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CiteMe - Academic Citations

by danielnichiata96
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Description

Obsidian plugin: search scholarly databases and insert formatted citations in 60 styles, including APA, MLA, Chicago and ABNT. No account needed.

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Latest Version

1.1.0
17 hours ago

Changelog

Added

  • "Check references in this note" checks the selected references, or the entries under the References heading, with CiteMe's reference checker. Each reference is marked found, to review, or not found, with the DOI of the matching record. "Check selected references" does the same from the right-click menu.
  • Optional "CiteMe token" setting. With a token, reference checks use your CiteMe plan; CiteMe Pro has no monthly limit. Without one, a check covers up to 10 references and each network gets 5 checks a month.
See all version on GitHub

README file from

Github

CiteMe - Academic Citations for Obsidian

Search scholarly databases, insert formatted citations, and check whether the references in a note exist, without leaving Obsidian. No account needed.

Searching for a paper from the CiteMe modal in Obsidian

Features

  • Instant search - Search millions of academic papers without leaving Obsidian
  • 60 citation styles - APA, MLA, Chicago, Harvard, IEEE, Vancouver, ABNT, and more, all available without an account
  • Smart insertion - Insert in-text citations, full bibliography entries, or both
  • References management - Automatically builds and maintains a References section in your notes
  • Duplicate detection - Prevents adding the same citation twice (checks by DOI and text)
  • Reference check - Checks the references in a note against scholarly databases and marks each one found, to review, or not found
  • DOI lookup - Search directly by DOI for precise results
  • Usage visibility - Shows your searches in the last 24 hours in the Obsidian status bar
  • Mobile compatible - Works on both desktop and mobile Obsidian

Installation

In Obsidian, open Settings → Community plugins → Browse, search for "CiteMe", then select Install and Enable. The link obsidian.md/plugins?id=citeme opens the plugin page directly in Obsidian.

Manual Installation

  1. Download main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css from the latest release
  2. Create a folder citeme inside your vault's .obsidian/plugins/ directory
  3. Copy the downloaded files into the citeme folder
  4. Restart Obsidian and enable the plugin in Settings > Community Plugins

From Source

cd obsidian-citeme
npm install
npm run build

Copy main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css to your vault at .obsidian/plugins/citeme/.

Usage

Search Citations

  • Command palette: Open command palette (Cmd/Ctrl+P) and type "Search citations"
  • Ribbon icon: Click the book icon in the left sidebar
  • Right-click menu: Select text, right-click, and choose "Search citation for selected text"

Insert Modes

Mode What it inserts
Bibliography Full formatted citation at cursor position, with italics as Markdown
In-text The style's in-text citation, e.g., (Vaswani et al., 2017)
Both In-text at cursor + full citation in References section

An in-text citation in the note and the full entries under References

Check References

Run "Check references in this note" from the command palette. The plugin sends the selected text, or the entries under your References heading when nothing is selected, to CiteMe's reference checker. You can also select references, right-click, and choose "Check selected references".

Each reference comes back as:

Result Meaning
Found A matching record exists; the DOI links to it
To review A partial match, a different DOI, a retracted work, or grey literature
Not found No matching record. Real works that are not indexed also end up here, so check it by hand before assuming it is fabricated

A match does not confirm the year, journal, or pages.

Reference check results for a note

Limits

The plugin needs no account. Searches share CiteMe's anonymous budget of 500 searches per 24 hours per network, and the status bar shows how many you have used. Search runs after you pause typing, so each query costs one search.

Without an account, a reference check covers up to 10 references and each network gets 5 checks a month. To check longer lists, create a token in your CiteMe settings and paste it into the plugin's "CiteMe token" setting: checks then use your CiteMe plan, and CiteMe Pro has no monthly limit.

DOI Lookup

Use "Search by DOI" from the command palette to find a paper by its DOI. This opens a detail view with all formatted citation variants before inserting.

References Section

When enabled (default), the plugin automatically:

  1. Finds or creates a ## References heading in your note
  2. Appends full bibliography entries alphabetically
  3. Skips duplicates (matched by DOI or exact text)

Settings

Setting Default Description
CiteMe on the web Link Opens citeme.app (library, reference checking, exports)
Citation style APA Default citation format
Results limit 5 Number of search results (1-20)
Insert format Bibliography How citations are inserted
Sort by Relevance Result sorting order
Add to References On Auto-append to References section
CiteMe token Empty Optional. Reference checks use your CiteMe plan instead of the anonymous limits
References heading ## References Heading text for the references section

CiteMe plugin settings

Supported Citation Styles

All 60 curated CiteMe styles are available, including APA, MLA, Chicago (Author-Date and Note), Harvard, IEEE, Vancouver, ABNT, AMA, ACS, Turabian, OSCOLA, Bluebook, Nature, Science, Cell, The Lancet, ISO 690, DIN 1505, and German and French university styles. The list is kept in sync with CiteMe by npm run sync:saas-contract.

Network & Privacy Disclosure

This plugin connects to the CiteMe API (https://citeme.app) to search academic databases, format citations, and check references. Your search text is sent to CiteMe to run the search. A reference check sends the selected text, or the entries under your References heading, to CiteMe. Requests are tagged with X-Source: obsidian-plugin for channel attribution. Searches carry no account credentials. If you add a CiteMe token, reference checks send it in the Authorization header; the token is stored in the plugin's data.json inside your vault, so leave it out of vaults you share or publish. See CiteMe's privacy policy at https://citeme.app/privacy.

Development

git clone https://github.com/danielnichiata96/obsidian-citeme.git
cd obsidian-citeme
npm install
npm run sync:saas-contract # Optional: refresh SaaS parity snapshot when ../citeme exists
npm run dev   # Watch mode (rebuilds on file change)
npm run build # Production build

Links

  • CiteMe - The citation search engine powering this plugin
  • Obsidian - A powerful knowledge base on top of a local folder of plain text Markdown files

License

MIT

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