA 7, Chicago 18 A and B, MLA 9, Vancouver, Harvard | Supported until January 2027 | Monash University Library (2026) |
| QUT | APA, Harvard, AGLC, Vancouver | Based on Chicago author-date | Queensland University of Technology (2026) |
| RMIT | AGLC4, APA 7, Chicago A and B, IEEE, Vancouver, RMIT Harvard | Based on the current Style Manual | RMIT University Library (n.d.) |
| UNSW | APA and Harvard, "the two accepted referencing frameworks" | Based on the 2002 Style manual | UNSW Sydney (n.d.) |
| Queensland | ACS, AGLC, APA 7, Chicago 18, CSE, IEEE, MLA 9, Vancouver (AMA) | Not listed | University of Queensland Library (n.d.) |
| UTS | APA 7, AGLC | Not on the page we read | University of Technology Sydney Library (n.d.) |
| Any of them | EdCitation's Cite a source, in six styles: Harvard, APA 7, Vancouver, IEEE, Chicago 18 author-date, MLA 9 | Cite Them Right version | EdCitation |
Why Melbourne, Deakin and Monash dropped Harvard
Because there is no Harvard rulebook to follow. The University of Melbourne Library (n.d.) says it no longer gives Harvard advice, calling the style one "that has not been updated for more than 15 years" with no manual behind it, and points students to APA or Chicago B. Deakin University (2026) retired its Australian Harvard guide in February 2026; the old PDF stays online but is no longer maintained. Monash University Library (2026) says it will stop supporting Harvard from January 2027 and names APA 7, Chicago 18 and MLA 9 as alternatives. If you are part-way through a degree at one of these, ask whether a unit still accepts Harvard before you convert a long list.
What is Australian Harvard based on?
On the Australian Government Style Manual, in one of its two editions. The current digital Style Manual, run by the Australian Public Service Commission, sets out an author-date system for government writers and says plainly that writers outside government "might follow other rules". RMIT University Library (n.d.) notes the manual is not aimed at students, which is why each university adapts it.
The digital edition changed five things from the sixth edition of 2002, and its release notes list them: "et al." from three authors, "and" instead of "&", a colon rather than a comma before page numbers, no comma between surname and initials, and a hyperlinked title in place of a printed URL (Australian Public Service Commission, 2026). Those five changes are why two Australian Harvards now sit side by side.
Three Australian Harvards
- The digital Style Manual: Monash and RMIT. Monash's guide is "based on the Australian Government's Style Manual"; RMIT's likewise. Both put the year in brackets and quote pages after a colon, as (Day 2018:3) in RMIT's example. Both depart from the manual on one point: they print the URL at the end instead of hyperlinking the title.
- The 2002 Style manual: UNSW and Griffith. UNSW's guide is a modified version of the sixth edition, published by Snooks & Co. in 2002, and Griffith's AGPS Harvard is based on the same edition. The year has no brackets, pages are written "p. 23", "&" joins names in brackets, and volume and issue are spelt out as "vol. 26, no. 2".
- Chicago underneath: QUT. QUT's Harvard "uses the author-date style" of the Chicago Manual of Style, 18th edition, and prefers given names written in full.
Copy your guide's pattern for your source type, not a summary table. Griffith's journal section cites (Fetherston 2007, p. 61), yet the author table in its First Peoples section shows APA's (Fetherston, 2007).
How does Australian Harvard differ from UK Harvard?
In punctuation and in how many authors are listed, not in the facts a reference holds. UK universities mostly follow Cite Them Right, which is the Harvard EdCitation builds (see our Harvard referencing guide). Here is one real article, as EdCitation's Cite a source returned it and as the two Australian patterns set it.
EdCitation's Harvard (Cite Them Right), as returned:
Kelleher, T. (2009) 'Conversational Voice, Communicated Commitment, and Public Relations Outcomes in Interactive Online Communication', Journal of Communication, 59(1), pp. 172–188. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.2008.01410.x.
Digital Style Manual pattern (Monash, RMIT):
Kelleher T (2009) 'Conversational voice, communicated commitment, and public relations outcomes in interactive online communication', Journal of Communication, 59(1):172–188, doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.2008.01410.x.
2002 Style manual pattern (UNSW):
Kelleher, T 2009, 'Conversational voice, communicated commitment, and public relations outcomes in interactive online communication', Journal of Communication, vol. 59, no. 1, pp. 172-188, DOI:10.1111/j.1460-2466.2008.01410.x.
| Element | EdCitation's Harvard | Digital Style Manual | 2002 Style manual (UNSW) |
|---|---|---|---|
| In the text | (Kelleher, 2009) | (Kelleher 2009) | (Kelleher 2009) |
| A quotation's page | (Kelleher, 2009, p. 175) | (Kelleher 2009:175) | (Kelleher 2009, p. 175) |
| Et al. in the text | Four or more authors | Three or more | More than three |
| Et al. in the list | Four or more authors | Never: all authors | Never: all authors |
| Name | Kelleher, T. | Kelleher T | Kelleher, T |
| Volume and pages | 59(1), pp. 172–188 | 59(1):172–188 | vol. 59, no. 1, pp. 172-188 |
| DOI | Available at: https://doi.org/… | doi:10.… | DOI:10.… |
The title needs fixing by hand in every Australian version: all of them ask for capitals only on the first word and proper nouns, and our output kept the capitals in the publisher's record. The et al. rule matters most. For a five-author article, EdCitation printed "Kennedy, G.E. et al. (2008)" in the list (Kennedy et al., 2008); the Style Manual and UNSW say to list every name there, and Monash's and RMIT's four-author examples do.
