Version of Record
The publisher's final, fixed version of a scholarly article.
The version of record (VOR) is the final published version of an academic article — the version that has been copy-edited, typeset, paginated, and assigned a permanent identifier such as a DOI. It is the version that should be cited in scholarly work.
Scholarly publishing has several other versions. The author's original manuscript is the first draft submitted to the journal. The accepted manuscript is the version accepted after peer review but before copy-editing. The preprint is a version posted before formal peer review. None of these is the version of record.
Citing the VOR matters because page numbers, section headings, and even wording can change between versions. A quotation from an accepted manuscript may not match the final text, which can mislead readers and embarrass the writer.
Common mistake: treating a PDF from the author's website as the VOR. If the PDF is the accepted manuscript, it should be cited as such, not as the published article.
“Smith, J. 'Citation Practices in the Digital Humanities.' Journal of Scholarly Editing 12, no. 3 (2024): 45–67. https://doi.org/10.xxxx/jse.2024.0034.”
Keep reading the glossary
A permanent digital identifier that points to a work no matter where it moves online.
The date you actually read an online source, recorded because online sources change.
A single item in a bibliography or reference list.
A formal reference that lets a reader locate the source of a quote.