Congratulations to the students whose essays were selected for the 2026 edition of Writing with MLA Style! Essays were selected as examples of excellent student writing that use MLA style for citing sources.

MLA Style specifies guidelines for formatting manuscripts and citing research in writing. MLA Style also provides writers with a system for referencing their sources through parenthetical citation in their essays and Works Cited pages.

This resource, updated to reflect the MLA Handbook (9th ed.), offers examples for the general format of MLA research papers, in-text citations, endnotes/footnotes, and the Works Cited page.

Apply MLA format to your title page, header, and Works Cited page with our 3-minute video, template, and examples.

The MLA Style Center offers free online resources on MLA style, including an interactive MLA format template, answers to common questions on Ask the MLA, advice from the MLA editors, and more.

Do you teach digital literacy? Tell us how you use the MLA Guide to Digital Literacy in your classroom!

Writing an MLA style paper and need something to reference? Check out Excelsior Online Writing Lab's collection of MLA sample papers.

For starters, the essay is in MLA format. That means it follows the style manual of the Modern Language Association, which tells you how to format the paper itself and every source you cite.

Do you have an essay or writing assignment but are not sure how an essay should look? Many students who are new to university writing often lose marks unnecessarily due to improper formatting or an unclear writing structure. This handout will help you to visualize a typical essay written in MLA format, as well how to organize your ideas ...

What Is an MLA-Style Essay? MLA (Modern Language Association) style is used mostly for analyzing documents in English and other humanities courses. When using material from a source, MLA style emphasizes identifying the author of the source.