# Citation File Format Schema

**Canonical:** https://apis.io/apis/citation-cff/cff-schema/  
**Provider:** Citation File Format — https://apis.io/providers/citation-cff/  
**Documentation:** https://github.com/citation-file-format/citation-file-format

Citation File Format Schema is one of 6 APIs that [Citation File Format](https://apis.io/providers/citation-cff/) publishes on the [APIs.io](https://apis.io/) network. This API exposes 2 JSON Schema definitions. Tagged areas include JSON-Schema, Schema, Validation, and YAML. The published artifact set on APIs.io includes API documentation and 2 JSON Schemas.

The CFF schema defines the structure of a CITATION.cff file in YAML, including required cff-version, message, and authors fields plus optional version, doi, license, repository-code, preferred-citation, and references blocks. The current schema version is 1.2.0 and is published as JSON Schema in the citation-file-format GitHub repository under an open-source license.

## Machine-readable artifacts (6)

- **JSONSchema** — https://github.com/citation-file-format/citation-file-format/blob/main/schema.json
- **Documentation** — https://github.com/citation-file-format/citation-file-format/blob/main/README.md
- **Schema Guide** — https://github.com/citation-file-format/citation-file-format/blob/main/schema-guide.md
- **Website** — https://citation-file-format.github.io/
- **JSONSchema** — https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/citation-cff/refs/heads/main/json-schema/citation-cff-schema.json
- **APIsJSON** — https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/citation-cff/refs/heads/main/apis.yml

## Other Citation File Format APIs (5)

- [cffinit Authoring Tool](https://apis.io/apis/citation-cff/cffinit/)
- [cffconvert](https://apis.io/apis/citation-cff/cffconvert/)
- [cff-validator GitHub Action](https://apis.io/apis/citation-cff/cff-validator/)
- [GitHub Native Citation Support](https://apis.io/apis/citation-cff/github-citation-integration/)
- [Zenodo Software Publishing](https://apis.io/apis/citation-cff/zenodo-integration/)

## Tags

JSON-Schema, Schema, Validation, YAML

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Profiled by [API Evangelist](https://apievangelist.com) and published on [APIs.io](https://apis.io/apis/citation-cff/cff-schema/). The API's provider profile, Kin Score and agent-readiness rating are at https://apis.io/providers/citation-cff/.