iThenticate is text recognition software that checks a manuscript or proposal against published literature to identify both legitimate duplication (e.g., literature citations) and inappropriate use of text (e.g., plagiarism or redundant publication).

Federal agencies like the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) use iThenticate during research misconduct investigations. Many professional and scholarly journals use iThenticate to screen submissions for originality and self-plagiarism.

Users can upload manuscripts, grant proposals and other professional works into iThenticate, which then compares the work against its database of 70 billion webpages and more than 200 million open access and paywalled scholarly articles, books, conference proceedings, abstracts and other content.

Request an account

To request an account, please complete the iThenticate Account Request Form. You will receive an email with login instructions once your request is processed.

Training materials are available on the iThenticate website, including Training for Academic Customers and a Quick Start Guide.

Frequently Asked Questions

iThenticate is a web-based service that identifies written material that matches text from other documents, including properly attributed content. Use this tool to check your work for unintentional plagiarism. Make sure that any highlighted sections of your document are properly quoted, summarized or paraphrased.

Use of this service is licensed to MU faculty and staff who intend to publish scholarly papers, those writing grant proposals and all individuals who are part of a faculty research team, including research administrators and graduate and undergraduate students.

  1. Log in at iThenticate.com.
     
  2. Go to the “Submit a Document” menu on the right side of the “My Documents” home screen.
     
  3. Select “Upload a File”, browse for the file you want to submit and then click the “Upload” button. If you prefer submitting text directly instead of submitting a file, click the “Cut & Paste” option.

Files cannot exceed 400 pages, 40MB or 2MB of raw text. Accepted file types are MS Word, Word XML, WordPerfect, PostScript, PDF, HTML, RTF, HWP, OpenOffice (ODT) and plain text (TXT).

In addition to the internet, uploaded files are compared to over 40 million published research articles from more than 590 global scientific, technical and medical publishers. iThenticate's comparison database includes more than one million abstracts and citations from PubMed and over 20,000 research titles from EBSCOhost and Gale InfoTrac OneFile. iThenticate also maintains its own web crawler, indexing over 10 million webpages daily.

Results are delivered within minutes, depending on document length.

The results include a percentage score, called a "similarity index” that indicates how much of the document matches other sources. iThenticate does not determine whether a manuscript contains plagiarism. The service identifies content in a submitted manuscript that matches other sources, primarily to encourage authors to check that their sources have been properly cited.

The results include number-coded and color-coded highlighted parts of the manuscript that correspond to matching sources in the iThenticate database. Authors should look carefully at these to determine whether their sources have been properly cited.

Yes. iThenticate does not exploit, resell or share submitted manuscripts. iThenticate does not add your manuscript to any databases. You retain all rights to your work.

If you have questions or would like to schedule a training session for your department's faculty and staff, contact Zach Beran in the MU Office of Sponsored Programs Administration at beranz@missouri.edu or 573-882-0290.

For information on publishing ethics, plagiarism and copyright, contact MU Libraries at  573-882-4581.

Contact Us

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Email: MUResearchOSPA@missouri.edu Phone: 573-882-7560