Citing a book in IEEE format is straightforward once you know the structure — but the exact rules differ depending on whether the book has a single author, multiple authors, an editor, or is a chapter within an edited volume. This guide covers every scenario with complete, ready-to-use examples.
IEEE Book Citation: Basic Structure
[#] A. A. Author, Title of Book: Subtitle if Any, Xth ed. City, State (if USA), Country: Publisher, Year.Field-by-Field Breakdown
| Field | Rule | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Reference number | Sequential bracket | [1] |
| Authors | Initials then last name; «and» before last | S. M. Kay and R. A. Haykin |
| Book title | Italicized; title case | Statistical Signal Processing |
| Edition | Only if not the first; abbreviated | 3rd ed. |
| City, State, Country | State abbreviation only for US cities | Hoboken, NJ, USA / London, U.K. |
| Publisher | Full publisher name | Prentice Hall |
| Year | Four-digit year | 2021 |
Complete Examples by Case
Single author — first edition
[1] S. M. Kay, Fundamentals of Statistical Signal Processing: Estimation Theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ, USA: Prentice Hall, 1993.Two authors
[2] R. C. Dorf and R. H. Bishop, Modern Control Systems, 13th ed. Hoboken, NJ, USA: Pearson, 2017.Three or more authors
[3] T. M. Cover, J. A. Thomas, and R. W. Yeung, Elements of Information Theory, 2nd ed. Hoboken, NJ, USA: Wiley-Interscience, 2006.Edited book (editor instead of author)
[4] A. D. Dempster, Ed., Maximum Entropy and Bayesian Methods. Dordrecht, Netherlands: Kluwer Academic, 1988.Chapter in an edited book
[5] P. Stoica and R. Moses, "Spectral analysis of signals," in Signal Processing Handbook, A. Poularikas, Ed. Boca Raton, FL, USA: CRC Press, 2009, pp. 1121–1180.For a chapter, the chapter title goes in quotation marks, «in» precedes the book title, and the editor’s name follows the book title with «Ed.» or «Eds.»
Online book (e-book with DOI)
[6] C. M. Bishop, Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning. New York, NY, USA: Springer, 2006. [Online]. Available: https://www.springer.com/book/9780387310732Book in a series
[7] A. Papoulis and S. U. Pillai, Probability, Random Variables, and Stochastic Processes, 4th ed. (McGraw-Hill Series in Electrical Engineering). New York, NY, USA: McGraw-Hill, 2002.Special Cases
| Case | What changes | Example adjustment |
|---|---|---|
| No author listed | Start with title | Book Title, Ed. A. Editor. City: Publisher, Year. |
| Corporate/institutional author | Full organization name as author | IEEE, IEEE Standard for…, Year. |
| Translated book | Add translator after title | Title, trans. A. Translator. City: Publisher, Year. |
| Republished/reprint | Add original year in parentheses | Publisher, Year (orig. pub. XXXX). |
Common Mistakes
- Not italicizing the book title — always italicize in IEEE
- Including the city for non-US publishers without the country — add country (U.K., Germany, etc.) for non-US locations
- Writing «1st edition» — first editions are never mentioned; only 2nd, 3rd, etc.
- Listing editors as authors — use «Ed.» or «Eds.» after the name, not as the first field
- Wrong author format: «Smith, J.» instead of «J. Smith»
IEEE Book vs. Journal Citation: Key Differences
| Element | Book | Journal article |
|---|---|---|
| Title format | Italicized, title case, no quotes | Quoted, sentence case, not italicized |
| Publisher info | City, Country: Publisher, Year | Not included |
| Volume/issue | Not applicable (use edition) | vol. X, no. Y |
| Pages | Total pages not cited; chapter pages use pp. | pp. ZZZ–ZZZ required |
For the full IEEE citation system — including conference papers, theses, and websites — see the IEEE Format Center.