Who is the author of a government report in APA 7?

The people named on the title page or cover, or — if no people are named there — the most specific agency that issued the report (APA Style, elements of reference list entries; §10.4). Parent departments belong in the publisher slot. A transmittal letter does not create an author. Do not write "U.S. Government."

Do I put CDC or NCES in the reference list or only in the text?

Spell the agency out in the reference list. You may introduce an abbreviation in the first in-text citation — (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2023) — and use (CDC, 2023) after that. Never write "CDC." as the reference-list author.

When do I omit the publisher?

When the group author and the publisher are the same body. APA's creating-a-reference-list handout says to put the group in the author element and omit it from the source. Keep parent agencies that are not already in the author name, as in the official National Cancer Institute example.

Where does the report number go?

In roman parentheses immediately after the italic title, with no period between the title and the opening parenthesis. Copy the office's own label: NIH Publication No. 18-2059, NCES 2026-144, Report No. NASA/CR-2018-220043, GAO-25-107743, RL30064. Skip the element if the cover has no number.

Should I cite the PDF or the landing page?

Use the most stable official URL. APA's Taking Time example uses the cancer.gov PDF. NCES 2024-144 still points readers to the pubsearch landing page; the 2026 volume is offered as a direct IES PDF. Either is acceptable when both resolve to the same report. Do not use a library-database session URL.

How do I cite a Congressional Research Service report in APA?

Treat it as a §10.4 report. If the cover names a person, that person is the author and Congressional Research Service is the publisher. Keep the printed RL or R number. Example: Brudnick (2026) for the 10 September 2026 update of RL30064. Do not use Congress.gov's bill citation button, and do not cite the product as a statute.

How do I cite statistics or a table from a government report?

Cite the report, not the table as a separate source. Name the table or figure in the sentence: (National Center for Education Statistics, 2026, Table 2) or (Irwin et al., 2024, Table 2). If you downloaded the underlying microdata and reanalyzed it, cite the data set instead of, or in addition to, the report.

Is the CDC National Diabetes Statistics Report a 2024 report?

Not on the live CDC page, which the agency says is continually updated. A January 2026 page stamp is not a monograph year. Cite that page as a webpage with (n.d.) and a retrieval date, or cite a dated snapshot such as the 29 November 2023 CDC Stacks deposit. Do not invent (2024) for a page that has no 2024 publication year.

How do I cite a law, bill, or congressional hearing?

Those are not §10.4 reports. APA 7 Chapter 11 follows the Bluebook for statutes, regulations, and cases. A hearing or unpublished remark is a hearing record or a personal communication. See how to cite legal cases.

Do I add a retrieval date to a GAO, CRS, or WHO report?

No. Numbered, dated reports are archived publications. APA 7 §9.16 adds a retrieval date only for unarchived works designed to change. Never add a retrieval date to a DOI.

How is this different from citing a government document in Chicago?

APA 7 uses one author–date report pattern for agency publications. Chicago splits public documents into classes (agency book, congressional report, executive order, statute) and often uses notes-bibliography or the Bluebook. Do not mix a CMOS note number with an APA parenthetical year.

How to Cite a Government Report in APA (7th Edition) [2026]

How to Cite a Government Report in APA: Quick Answer

Look at the title page or cover first. If only the agency is named there, the agency is the author. If people are named on that page, those people are the authors and the agency is the publisher. Italicize the title. Put any report, publication, or document number in parentheses after the title. Omit a publisher that merely repeats the group author. Prefer a DOI written as https://doi.org/...; otherwise use the report's stable landing-page or PDF URL, not a database session link.

APA 7 §10.4 templates

Reference, agency as author:

Agency Name. (Year). Title of report (Report No. xxx). Publisher. https://xxxxx

Reference, agency as author, publisher omitted:

Agency Name. (Year). Title of report (Report No. xxx). https://xxxxx

Reference, individual authors at an agency:

Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Year). Title of report (Report No. xxx). Agency Name. https://xxxxx

Parenthetical citation, group author:

(Agency Name, Year)

Narrative citation, group author:

Agency Name (Year)

Parenthetical citation, three or more named authors:

(Author et al., Year)

The APA Style report by a government agency page, created in 2020 from the 7th edition and still the live official example set as of this rewrite, states the author-and-publisher split in two sentences that later examples on this page follow. University reprints such as the Alamo Colleges APA report page quote the same wording.

APA Style on who authors a government report

The specific agency responsible for the report appears as the author. The names of parent agencies not present in the group author name appear in the source element as the publisher.

