Zotero guide: Editing and organising references

Adding PDF files to references

Zotero will often automatically add the PDF file to the reference when the Zotero Connector is used. However, if needed you can add the PDF file that matches your reference manually by dragging and dropping the file onto the relevant reference in your Zotero list. Alternatively, you can select the reference and click the ‘paperclip’ icon on the top menu bar, or right-click on the citation and choose ‘Add attachment’. Select ‘Attach stored copy of file’ and select the file to upload. See our FAQs section for information on annotating PDFs in Zotero.

Editing reference entries

Sometimes the information brought into Zotero automatically (e.g. via the Connector icon) can be incomplete or incorrect, and you will need to edit it. It is essential that you verify that the records in your library are accurate, which means you will need to check your reference list entries against the referencing style you wish to use. To edit a reference, select it from the centre column. You can then view and edit its information on the Info tab of the right column. Changes are saved automatically as they are made.

Editing titles: You can manually change the case by right-clicking on the title, and selecting either ‘Title Case’ or ‘Sentence case’. Double-check these changes, as any proper nouns will not be recognised when transforming the capitalisation.

Editing authors: Right-click on the ‘Author’ heading in the right panel. You can change the Author type (e.g. to an editor) and move the order of listed authors. Use the buttons on the right to add, delete, and change whether the author first and surnames are in a single or separate field. To create a reference entry for an author-date style where the name order is Surname, first name/initials e.g. Brown, W., use two fields with the surname first and a comma separating the surname and first name/s or initials. Learn more about editing items.

Editing item types (e.g. creating book chapters): It’s not possible to add a book chapter/book section automatically. You should add the book automatically and then edit the item type (in the right panel) from ‘book’ to ‘book section’. You then need to make sure you fill in the author, editor, section/chapter title and book title appropriately.

Removing duplicates

Click on ‘Duplicate Items’ in the Zotero left side panel to view any duplicates detected by Zotero.

Choose the version of the item to use as the ‘master’ and click ‘Merge [#] items’ in the right panel. 

If the item fields don't match completely, you can select one item to be the ‘master’ from the list at the top of the right panel, then select alternative versions of mismatched fields using the icons to the right of each field.

Merged duplicates are automatically detected by word plugins and don’t affect your automatically generated citations and bibliographies.

Learn more about detecting and merging duplicates.

Collections

You can organise your references into folders which are called ‘Collections’. To add a new collection, click on the folder icon in the top menu, or right-click on ‘My Library’ and select ‘New Collection’. Name your collection, and drag and drop the relevant references into it.

You can have as many collections as you like. Sub-collections can be created by dragging and dropping a collection onto another collection, or by right-clicking an existing collection and choosing ‘New Sub-collection’. Items can be assigned to multiple collections, and doing so does not duplicate the item.

Tags

Tags allow you to add keywords to a reference. You can tag items based on their topics, methods, status, or even based on your own workflow (e.g., “to-read”). Items can have as many tags as you like, and you can filter your library (or a specific collection) to show items having a specific set of one or more tags. Tags may also be automatically assigned to items that you have added to Zotero from the web, for example the subject headings from journal articles may be automatically added as tags.

To add a tag, select a reference from the middle panel, then choose the ‘Tags’ tab on the right panel. Click ‘Add’ and start typing the tag. Click the ‘minus’ button to delete a tag. To add the same tag to multiple references at the same time, select all the relevant references, then drag and drop them onto the tag listed in your bottom left panel.

All tags you use will be listed on the bottom left panel. You can choose to colour code your tags by right clicking on a tag in this panel. Clicking on a tag here will also filter your Library to show only those references with this tag.

If desired, you can remove automatic tags by clicking on the multicolour button in the bottom left panel and deselecting the 'Show Automatic' option. You can also delete automatic tags using the multicolour button.

Please be aware if you export your Zotero library tags will be retained but collections will not. Learn more about collections and tags.

Notes

You can add notes to your references, as well as standalone notes that are not attached to a specific reference. To add a note to a reference, select a reference from the middle panel, then choose the ‘Notes’ tab on the right panel. Click ‘Add’ and start typing the note. Learn more about notes.

Related items

You can relate a pair of items to each other, or you can relate a number of items to a single 'parent' item. Examples of where this is useful include relating book chapters to the parent volume, or relating several book reviews to a specific book. To relate items to each other, select a reference from the middle panel, then choose the ‘Related’ tab on the right panel. Click ‘Add’ and select one or multiple items to relate to the parent item. Learn more about related items.

Sorting

The default headers that appear in the centre Zotero panel are Title, Creator and Attachments. You can add additional headers, or remove existing headers, by right clicking on an existing header (e.g. Title) and then selecting from the options that appear.

You can sort your references by clicking on the header titles (e.g Creator, Title, Year etc), click again to change from ascending to descending order. 

Searching

Zotero has a quick search function, using the search bar in the top menu bar. Choose your search fields from the drop-down menu. Note that searching ‘everything’ includes any full-text PDFs. There is also an advanced search functionality with more detailed search options. Click on the magnifying glass icon to view advanced search.  Learn more about sorting and searching.