Citations tower · floor

Footnote citation: inserting one, and what goes in it

A footnote citation is two separate problems that get searched as one. The first is mechanical — how to make the little raised number appear and the note attach itself to the right page. The second is editorial: what actually belongs down there. Most pages answer one and leave the other, so this floor does both, in that order.

In Microsoft Word

References›Insert Footnote

Microsoft: “On the References tab, select Insert Footnote or Insert Endnote.” The numbering is automatic — “A number or symbol on the footnote or endnote matches up with a reference mark in the document”.

“Footnotes appear at the bottom of the page and endnotes come at the end of the document.” To get back to where you were: “double-click the reference mark at the beginning of the note”.

In Google Docs

Insert›Page elements›Footnote

Same idea, different menu, and the numbering is handled for you in the same way.

One trap worth knowing before you start. Google: “If your document is in pageless format, footnotes will all appear together at the end of your document.” In pageless mode a footnote is not at the foot of anything — which matters if the person marking it expects notes on the page.

Both applications number the notes for you, renumber them when you insert one in the middle, and move them when you move the text. Typing the numbers yourself is the single commonest way this goes wrong, and it goes wrong silently — everything looks correct until a paragraph is cut and every number after it is one out.

What goes in the note, when it is a citation

Chicago’s notes-bibliography system, from its free Citation Quick Guide, read 21 August 2026.

The first time you cite a source
1. Charles Yu, Interior Chinatown (Pantheon Books, 2020), 45.
Every time after that
3. Yu, Interior Chinatown, 48.
And once, in the list at the end
Yu, Charles. Interior Chinatown. Pantheon Books, 2020.

The shortened form is the part people miss, and it is what keeps a heavily referenced chapter readable. A document where every note repeats the full publication details is not more rigorous — it is harder to read, and it is not what the style asks for.

If you are writing to a word limit, check what your software counts. Google states it plainly: “Unless you select a section of the document, word count applies to everything except headers, footers, and footnotes.”

So an essay with substantial notes can be well over a limit that the counter in the corner says you are comfortably under — or, if your department excludes notes too, comfortably under one you thought you had exceeded. Either way the number on screen is not the number being marked, and finding that out the night before is worse than finding it out now.

On the editorial half, the thing worth understanding is that a footnote is not automatically a citation. Styles that use notes for references — Chicago’s notes-bibliography system is the most common — put the source down there. Styles that do not, such as APA and MLA, put the source in the sentence and leave notes for genuine asides. Using footnotes for references in a style that does not want them is a formatting error rather than a stylistic choice, and it is one the software will happily let you make.

The searches around this one come from both halves. Footnote citation and how to cite in a footnote are people who already know they need notes and want the form. How to add footnotes in word and how to insert a footnote are the mechanical question. And footnote vs endnote is the small decision in between: same content, different location, and usually a matter of what the department or the publisher asks for rather than of preference.

One practical habit closes the gap between the two halves. Insert the note at the moment you use the source, not at the end. Notes added afterwards, from memory or from a browser history, are where wrong page numbers and half-remembered editions come from — and a wrong page number in a note is harder to spot and more damaging than an untidy one.

Where to start

Four ways in.

“I need the number to appear.”
It is above. Then making them behave
“What do I put in the note?”
Go to what belongs in a note
“Footnote or endnote?”
That is notes and styles
“My word count looks wrong.”
Read counting and limits

Making them behave

The mechanical half. Everything here is a feature of the software, and everything here breaks the same way when it is done by hand.

Inserting and renumberingWhy automatic numbering matters, and what happens when you type numbers yourself.Being built
Footnotes in Google DocsThe menu, and the pageless-format trap that moves them all to the end.Being built
Converting notes to endnotesChanging location without retyping anything.Being built
When formatting goes wrongSeparator lines, spacing and notes that split across pages.Being built

What belongs in a note

The editorial half, and the one that decides whether the notes help a reader or merely exist.

Full note and shortened noteFirst citation, every later citation, and why the second form is so much shorter.Being built
Asides rather than sourcesThe note that adds something, and how to tell it from the one that should be in the sentence.Being built
Ibid. and repeated sourcesWhat Chicago now advises when the same source appears twice in a row.Being built

Notes and styles

Which styles use notes for citations and which do not. Getting this wrong is common and entirely avoidable.

Chicago’s two systemsNotes and bibliography, or author-date. Choosing is the first step.Open this floor → APA and MLAAn in-text citation takes one of two shapes, and neither of them is a footnote.Open this floor →
Footnote or endnoteSame content, different place, and who actually decides.Being built

Counting and limits

The practical consequence of having notes at all, and the one that catches people at submission.

What the word count excludesGoogle leaves footnotes out. Whether your department does is a separate question.Open this floor →
Asking what countsThe one-line question to your department that settles it before you write.Being built
Reference managersZotero and its neighbours, for when the reading list is measured in hundreds.Being built

What this tower will not do

It will not tell you to type note numbers by hand. Both applications do it properly and both fix themselves when the text moves.

It will not treat a footnote as decoration. In some styles it is where the citation lives; in others it is a formatting error, and the floor says which is which.

And it will not guess your word limit rules. What the software counts is documented and quoted here; what your department counts is a question only they can answer, and it takes one line to ask. What holds instead is simple: the instructions here are quoted from Microsoft, Google and the Chicago Manual of Style.

Where this page got its facts

  1. Microsoft Support — Add footnotes and endnotes in Word — support.microsoft.com, read 21 August 2026.
  2. Google Docs Editors Help — Add footnotes, including the pageless format behaviour — support.google.com, read 21 August 2026.
  3. The Chicago Manual of Style Online — Citation Quick Guide, notes-bibliography samples — www.chicagomanualofstyle.org, read 21 August 2026.
  4. Google Docs Editors Help — Count the words in a document — support.google.com, read 21 August 2026.

Written by Alberto Gulotta

Founder and editor of AI Tools Primer, writing from Palermo, Italy. Thirty-five years of taking computers apart, starting with a Commodore 64 — the long version is on the about page.

Something wrong on this page? Write to aitoolsprimer@gmail.com and it gets fixed.

Written on 21 August 2026.

Independence and limits

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