This creates concise in-text citations and complete reference list entries.

Anatomy of an APA 7 Government Report Reference

Section 10.4 uses the same four elements as every APA reference — author, date, title, source — plus one report-specific extra: an identifying number after the title. Before you fill those slots, the APA Style elements of reference list entries page tells you how to read the cover. The same title-page test is reprinted on the Alamo Colleges elements page.

APA Style on the title-page test

If the names of individuals are presented on the title page or cover, treat the work as having individual authors.

If only the name of the group is presented on the title page or cover, treat the work as having a group author, even if individuals are credited elsewhere in the work (e.g., in an acknowledgments section).

When numerous layers of government agencies are listed as the author of a work, use the most specific agency as the author in the reference (e.g., use "National Institute of Nursing Research" rather than "U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Nursing Research"). The names of parent agencies not present in the group author name appear in the source element as the publisher.

Where each APA 7 government-report element comes from
Element	What to write	Where students go wrong
Author	People on the title page, or the most specific agency	Writing "U.S. Government" or listing every parent department as author
Date	Year on the title page or copyright page	Using today's date, a "last reviewed" stamp, or the series start year
Title	Official title in italics and sentence case	Headline-capitalizing the whole title, or inventing a shorter one
Report number	Exact number in roman parentheses after the title	Dropping NCES, NIH, NASA/CR, GAO, or CRS numbers that are printed on the cover
Publisher	Parent agencies not already in the author name; omit a repeat	Repeating "Centers for Disease Control and Prevention" as publisher
Locator	DOI as `https://doi.org/...`, else a stable .gov or organization URL	Pasting a library-database session URL, or pairing a DOI with a retrieval date

Author

Name the group or the people who issued the report, not the cabinet secretary who signed a transmittal letter and not the database that hosted the PDF. National Cancer Institute, not "U.S. Department of Health and Human Services." National Center for Education Statistics, not "U.S. Department of Education," when NCES is the group author. A commissioner's signed letter — Matthew Soldner on the 2026 Condition of Education, for example — does not make that person an author. If two agencies share credit on the cover, join the two names with an ampersand. List individual authors the same way you would on a journal article: surnames and initials, up to 20 names in the reference, then et al. in the text. If no person and no agency can be recovered, follow how to cite a source with no author rather than inventing "U.S. Government."

Date

Use the year the report was published. APA's official government-agency example uses only the year (2019), even though some library handouts add a month. If the cover gives a full date and you are citing a press release or another gray-literature item that APA dates to the day, include year, month, and day. If you cannot recover a date after a real search, write (n.d.) and see how to cite a source with no date. Do not use the date you downloaded the PDF. A living dashboard that is "continually updated" and has no archived version may need a retrieval date; a numbered, dated report does not.

Title and report number

Copy the official title and put it in italics and sentence case: capitalize the first word, the first word after a colon, and proper nouns. Do not rewrite a long government title into a methods-section paraphrase. The APA Style creating a reference list handout, last updated 23 February 2022, places identifying information after the title, not in a second sentence.

APA Style on report numbers and document type

For book and report references, place any identifying information (e.g., edition, report number, volume number) in parentheses after the title. Do not add a period between the title and the parenthetical information.

If the report has a report number, include it in parentheses without italics after the report title.

Reference formats are based on the document type (e.g., journal article, report), not the retrieval method (e.g., online, in print).

Even if you retrieved a work online, determine what type of document it is. Only cite a work as a webpage or website if no other category fits.

Write the number the way the issuing office writes it: NIH Publication No. 18-2059, NCES 2026-144, Report No. NASA/CR-2018-220043, GAO-25-107743, RL30064. If the cover has no number, omit the parentheses. Do not invent Report No. 1.

Publisher and locator

The publisher slot is for parent agencies that are not already in the author name. That is why the official National Cancer Institute example lists "U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health" after the title: NCI is the author; HHS and NIH are the source. When the group author and the publisher are the same body, omit the publisher. Prefer a DOI over any other URL. If there is no DOI, use the report landing page or a stable PDF URL on a .gov or organization domain. See how to use DOIs and how to find a DOI. Never add a retrieval date to a DOI.

APA Style on omitting a repeated publisher

When the author and the publisher of a work are the same (as in many reports, books, and websites published by group authors), include the group name in the author element and omit it from the source element.

