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Overleaf & LaTeX

Tips and tools for writing your paper in Overleaf / LaTeX

Bibliography Management in Overleaf

When it comes to bibliography management packages, there are three main options in LaTeX: biblatex, bibtex and natbib (a package for use with bibtex). Biblatex is a modern program to process bibliography information, provides an easier and more flexible interface and a better language localization that the other two options.

Reference Managers (EndNote, Zotero, Mendeley)

You can use your favourite reference manager with Overleaf. They have direct integrations with Zotero & Mendeley. You can use Overleaf with EndNote and easily upload a .bib file from other services.

How to Search for References in an Overleaf Project

Providing citations to prior work is an important aspect of academic writing but managing and using a library of references can be time-consuming. Overleaf provides you not only with integrations with reference managers but also an enhanced reference-search feature.

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Biblatex


A video tutorial (04:49 mins):

More examples can be found here.

BibTeX

Although BibTeX is an older format, it is still widely used in the research world. 

BibTeX is a file format used for lists of references for LaTeX documents. Many citation management tools support the ability to export and import lists of references in .bib format. Some reference management tools can generate BibTeX files of your library or folders for use in your LaTeX documents.

Learn how to create and manage bibliographies using BibTeX on Overleaf:

  • by reading this article by Overleaf TeXpert, Lian Tze, that pulls together all the threads relating to citations, references and bibliographies, as well as how Overleaf and related tools can help you manage your references
  • by watching a short video (3:30 mins) by V. Knight:

Overleaf supports BibTeX styles and packages available in TeX Live. Here’s a specific list of the .bst files that are already installed on Overleaf’s servers (so you don’t have to add them specifically to your project) as well as the link to the package documentation:

Researcher?