Developed in 2024 by a team of Canadian law librarians and updated in 2025, this new legal citation style guide offers a free, open-access alternative to the McGill Guide. However, the McGill Guide remains the most widely used format in Canadian courts and legal writing. This guide also includes guidance on citing AI-generated content which is not covered in the McGill guide.
The standard legal citation format in Canada is the "McGill style." The official manual is the Canadian Guide to Uniform Legal Citation (10th ed.) and is available at the Research Help Desk. Call #: KE 259 C264 2023. This 10th edition has the following three citation patterns.
1. Neutral citation
Neutral citations include these elements:
2. No neutral citation (on CanLII)
3. No neutral citation and no CanLII citation