How to Abbreviate Agency Names in Text

Spell the agency out in the reference list. In the paper, you may abbreviate a well-known name after you introduce it, following the APA Style group author abbreviations page and the author–date citation system table. You are not required to abbreviate. APA says to abbreviate when the short form is well known, will prevent cumbersome repetition, or will appear at least three times.

APA Style on introducing a group-author abbreviation

As with other abbreviations, provide the full name of the group on first mention in the text, followed by the abbreviation.

If the group name first appears in a narrative citation, include the abbreviation before the year in parentheses, separated with a comma.

If the group name first appears in a parenthetical citation, include the abbreviation in square brackets, followed by a comma and the year.

In the reference list entry, do not abbreviate the group author name. Instead, spell out the full name of the group as presented in the source.

Define the abbreviation for a group author only once in the text, choosing either the parenthetical or the narrative format. Thereafter, use the abbreviation for all mentions of the group in the text.

Official APA author–date forms for a group author

First parenthetical citation:

(National Institute of Mental Health [NIMH], 2020)

Subsequent parenthetical citations:

(NIMH, 2020)

First narrative citation:

National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH, 2020)

Subsequent narrative citations:

NIMH (2020)

Reference list (never the abbreviation):

National Institute of Mental Health.

Worked Examples From Official Pages and Real Reports

The first three references are the official APA Style examples, still reprinted on the live government-agency and individual-author pages and on the Alamo Colleges gray-literature reprint. The later ones apply the same §10.4 pattern to reports you can open today, including the May 2026 Condition of Education volume and the 10 September 2026 CRS update of RL30064. Do not reuse the invented "Smith, J. K." Department of Energy report or the nonexistent GAO-24-123 climate memo from older versions of this page.

Official example: agency author, parent agencies as publisher

APA Style's government-agency page uses the National Cancer Institute booklet Taking Time. The PDF is still on cancer.gov. NCI is the author. HHS and NIH appear only as publisher. The publication number sits in roman type after the italic title. SNHU Library reprints the same official example.

APA Style, report by a government agency

Reference list:

National Cancer Institute. (2019). Taking time: Support for people with cancer (NIH Publication No. 18-2059). U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health. https://www.cancer.gov/publications/patient-education/takingtime.pdf

Parenthetical citation:

(National Cancer Institute, 2019)

Narrative citation:

National Cancer Institute (2019)

Official example: most specific institute, not the whole department

The same parent-agency rule appears on the elements page with a National Institute of Nursing Research report. APA Style's printed example uses 2015 and NIH Publication No. 15-NR-8018. The live PDF opened on 16 September 2026 at the current NINR path still carries that publication number and an August 2020 colophon. NINR is the author. HHS and NIH are the publisher. Do not write the whole hierarchy in the author slot. If the PDF you opened carries a later colophon, cite the year on that file — do not copy a year from a library reprint of a different deposit.

APA Style, layered government author

Reference list:

National Institute of Nursing Research. (2015). A family’s perspective: Pediatric palliative care stories (NIH Publication No. 15-NR-8018). U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health. https://www.ninr.nih.gov/sites/default/files/docs/NINR_508c_FamilyStories_0.pdf

Parenthetical citation:

(National Institute of Nursing Research, 2015)

Narrative citation:

National Institute of Nursing Research (2015)

Official example: named authors, report number, NASA as publisher

When people are named on the cover, they take the author slot. APA Style's individual-author report page uses this NASA contractor report. The NASA Technical Reports Server still lists Document ID 20190001401, publication date 30 August 2018, and report number NASA/CR-2018-220043. The authors are Stuster, Adolf, Byrne, and Greene. In text, three or more authors become et al. from the first citation.

APA Style, report with individual authors

Reference list:

Stuster, J., Adolf, J., Byrne, V., & Greene, M. (2018). Human exploration of Mars: Preliminary lists of crew tasks (Report No. NASA/CR-2018-220043). National Aeronautics and Space Administration. https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20190001401.pdf

Parenthetical citation:

(Stuster et al., 2018)

Narrative citation:

Stuster et al. (2018)

The Condition of Education title-page test: 2024 named authors, 2026 group author

The annual Report on the Condition of Education is the classic classroom trap, and the cover changed. The 2024 volume (NCES 2024-144) names Véronique Irwin and colleagues on the title page, so those people are the authors and NCES is the publisher. The May 2026 volume (NCES 2026-144) does not. Its title page and NCES's own suggested citation name the National Center for Education Statistics as author. A catalog line that says "NCES" is not a title page, and a commissioner's transmittal letter is not an author line. APA 7 drops the city NCES still prints, drops the "Retrieved [date]" line on a dated PDF, and puts the parent agencies — U.S. Department of Education and the Institute of Education Sciences — in the publisher slot rather than repeating NCES.

