Is my bibliography uploaded?

No. This tool runs entirely in your browser — your bibliography never leaves the device.

Zotero, EndNote, or Mendeley?

Export as BibTeX (.bib), not RIS. Better BibTeX for Zotero is the most reliable path.

What entry types are supported?

Classic BibTeX types plus common BibLaTeX ones: article, book, inproceedings, incollection, thesis, online, software, dataset, patent, preprint, and more.

How do I find undefined cites ([?])?

Paste your .tex into the cited-keys box. The checker compares \cite{…} keys to the .bib.

What’s the difference vs a BibTeX validator?

A validator asks whether the file parses. This checker asks whether entries are complete, unique, and citable.

Free · runs in your browser

Bibliography checker

Drop a .bib from Zotero, EndNote, or Overleaf. Catch missing fields, duplicate keys and DOIs, bad author lists, and cites in your paper that never made it into the file.

Input0 @entries

Results

Paste or drop a .bib, then check. Nested braces and @string are handled.

When researchers use this

Same checks whether you are submitting to NeurIPS, a Nature journal, or depositing a thesis. The .bib is the source of truth; the PDF is just a rendering.

Before you submit

Catch incomplete @article rows and duplicate keys that explode at bibtex time — not in the desk-reject email.

Lab .bib cleanup

Shared libraries accrete copies of the same paper. Duplicate DOI/title checks find them.

Thesis / survey

Hundreds of entries. Filter errors vs suggestions and export a report for your advisor.

Camera-ready cites

Paste the paper TeX to see undefined \cite keys and leftovers you never cited.

Style conversion

Moving Zotero → BibTeX often leaves “et al.” and http-less URLs. Those are called out.

Reproducibility

Articles without DOI/URL/eprint are flagged so readers can actually find the source.

Required fields by type

BibTeX will often compile with missing fields and silently drop them from the formatted list. That is worse than an error.

Type	Required
@article	author, title, journal, year
@book	title, publisher, year
@inbook	title, publisher, year
@incollection	author, title, booktitle, publisher, year
@inproceedings	author, title, booktitle, year
@conference	author, title, booktitle, year
@proceedings	title, year
@techreport	author, title, institution, year
@report	author, title, institution, year
@phdthesis	author, title, school, year
@mastersthesis	author, title, school, year
@thesis	author, title, institution, year
@unpublished	author, title, note
@manual	title
@booklet	title
@misc	title
@online	title, url
@electronic	title, url
@webpage	title, url
@patent	author, title, number, year
@software	author, title, year
@dataset	author, title, year
@preprint	author, title, year

Live cites in the editor

Bibby Chat can search literature, write BibTeX, and keep cite.bib in the project — so the checker is a last pass, not the whole workflow.

Open in Bibby AI

FAQ

Missing required fields per entry type, duplicate keys and DOIs, near-duplicate titles, bad DOI/URL shapes, “et al.” in author fields, single-hyphen page ranges, future years, generic keys, arXiv papers without eprint, broken crossref, and (if you paste TeX) cites that are missing from the .bib or never used.