Cite While You Write Commands

When Cite While You Write is installed, several EndNote commands appear on an EndNote 2025 tab in Word. When you select an EndNote command from the tab, the EndNote program starts (if not already running) and a Cite While You Write submenu becomes active on EndNote’s Tools menu, displaying some of the same EndNote commands available in Word.

Note: When you use Cite While You Write Preferences to select EndNote online as the active Cite While You Write Application, an EndNote 2025 tab appears in Word. The EndNote online tab displays a smaller set of CWYW commands than the EndNote desktop application.

Below are brief descriptions of the Cite While You Write commands that are found from the EndNote 2025 tab.

Citations Group
  • Insert Citation > Insert Citation: Search for EndNote references to select and insert as citations in your Word document. See Finding and Inserting Citations in Microsoft Word.
  • Insert Citation > Insert Selected Citation(s): Insert a citation for each reference currently selected in the open EndNote library. You can insert up to 250 references in a single in-text citation. See Inserting Selected Citations in Microsoft Word.
  • Insert Citation > Insert Note: Add custom text citations to your Word document. See Including Notes in the List of References in Microsoft Word.
  • Insert Citation > Insert Figure: Search for an EndNote reference that contains a figure, and insert a figure or table in your Word document. The figure or table is numbered, and automatically added to the document. Figures inserted in the document will not appear in the bibliography. See Finding and Inserting Figures and Tables.
  • Go To EndNote: Bring EndNote to the front of your screen. This command launches EndNote if it is not already running.
  • Edit & Manage Citation(s): Edit existing individual or multiple citations. You can omit author and/or year from citations, add prefix or suffix text (such as page numbers) to citations, or delete formatted citations from the paper. See Editing Citations in Microsoft Word.
  • Edit Library Reference(s): Select citations in your Word document, then select this command to directly edit the corresponding references in EndNote.
Bibliography Group
  • Style: Select an output style from the list to format (or reformat) your paper according to the rules of the selected style. The styles listed are marked as "favorites" in the EndNote style manager.
  • Update Citations and Bibliography: Format (or reformat) your paper according to the rules of the selected style. The formatting process replaces the temporary citations in your paper with formatted citations, and builds a bibliography at the end of the document. This command also updates the formatted figures and tables found within the body of the document or in a list at the end of the document.
  • Convert Citations and Bibliography > Convert to Unformatted Citations: Unformat a selected citation before editing it or unformat the whole document. This removes style formatting for the selected citations, and leaves temporary citations, which usually consist of the author’s last name, the year, and the record number surrounded by delimiters. Use Update Citations and Bibliography to format the paper again. See Unformatting Citations in Microsoft Word.
  • Convert Citations and Bibliography > Convert to Plain Text: Save a copy of your document without formatted Cite While You Write field codes. Formatted citations and the bibliography are saved as text. See Field Codes in Microsoft Word and Removing Field Codes.
  • Convert Citations and Bibliography > Convert Reference Manager Citations to EndNote: Convert any Reference Manager citations in this document to EndNote Cite While You Write citations. This option assumes that you have converted your Reference Manager database to an EndNote library. Values include Author Date RefID and RefID. For information on converting a Reference Manager database, see Converting a Reference Manager Database to EndNote.
  • Convert Citations and Bibliography > Convert Word Citations to EndNote: Convert any citations created by Microsoft Word in the document to EndNote Cite While You Write citations.
  • Categorize References: This feature allows you to create a bibliography organized by categories you create. See Reference Type Categories in Output Styles.
  • Instant Formatting: Turn instant formatting on or off for the document, set how frequently EndNote scans for temporary citations, and whether EndNote checks for citation changes.
  • Configure Bibliography: Click the arrow in the bottom right corner of the Bibliography section to display a tabbed dialog of formatting options. When you click OK to leave the dialog, EndNote formats (or reformats) your paper according to the rules of the selected style. See Configuring the Bibliography in Microsoft Word.

Note: By default, Instant Formatting is turned on, so your citations and bibliography are automatically formatted as you work.

Tools Group
  • Export to EndNote > Export Traveling Library: Create an EndNote library from the references used in your paper. See Exporting Word’s Traveling Library to an EndNote Library.
  • Export to EndNote > Export Word Citations: Create an EndNote library from citations created by Word in the document.
  • Export to EndNote > Export Word Master List: Create an EndNote library from the master list of citations created by Word.
  • Preferences: Change general Cite While You Write preferences, change the EndNote keyboard shortcuts available in Word, change figure and table settings, or switch to EndNote online Cite While You Write. See Setting Cite While You Write Preferences in Microsoft Word.
  • EndNote Help: Display help about Cite While You Write features.

You may prefer to execute these commands from the keyboard. Note the keyboard shortcuts defined under Cite While You Write Preferences.

Note: Several Cite While You Write commands also appear on the Tools menu in EndNote. To use these commands from within EndNote, you must use at least one Cite While You Write command from within Word during the current session.