Same series, two title pages, two APA 7 forms

2026 group-author report (NCES 2026-144):

National Center for Education Statistics. (2026). Report on the condition of education 2026 (NCES 2026-144). U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences. https://ies.ed.gov/sites/default/files/nces/document/2026/05/NCES%202026144.pdf

2026 parenthetical citation, first use if you abbreviate:

(National Center for Education Statistics [NCES], 2026)

2024 named-author report (NCES 2024-144):

Irwin, V., Wang, K., Jung, J., Kessler, E., Tezil, T., Alhassani, S., Filbey, A., Dilig, R., & Bullock Mann, F. (2024). Report on the condition of education 2024 (NCES 2024-144). National Center for Education Statistics. https://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2024144

2024 parenthetical citation:

(Irwin et al., 2024)

Do not copy the 2024 Irwin list onto 2025 or 2026. The 2025 summary volume (NCES 2026-019) also uses a group-author cover. For the education-source workflow around ERIC ED numbers, WWC practice guides, and CAEP workbooks, use the education citation guide. This page is the §10.4 title-page test those files still have to pass.

Numbered oversight report, publisher omitted

GAO prints a unique number on every product. Use that number; do not invent a GAO-YY-NNN placeholder. The 25 February 2025 High-Risk Series update is still GAO-25-107743. The PDF cover title is High-Risk Series: Heightened Attention Could Save Billions More and Improve Government Efficiency and Effectiveness. GAO is both author and publisher, so the publisher slot is empty. The title below follows the PDF cover, in sentence case.

U.S. Government Accountability Office, GAO-25-107743

Reference list:

U.S. Government Accountability Office. (2025). High-risk series: Heightened attention could save billions more and improve government efficiency and effectiveness (GAO-25-107743). https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-25-107743.pdf

Parenthetical citation, first use if you abbreviate:

(U.S. Government Accountability Office [GAO], 2025)

Subsequent parenthetical citations:

(GAO, 2025)

Congressional Research Service report

A CRS product is still a §10.4 report, not a statute and not a Congress.gov bill record. Congress.gov's built-in citation tool formats bills and the Congressional Record; it does not replace the title-page test for a CRS PDF. Congressional Salaries and Allowances: In Brief (RL30064) names Ida A. Brudnick on the cover and is marked Updated September 10, 2026. CRS is the publisher. The number is printed as RL30064, so that string goes in the parentheses — do not invent Report No. 1. Cite the PDF version you opened; later deposits increment the file suffix (.45 on the 10 September 2026 file).

CRS RL30064, formatted in APA 7

Reference list:

Brudnick, I. A. (2026). Congressional salaries and allowances: In brief (RL30064). Congressional Research Service. https://www.congress.gov/crs_external_products/RL/PDF/RL30064/RL30064.45.pdf

Parenthetical citation:

(Brudnick, 2026)

Narrative citation:

Brudnick (2026)

International organization report

Treat WHO, UNESCO, the World Bank, and similar bodies as group authors, not as "the UN." Global tuberculosis report 2025 is a titled WHO publication (ISBN 978-92-4-011692-4 on the publications landing page; 74 pages; 184 countries reporting; dated 12 November 2025) with no separate publisher line. Cite the report. If you only reused a number that already appears in a journal article about that report, cite the article.

World Health Organization, 2025

Reference list:

World Health Organization. (2025). Global tuberculosis report 2025. https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240116924

Parenthetical citation, first use if you abbreviate:

(World Health Organization [WHO], 2025)

Subsequent parenthetical citations:

(WHO, 2025)

Report, Webpage, Press Release, Data Set, CRS Product, or Law?

A .gov URL does not decide the reference type. APA formats the document, not the domain. Use this page when the object is a titled report, technical report, CRS product, or similar grey-literature publication. Switch guides when the object is something else.

