Citing Your Sources

Hanging indents are used in the works cited or bibliography of MLA, APA, Chicago, and various other citation styles. They allow the reader to easily see the breaks between separate citations and quickly scan a works cited or bibliography for author names. A hanging indent is required to format your works cited or bibliography properly. See the image below for an example of what a hanging indent looks like.

Follow the instructions below to format a hanging indent in Microsoft Word or Google Docs.  

Use the following steps to format a hanging indent in Microsoft Word. These steps work in both the full desktop version and the Office 365 online version of Word.

1. Highlight the citation(s) you want to indent. If you have multiple citation entries, make sure there is a single line of space between each one.
   


2. Right click and select "Paragraph."
   


3. Under "Indentation - Special" select "Hanging."
   


4. Click "OK."
   

Use the following steps to format a hanging indent in Google Docs.

1. Highlight the citation(s) you want to indent. If you have multiple citation entries, make sure there is a single line of space between each one.
   
2. Along the top menu, click on "Format," then go down to "Align & indent," then click on "Indentation options."
   
3. In the Indentation options menu, under "Special," select "Hanging."
   
4. Click "Apply."