Our Verdict

At the end of the day, the best thing about the Scrivener writer and text editor tool is its versatility.

What Is Scrivener Citation Manager?

If you’re writing a document that requires extensive citations, such as one that needs to be formatted in a scientific style, it can be helpful to use the Scrivener reference manager options within the tools you have access to in the software.

One of the recommendations for handling citing a reference is to first insert the footnotes you need using something like Word. Then, you can create a bibliography using something like the Zotero plugin for MS Word to create citations and then convert to the type you want.

This will allow you to start in Word, and then transfer the text you want in a Word document over to Scrivener with the format that you need. That way, your workflow will be interrupted less and you can use the best program for each job. Afterward, you can compile and export your Scrivener file into Docx, an RTF file, or whatever else you need to create.

Why Is the Citation Manager Useful?

The citation options in Scrivener are useful due to just how many different options you can create. If you start with a Docx file from Microsoft Word, for example, you can then import it into the Scrivener app in order to set up proper reference management in the writing program. You can also copy and paste whatever else you need to create the perfect paper.

The usefulness comes from the power you get to make every part of word processing and referencing work for you. This includes changing into formats like RTF, getting the tool to paste in references wherever you need, choosing a folder for where the files go ultimately, and so on.

How Do You Use the Citation Manager?

There are many possibilities for using Scrivener for citations. One is to create your file in the writing tool, and then add in citations using the drop-down menu. After that, you can create a reference page,

At the end of the day, the best thing about the Scrivener writer and text editor tool is its versatility. You can insert square brackets for references, create a bib file, change prefix suffix definitions, and use keyboard shortcuts to create the citation style and formatting that you want.

It will help you create a well-researched blog post, with a full number of citation management features as well. Often, it’s useful to start with something like Google Docs or even just a plain text work before switching over to the Scrivener writing tool for fully setting up the citation part of your text document.

In general, it’s definitely worth comparing it to other options like Bibtex or Latex. It may also be worth checking out the Github.io pages to help in deciding what will work best for your writing process as well.

You aren’t going to get a full sense of how powerful the Scrivener word processer is, however, until you use it to create a paper and reference paper yourself. There’s a trial for Scrivener that is well worth trying to see what it can do. It’s one of the only word processor options of its class that can handle just about any academic, scientific, or other related work with ease.