Choose the APA form that matches the object
What you used	Cite it as	Guide
PDF or HTML report with a title page and, often, a number	Report (§10.4)	This page
CRS product with an RL or R number	Report (§10.4); named author if the cover lists one	This page
Agency article or topic page with no report title page	Webpage	Cite a website in APA
Agency press release	Press release, dated to the day, with [Press release] after the title	This page, then the website guide if no other category fits
Files you downloaded and reanalyzed	Data set (§10.9)	Cite a data set in APA
Table or figure printed inside a report	The report; name the table in the sentence	This page
ERIC ED document that exists only in ERIC	Limited-circulation document, not a §10.4 agency report	Education citation guide
Statute, bill, regulation, or court opinion	Legal reference (Chapter 11 / Bluebook)	Cite legal cases
Chicago notes for the same government class	CMOS 18 document class, not APA §10.4	Cite government documents in Chicago

The living CDC statistics page

The current National Diabetes Statistics Report is a CDC website. The page retrieved on 16 September 2026 carried a "Jan. 21, 2026" stamp and this sentence:

CDC on the National Diabetes Statistics Report

This report is continually updated as data become available.

It is not a 2024 monograph, and the January 2026 stamp is not a reason to invent a numbered 2026 PDF. If you used the living page, cite it as a webpage. The Creating an APA Style reference list handout allows a retrieval date only when a work is designed to change and you are citing an unarchived version. If you used a dated deposit, cite that deposit. CDC Stacks holds a 29 November 2023 snapshot. CDC's own suggested citation on the live page also uses no year and an access date.

Same CDC product, two honest APA forms

Living webpage (retrieval date required):

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (n.d.). National diabetes statistics report. Retrieved September 16, 2026, from https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/php/data-research/index.html

Archived 2023 report:

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2023). National diabetes statistics report: Estimates of diabetes and its burden in the United States. https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/148231

That pair replaces the older invented "2024" CDC reference on this page. Spell out Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the reference; (CDC, 2023) is acceptable in later citations after you introduce the abbreviation.

A press release is not a report

APA's gray-literature examples include a dated press release with a bracketed description after the title. That is still not §10.4. The official sample, reprinted on the Alamo Colleges report page, dates the item to the day and omits a repeated publisher.

APA Style, press release (not a report)

Reference list:

U.S. Food and Drug Administration. (2019, November 15). FDA approves first contact lens indicated to slow the progression of nearsightedness in children [Press release]. https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-approves-first-contact-lens-indicated-slow-progression-nearsightedness-children

Parenthetical citation:

(U.S. Food and Drug Administration, 2019)

State and local reports

The pattern does not change at the state line. Use the specific board, department, or office as author. Add "California" or "City of Chicago" when the agency name would otherwise be generic ("Department of Public Health"). Omit a publisher that repeats that office. If you cannot verify the title page of the file you actually read, use the template rather than a guessed citation.

Template only — state or local agency report

Agency Name. (Year). Title of report (Report No. xxx). Parent Agency. https://xxxxx

Failure Modes Students Actually Hit

Hierarchy in the author slot. Write National Cancer Institute, not the whole HHS–NIH–NCI stack. Parents belong in the publisher element.
Named authors ignored — or copied onto the next year. If the title page lists people, they are the authors. If next year's cover does not, they are not. Condition of Education 2024 is Irwin et al.; 2026 is NCES.
Staff acknowledgments or a transmittal letter promoted to authors. Analysts thanked inside the PDF, and a commissioner who signed a letter, are not authors unless they appear on the title page or cover.
Report number dropped. NIH Publication, NCES, NASA/CR, GAO, and CRS numbers are how readers recover the same file.
Publisher repeated. If CDC wrote and posted the report, do not write CDC again as publisher.
Database URL instead of the .gov file. Cite the agency URL even if you first opened the PDF in ProQuest, HeinOnline, or a library catalog.
Living page given a fake year. A continually updated CDC or census dashboard is not (2024) unless that year is printed as the publication date of the version you used.
CRS product cited as a bill. RL30064 is a report. A House bill, a statute, or a Congressional Record excerpt follows Chapter 11. Congress.gov's APA button is for legislation, not for CRS PDFs.
Law dressed as a report. Bills, statutes, regulations, and opinions follow Chapter 11 and the Bluebook. See how to cite legal cases and the law citation guide.
Testimony dressed as a report. A hearing statement is not GAO-25-107743. Cite the hearing record or treat unpublished remarks as a personal communication.
Press release dressed as a report. A dated announcement with [Press release] is not a numbered technical report.
ERIC ED number treated as an agency report. An ED record that exists only in ERIC is a limited-circulation document. See the education citation guide.
Headline capitalization. Report titles are sentence case, like book titles.