Where do APA 7, Chicago, IEEE and Vancouver fit?
Across most of the country, by discipline. APA 7 appears in all ten guides and is what Melbourne and Monash name first as Harvard's replacement; our guide to APA 7 in-text citations covers it, and EdCitation's APA builder produces it.
Chicago comes in two forms. Melbourne, Monash and RMIT call them A (notes and bibliography) and B (author-date). EdCitation builds Chicago 18 author-date only, so a unit asking for Chicago A must be referenced by hand. Griffith still offers Chicago 17 beside 18; if your unit names 17, see rules that changed between editions.
IEEE is listed by Curtin, Deakin, Griffith, Melbourne, RMIT and Queensland for engineering and computing.
Two Vancouvers in health
Australian guides split between two sources. RMIT's Vancouver follows the National Library of Medicine's Citing Medicine; Queensland and Melbourne base theirs on the AMA Manual of Style, 11th edition, and QUT revised its Vancouver to AMA 11 in February 2022. EdCitation's Vancouver follows the NLM, so for an AMA-based unit, check each entry against your guide's examples.
Can I use a generator for AGLC in law?
Not ours. The Australian Guide to Legal Citation, now in its fourth edition, is published by the Melbourne University Law Review with the Melbourne Journal of International Law, and consultation on a fifth edition has closed (Melbourne University Law Review, n.d.). It is a footnote system, and nine of the ten universities in the table publish a guide to it; the UNSW page we read does not. EdCitation does not build AGLC, so law students follow their faculty's guide by hand. A journal article cited alongside case law can still be looked up in Cite a source to get its details right.
What do TEQSA and universities say about references?
That inventing a source is misconduct. The Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (2024), in its guidance note on academic and research integrity, lists "fabricating information" among breaches beside plagiarism, collusion and contract cheating, and expects providers to tell students what a breach is under Standard 5.2 of the Threshold Standards. TEQSA sets no referencing style.
University policies are more specific. The University of Queensland (2026) Student Code of Conduct Policy, in force from 1 January 2026, counts "fabricating data or inventing references" as cheating and "citations to non-existent or incorrect sources" as misrepresentation. A reference that cannot be traced is a problem under that wording even when the error was honest, which is why a list is worth checking before it is handed in. Our guide to checking a reference is real explains how.
How do you build an Australian reference list?
- Read the unit outline and note the style and, for Harvard, which guide: the university's own, not a UK one.
- Look each source up by its DOI, ISBN or page address in EdCitation's Cite a source and pick the nearest style: Harvard for the Style Manual versions, Chicago author-date for QUT's Harvard.
- Correct by hand: title capitals, the author list (every name for Australian Harvard), punctuation and the page format.
- Run the whole list through Verify references, then open each "check this" and settle it against the source.
- Read your university's integrity policy once, so you know what it counts as a breach.
What did EdCitation return on Australian sources?
Cite a source is the best place to start an Australian list. It takes the details from the publisher's own record, never composing them, lays the entry out in Harvard, APA 7, Vancouver, IEEE, Chicago 18 author-date or MLA 9, and flags a retracted paper. A chatbot has no record behind what it prints. It is free with no account. It will not produce Australian Harvard exactly, as the table above shows, and it does not build AGLC. We ran three DOIs and one government page.
Cite a source on three DOIs and a government page
For the Kelleher article above, APA 7 and Vancouver set the record's full title in sentence case, as both styles ask. Harvard, MLA, Chicago and IEEE kept its title case, which suits MLA and Chicago but not any Australian Harvard. The Style Manual's own example shortens that title to "Conversational voice".
For 10.14742/ajet.1233, from the Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, APA returned:
Kennedy, G. E., Judd, T. S., Churchward, A., Gray, K., & Krause, K.-L. (2008). First year students' experiences with technology: Are they really digital natives? Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 24(1). https://doi.org/10.14742/ajet.1233
The names and title are right, but there are no pages: the record holds none, while Griffith's own example of the article gives pp. 108-122. Its Vancouver entry wrote the journal in full and dated it "2008 Jan 16".
For 10.5694/mja2.52451, an eleven-author article in the Medical Journal of Australia, APA listed all eleven authors and "221(7), 367–373"; Vancouver gave the first six and "et al." with "Med J Aust. 2024 Oct 7;221(7):367-73".
