The “classic” citation dialog was the original citation dialog in Zotero, introduced in in 2006 and replaced as the default dialog in 2011 by the “red bar” citation dialog, which allowed for faster searching and citing via the keyboard. The “classic” dialog remained an option for people who preferred to choose citations by browsing their collections rather than searching.

In 2026, Zotero 8 introduced a new unified citation dialog, replacing the “red bar” dialog, the “classic” dialog, and the Add Note dialog (the “yellow bar”).

The new dialog includes a Library mode that directly replaces the classic dialog. It brings all the efficiency-enhancing features of the previous default dialog to people who want to browse by collection.

Library mode, selectable from the bottom right, includes the same collections and items lists as in the classic dialog.

The new dialog is optimized for keyboard use, so you can quickly move into the items list by pressing down-arrow and press Enter/Return to add one or more items to your citation.

In the new dialog, it's much faster to add page numbers and other locator to your citation. After making your selection, simply type a page number (e.g., “123”) directly into the search field, and it will be automatically added to the citation:

You can also add any locator — not just a page number — by typing the full or short name (e.g., “chapter 4” or “chap4”) after the citation and pressing Enter/Return.

If you need to make multiple changes, you can click the citation bubble — or use left-arrow to select the citation bubble and then press down-arrow — to open the citation popup. The locator field will already be focused, so you can immediately type your page number, and you can then adjust Prefix, Suffix, and Omit Author. When you're done, press Enter/Return twice to close the popup and add the citation to your document.

Instead of using arrows to move citations around, you can simply drag them to where you want them. To move with the keyboard, use left/right-arrow to select a citation and Shift-left/right to move it.

The new dialog includes a feature from the red-bar dialog that lets you quickly add citations for selected items and open documents.

When you open the dialog, the selected item in your library, or the selected document tab in the reader, will be shown in a section at the top of the window. To select it, you can simply press Return/Enter on your keyboard or click it with your mouse. You can also choose among other open documents.

This means that, if you just want to insert a citation for the PDF you're reading in Zotero, you can just click Add/Edit Citation and press Return/Enter twice to insert it into your document.

If you've already cited an item in your library, you can type its author or title, and it will show up in a Cited Items section at the top of the dialog. This also helps you avoid accidentally creating duplicate references for items that are duplicated in your library.

The collections list in the new dialog includes the Recently Read collection introduced in Zotero 9. This makes it easy to cite items you've opened recently, even if they're not currently open in a reader tab (and therefore showing in Open Documents).

In the new dialog, there's no text field to make manual edits to citations. It's been possible to edit citations directly in the document since the introduction of the red-bar dialog in 2011, which is why the red bar never included such a text field. More importantly, though, such manual edits should be avoided in almost all cases, since they prevent Zotero from updating the citation as you edit metadata, add other citations, or change citation styles. Instead, customize the citation via the citation dialog, which will allow Zotero to continue to update the citation as necessary.