4 Tools for Online Bibliographic Research

Last updated on February 23, 2025

A universal library open 24 hours a day to all students, teachers and researchers worldwide. The Net has made this dream possible with more advanced and powerful search tools and engines every day. Here is three some of them. Three Four free tools to do bibliographic research in seconds. Research unimaginable only a few years ago.

Google Scholar

Two of the tools featured in this list are signed Google which continues to dominate the web search industry. Google Scholar is a pearl that wins to be known. Google Scholar makes it possible to carry out extensive searches relating to academic work. articles, theses, books, executive summaries and articles. Google Scholar allows you to identify the most relevant research from academia. A real happiness. Google Scholar allows you, after registration, to create a personal library in which you can keep with one click the articles that interest you.
Link: Google Scholar

WorldCat

WorldCat opens catalogs of more than 10,000 libraries around the world. Just that. A gigantic metacatalogue. More than two billion books are available via a particularly fast search engine. You will be able to get bibliographic references in the five most used styles and export these bibliographic references in most useful formats. Interestingly, WorldCat tells you which libraries are geographically closest to you where to find the book or document you are looking for.
Link: WorldCat

Google Books

Google Books is a real showcase of the incredible power of the search tools offered by the Mountain View company. Google Books makes it possible to do full-text searches in millions of books. Out-of-print books, books in the public or commercial domain. The search shall be carried out at lightning speed. Most of the time you will be able to consult in the results at least the part(s) of the book where the subject of your search appears, when it is not the full text. That's great.
Link: Google Books

Update – 1 December 2015

Base

Base is One of the world's largest search engines for academic and scientific publications. A valuable resource offered by the University of Bielefeld. 70 million documents from more than 3000 sources. More than three quarters of them are offered in their entirety. Many French universities are represented. (Thanks to Florence Piron who pointed out the tool to me)
Link: Base