Cite as a report when

The file has a title page or numbered cover
The issuing office calls it a report, technical report, or publication
A report, publication, GAO, or CRS number is printed on the work
You used findings, tables, or recommendations from that publication

Do not use this template when

You only read an agency news or topic page
You reanalyzed microdata and need a data-set reference
The source is a statute, regulation, or opinion
The assignment asked for Chicago or MLA, not APA

Build the reference from the title page

Paste the report URL or DOI into the APA generator, or enter the agency, title, year, and report number in the report tool. Then check the title-page author, the roman report number, and the omitted publisher against §10.4.

APA citation generator Report citation generator

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is the author of a government report in APA 7?: The people named on the title page or cover, or — if no people are named there — the most specific agency that issued the report (APA Style, elements of reference list entries; §10.4). Parent departments belong in the publisher slot. A transmittal letter does not create an author. Do not write "U.S. Government."
Do I put CDC or NCES in the reference list or only in the text?: Spell the agency out in the reference list. You may introduce an abbreviation in the first in-text citation — (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2023) — and use (CDC, 2023) after that. Never write "CDC." as the reference-list author.
When do I omit the publisher?: When the group author and the publisher are the same body. APA's creating-a-reference-list handout says to put the group in the author element and omit it from the source. Keep parent agencies that are not already in the author name, as in the official National Cancer Institute example.
Where does the report number go?: In roman parentheses immediately after the italic title, with no period between the title and the opening parenthesis. Copy the office's own label: NIH Publication No. 18-2059, NCES 2026-144, Report No. NASA/CR-2018-220043, GAO-25-107743, RL30064. Skip the element if the cover has no number.
How do I cite the Condition of Education 2026?: Open the PDF cover. NCES 2026-144 is a group-author report: National Center for Education Statistics. (2026). Report on the condition of education 2026 (NCES 2026-144). U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences. Do not copy the 2024 Irwin et al. author list onto this cover.
Should I cite the PDF or the landing page?: Use the most stable official URL. APA's Taking Time example uses the cancer.gov PDF. NCES 2024-144 still points readers to the pubsearch landing page; the 2026 volume is offered as a direct IES PDF. Either is acceptable when both resolve to the same report. Do not use a library-database session URL.
How do I cite a Congressional Research Service report in APA?: Treat it as a §10.4 report. If the cover names a person, that person is the author and Congressional Research Service is the publisher. Keep the printed RL or R number. Example: Brudnick (2026) for the 10 September 2026 update of RL30064. Do not use Congress.gov's bill citation button, and do not cite the product as a statute.
How do I cite statistics or a table from a government report?: Cite the report, not the table as a separate source. Name the table or figure in the sentence: (National Center for Education Statistics, 2026, Table 2) or (Irwin et al., 2024, Table 2). If you downloaded the underlying microdata and reanalyzed it, cite the data set instead of, or in addition to, the report.
Is the CDC National Diabetes Statistics Report a 2024 report?: Not on the live CDC page, which the agency says is continually updated. A January 2026 page stamp is not a monograph year. Cite that page as a webpage with (n.d.) and a retrieval date, or cite a dated snapshot such as the 29 November 2023 CDC Stacks deposit. Do not invent (2024) for a page that has no 2024 publication year.
How do I cite a law, bill, or congressional hearing?: Those are not §10.4 reports. APA 7 Chapter 11 follows the Bluebook for statutes, regulations, and cases. A hearing or unpublished remark is a hearing record or a personal communication. See how to cite legal cases.
Do I add a retrieval date to a GAO, CRS, or WHO report?: No. Numbered, dated reports are archived publications. APA 7 §9.16 adds a retrieval date only for unarchived works designed to change. Never add a retrieval date to a DOI.
How is this different from citing a government document in Chicago?: APA 7 uses one author–date report pattern for agency publications. Chicago splits public documents into classes (agency book, congressional report, executive order, statute) and often uses notes-bibliography or the Bluebook. Do not mix a CMOS note number with an APA parenthetical year.

How to Cite a Government Report in APA: Quick Answer

Anatomy of an APA 7 Government Report Reference

Author

Date

Title and report number

Publisher and locator

How to Abbreviate Agency Names in Text

Worked Examples From Official Pages and Real Reports

Official example: agency author, parent agencies as publisher

Official example: most specific institute, not the whole department

Official example: named authors, report number, NASA as publisher

The Condition of Education title-page test: 2024 named authors, 2026 group author

Numbered oversight report, publisher omitted

Congressional Research Service report

International organization report

Report, Webpage, Press Release, Data Set, CRS Product, or Law?

The living CDC statistics page

A press release is not a report

State and local reports

Failure Modes Students Actually Hit

Build the reference from the title page

Related Guides

Frequently Asked Questions