What is the basic template?
Rule 18.2.2 breaks a website citation into five elements: (a) author, (b) title of the specific page, (c) date and time, (d) URL, and (e) pincite. Assembled, the template is:
Author, *Title of the Specific Page*, Website Name (Date, Time), URL.
Two working examples. With an author and a timestamp: Adam Liptak, *The Court's Shadow Docket Grows*, N.Y. Times (Feb. 2, 2024, 5:03 AM), https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/02/us/shadow-docket.html. With an institutional owner and no date: *About the FTC*, Fed. Trade Comm'n, https://www.ftc.gov/about-ftc (last visited Mar. 4, 2024).
Punctuation matters as much as order: comma after the author, comma after the page title, no comma between the website name and the date parenthetical, comma after the closing parenthesis and before the URL, and a period at the very end.
Are you even allowed to cite the website?
Rule 18.2.1 controls this threshold question, and students skip it constantly. If the online source is an authenticated, official, or exact copy of a print source — a govinfo.gov PDF of the U.S. Code, a court's slip opinion PDF, a scanned law review article on HeinOnline — you cite it as if you held the print version. No URL required. You may add one if it materially helps the reader find the document, but the citation form is the print form.
Direct citation to the website is proper when the material exists only online (a blog post, an agency press release, a FAQ page) or when the print source is so obscure that citing it alone would frustrate the reader. That is the situation this guide addresses.
The third possibility is a parallel citation: cite the print source in full, then append "available at" plus the URL, when the online version will substantially improve access. Reserve "available at" for that situation. Do not sprinkle it in front of every URL — a direct internet citation under Rule 18.2.2 uses no introductory signal before the URL at all.
Who counts as the author, and what is the 'title'?
Use a named individual author when the page identifies one, formatted under the ordinary author rules (full name as it appears, no honorifics). If no individual is named but an entity plainly authored the content — an agency, a company, an advocacy group — use that entity as the institutional author.
Here is the trap: if the institutional author is the same as the website name, do not list it twice. Give it once, in the website-name slot. So it is *About the FTC*, Fed. Trade Comm'n, https://www.ftc.gov/about-ftc (last visited Mar. 4, 2024) — not "Fed. Trade Comm'n, About the FTC, Fed. Trade Comm'n."
The title element is the title of the specific page, italicized, reproduced as it appears on the page (capitalize under Rule 8; do not reproduce ALL-CAPS banner styling). The website name follows in the periodical slot, abbreviated per Table 6 and Table 13 where those tables apply (N.Y. Times, Wash. Post, Fed. Trade Comm'n). If a site has both a main name and a distinct sub-blog, join them with a colon: N.Y. Times: Bits, or SCOTUSblog. Use the domain name as the site name only when the site has no other identifiable name.
Typeface differs by document. In a law review footnote (Whitepages), the website name appears in LARGE AND SMALL CAPS. In a brief, memo, or 1L legal writing assignment (Bluepages), you use ordinary roman type for that element and italics only for the page title. Ask which convention your course requires — this is the single most common source of point deductions.
Which date do you use, and where does 'last visited' go?
Use the date the page itself displays for that content: a posting date, an article dateline, or a "last updated" or "last modified" date. Format it under Rule 12/16 conventions with month abbreviations from Table 12 (Jan., Feb., Mar., Apr., May, June, July, Aug., Sept., Oct., Nov., Dec.). Note that "Sept." is four letters in Bluebook style.
Include a time of day when the source displays one — standard for blogs, wire stories, and anything updated during the day. Format it as "(Jan. 29, 2009, 10:36 AM)" with a comma after the year and no periods in AM/PM.
Only if the page shows no date of any kind do you use a last-visited parenthetical, and it goes after the URL, not before it: https://www.ftc.gov/about-ftc (last visited Mar. 4, 2024). Using "last visited" on a dated page is wrong; so is putting it in the date slot before the URL. If the page gives a "last updated" date, that date replaces both the posting date and any last-visited parenthetical.
How do you format the URL and should you archive it?
Give the URL in full, including the transmission protocol (https:// or http://), and make it lead directly to the cited page rather than the site's front door. Do not italicize, underline, or bracket it; do not put it in angle brackets; and never write "Retrieved from" or "accessed at" — those are APA and MLA habits. Reproduce the URL's capitalization exactly. Strip tracking junk after the substantive path (utm_source, session IDs) so the link stays usable.
When the direct URL is absurdly long or the page is reachable only by clicking through a search interface, Rule 18.2.2(d) lets you cite the root or intermediate URL and add a parenthetical path: https://www.sec.gov/edgar (follow "Company Filings" hyperlink; then search "Apple Inc."). Use this sparingly; a working deep link is always better.
Rule 18.2.1 encourages archiving because links rot. If you create a permanent archive, append the archival URL in brackets immediately after the live URL: https://www.example.org/report [https://perma.cc/ABCD-1234]. Law reviews almost always require Perma links for internet sources; check your journal's manual before you cite-check an issue. Courts and firms rarely require them, though some judges appreciate them.
How do you pincite, and how do you shorten later references?
For a paginated PDF hosted online, pincite to the PDF's page numbers exactly as you would in print: at 14. For unpaginated HTML, pincite to whatever internal structure exists — a numbered paragraph (¶ 12), a section heading (under "Enforcement Priorities"), or a numbered list item. If nothing exists, omit the pincite rather than counting screens or invented page numbers.
Short forms follow the underlying source type. Use *id.* when the immediately preceding citation is the same page, with a new pincite if it changed. Otherwise use the author's last name plus *supra* and the footnote number in a law review (Liptak, *supra* note 14), or a shortened title plus *supra* in a brief when there is no personal author (*About the FTC*, *supra*). Do not repeat the URL in a short form.
One more format issue: in a brief, many courts and legal writing professors want citations in the text or in footnotes without small caps at all. The elements and their order never change; only the typeface does.
What are the recurring mistakes?
Most website-citation errors are mechanical and cost easy points. Run this list before you submit.
- Citing the HTML version of a statute, regulation, or opinion when an authenticated PDF exists — cite the print form under Rule 18.2.1.
- Using "available at" before a standalone internet citation, when it belongs only in a parallel citation to a print source.
- Adding "(last visited ...)" to a page that displays a posting or last-updated date.
- Placing the last-visited parenthetical before the URL instead of after it.
- Duplicating an institutional author in both the author and website-name slots.
- Forgetting Table 6 and Table 13 abbreviations in the website name, or over-abbreviating a site name that appears in no table.
- Dropping the closing period after the URL, or italicizing the URL.
- Citing Wikipedia, ChatGPT output, or an AI summary as substantive authority — the form may be right, but the source will not be credited in a brief or a seminar paper.