Complete Guide on Harvard Essay Format - 2023

There are a number of essay formats that you can use when writing your essays. The essay format you choose depends on your instructor and the university you are studying in. Some commonly used essay formats include APA, MLA, and AMA. This article will give you a complete overview of the Harvard essay format. Once you are done reading this article, you will be master at writing essays using the Harvard essay format.

If you are great at writing essays but cannot remember specific formats, then get in touch with an essay writer. These writers are trained professionals who know how to write an essay using the proper formatting. Any format essay you want, these writers can help you write one.

What is the Harvard essay format?

The Harvard essay format is one of the most used essay formats by students. Just like the Chicago essay format, the Harvard essay format is used by students when they write academic essays or research papers. Students who are in the field of philosophy, behavioral sciences and humanities are told by their instructors and supervisors to use the Harvard essay format.

However, the use of the Harvard writing format is not limited to these three disciplines. As mentioned before, it is up to the university or your supervisor to decide what essay format you should use.

Now that we know what the Harvard essay format is, let us take a look at the complete overview of the format in the next section. The next section will help in answering your question, ‘What points do I need to remember when I write my essay in Harvard format?’

Overview of Harvard essay format

The overview will start by defining some general rules that are a part of the Harvard essay format. Following are the general rules that you should remember

Use a 1-inch margin on all four sides of the paper.

Only two font styles are recommended in a Harvard format essay. These fonts are Times New Roman and Arial. The font size should be no larger than 12pt

Just like other essay formats, remember to use double-line spacing.

Use an indent before you start every new paragraph. This indent is usually half an inch

In the top right corner of the page, include the page number. This page number is actually part of the header.

Another thing to add to the header is a short title of the paper. This should be placed on the right of the page number.

The header on the first page will be slightly different from the rest of the paper. It is the short title of the paper followed by the words ‘Running head’ in all capital and has to be added to the top left corner of the page.

Before you start to write my paper, include a title. This title should be aligned to the center and should not be bold-faced, underlined, or italicized.

When writing the title, remember to capitalize all the main words of your title. Prepositions, conjunctions, and short articles do not need to be capitalized. Now that you are aware of the general rules, let us take a look at how headings and subheadings are formatted in a Harvard essay format.

Every heading that comes after your title is a subheading. Subheadings are used in a Harvard essay format to divide the essay into different chapters. Level 1 headings have almost the same formatting as the title of your essay. This means that it should not be bold-faced, underlined, or italicized.

Level 2 headings are a little different from the level 1 headings. All level 2 headings of your essay need to be left-aligned. They are not underlined or bold-faced but are italicized. Each paragraph you start after a heading should be indented. This indent should not be any more than half an inch.

Let us now cover how the cover page should be formatted. The cover page includes the title of your essay, your name, and the name of your institute. Remember to center the title so that it shows up in the middle of the page. After the title, you should add your name. Your name should be at exactly the halfway mark of the page. A little distance below your name, you should list the name and number of your course. After this comes the name of your professor and then the name of your university.

Other parts of the format include an outline and a reference page. The outline is the backbone of your essay. It lists all the headings and subheadings of your essay. The reference page lists all the outside sources that you have included in your essay. These outside sources can be either primary sources or secondary sources. The format dictates that these sources should be listed in alphabetical order.

Citation in Harvard essays is similar to APA. The only difference is that you do not add a comma between the name of the author and the year. An example of a Harvard essay citation would be (Author 2021). In APA, this exact citation would be (Author, 2021)

If you have trouble memorizing the essay formats, then an essay writing service might be able to help you. These services can present you with sample papers that will provide you a guide for every essay format out there

Now that you are up to speed about the Harvard essay format, you should be able to write a perfect essay using this specific format. Remember to practice this essay format before writing an essay for your course. Practice makes perfect, so we suggest that you get loads of it. Once you get the hang of it, the Harvard essay format will be at your fingertips