For the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade's page Australia in Brief, the APA entry began "Australia in Brief. (n.d.)" and Harvard "Australia in Brief (no date)", while Chicago made the department the author. The page itself says it is the 52nd edition, revised in February 2021. Correct the page's details before the entry is built: add the department as author and 2021 as the year.
Verify references on a short list
We pasted nine entries, most copied from the guides above. Verify references answered:
- Monash's examples by Alexander and by Tharoor, and Griffith's by Buckridge and Guest: verified, "The DOI resolves to this record and the title matches."
- Griffith's Kennedy example, without a DOI: verified, "Title, year and first author match a published record."
- The Style Manual's Kelleher example: "check this", "The DOI's record has the same first author and year but another title". The shortened title is the reason.
- The Style Manual's "Jackson D, Li X and Chandran P (2018)" in Psychological Science Australia: not found, "No publisher's or registry's record matches this reference." We found no journal of that name in Crossref's journal list, so read it as an example of the form, not a source to cite.
- UNSW's Karskens example, The Rocks: life in early Sydney, 1997: "check this", "A record with this title exists, but it was published in 1970, not 1997." It had matched a journal article of the same short title; the book is real, and a library catalogue lists it as 1997.
- Monash's DFAT entry in Style Manual form: "check this", "the page there has a different title". The same page in APA form came back verified.
- Mabo v Queensland (No 2) in AGLC form: "could not check", "A court case or a statute is not in the publishers' records. Check it at the court's or the legislature's own site, or in a law report." Law reports are outside what it searches, and it says so rather than calling the case missing.
Read every "check this" yourself: two of them here were right entries. With the Pro plan ($8 a month), References from a file checks a whole uploaded paper and matches each citation to its entry; see pricing.
Quick questions
Is Harvard still used at Australian universities?
Yes, at some. RMIT, UNSW, Griffith and QUT keep their own versions, while Melbourne has stopped supporting it, Deakin retired its guide in February 2026 and Monash will in January 2027.
Is Australian Harvard the same as UK Harvard?
No. Australian versions follow the Australian Government Style Manual, with no comma before the year in the text and, in the Style Manual and UNSW's guide, every author in the list, while most UK guides follow Cite Them Right.
Does EdCitation do AGLC?
No. EdCitation's Cite a source covers the six general styles, from Harvard to Vancouver, but not legal citation, so AGLC4 footnotes are written by hand from the faculty's guide.
Which style should I use if my unit lets me choose?
APA 7: all ten guides we read support it, and Melbourne and Monash name it as the alternative to Harvard.
Can I reference the Style Manual's examples as sources?
Not all of them. Some are illustrations: we could find no journal matching the Style Manual's Psychological Science Australia example.
References
- Australian Public Service Commission. (2026). Author–date. Style Manual. https://www.stylemanual.gov.au/referencing-and-attribution/author-date
- Curtin University Library. (n.d.). Referencing. UniSkills. https://uniskills.library.curtin.edu.au/referencing/
- Deakin University. (2026). Harvard. https://www.deakin.edu.au/students/study-support/study-resources/referencing/harvard
- Griffith University Library. (n.d.). AGPS Harvard. https://www.griffith.edu.au/library/study/referencing/agps-harvard
- Kelleher, T. (2009). Conversational voice, communicated commitment, and public relations outcomes in interactive online communication. Journal of Communication, 59(1), 172–188. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.2008.01410.x
- Kennedy, G. E., Judd, T. S., Churchward, A., Gray, K., & Krause, K.-L. (2008). First year students' experiences with technology: Are they really digital natives? Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 24(1). https://doi.org/10.14742/ajet.1233
- Melbourne University Law Review. (n.d.). AGLC. https://law.unimelb.edu.au/mulr/aglc
- Monash University Library. (2026). Harvard: Getting started. https://guides.lib.monash.edu/harvard
- Queensland University of Technology. (2026). QUT cite|write: Harvard. https://www.citewrite.qut.edu.au/cite/
- RMIT University Library. (n.d.). Easy Cite referencing guide. https://www.lib.rmit.edu.au/easy-cite/
- Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency. (2024). Guidance note: Academic and research integrity (Version 2.0). https://www.teqsa.gov.au/guides-resources/resources/guidance-notes/guidance-note-academic-integrity
- University of Melbourne Library. (n.d.). Referencing styles. Re:cite. https://library.unimelb.edu.au/recite/referencing-styles
- University of Queensland. (2026). Student Code of Conduct Policy. Policy and Procedure Library. https://policies.uq.edu.au/document/view-current.php?id=145
- University of Queensland Library. (n.d.). Referencing style guides. https://guides.library.uq.edu.au/referencing
- University of Queensland Library. (2026). Vancouver (AMA) referencing style. https://guides.library.uq.edu.au/referencing/vancouver-ama
- University of Technology Sydney Library. (n.d.). APA 7th referencing. https://www.lib.uts.edu.au/referencing/apa
- UNSW Sydney. (n.d.). UNSW's Harvard referencing guide. https://www.unsw.edu.au/student/managing-your-studies/academic-skills-support/toolkit/referencing/harvard