Guide

How to add endnotes in Google Docs

Google Docs has footnotes (Insert → Footnote) but no endnotes: there's no setting to put the notes at the end of the document or chapter instead of the bottom of each page. Theses, books and many style guides want endnotes, so here are three ways to get them, and the catch with each.

Updated October 2026

Method 1: by hand, with superscript numbers and bookmarks

1. At the end of the document, add a heading called Notes (Format → Paragraph styles → Heading 1).
2. Under it, type each note on its own line, starting with its number: 1. Smith, Coastal Change (2019), p. 41.
3. In the text, type the matching number where the note belongs, select it and press Ctrl + . (⌘ + . on a Mac) to make it superscript.
4. Optional, so readers can click through: put the cursor at the start of the note, choose Insert → Bookmark, then select the superscript number in the text, press Ctrl + K and pick the bookmark.

Things to know:

• Nothing renumbers. Add a note between 3 and 4 and every number after it, in the text and in the notes, has to be changed by hand.
• Notes drift out of order when you move paragraphs around, and it's easy to miss one.
• It's fine for a short piece with a handful of notes that won't change.

Method 2: write footnotes, convert them at the end

Write with ordinary footnotes while you draft, which Docs numbers for you, and turn them into endnotes once the text is finished. See how to convert footnotes to endnotes for the ways to do that. The catch is the word "finished": a one-off conversion leaves you with Method 1's plain numbers, so any edit after that means renumbering by hand again.

Method 3: Live Endnotes, which keeps them numbered

Live Endnotes is an add-on for Google Docs that manages endnotes for you and can be run as often as you like. Converting footnotes is free, and so are up to 10 endnotes per document.

1. In your document, choose Extensions → Live Endnotes → Open.
2. Click in the text where the note belongs, open the Add tab, type the note and press Add endnote at cursor. A linked superscript marker goes in the text and the note goes in a Notes section at the end, already in the right place.
3. Already have footnotes? Press Convert all to endnotes.
4. After moving, adding or deleting text, press Rebuild endnotes. Markers and notes are renumbered and re-sorted, and running it twice changes nothing.

Notes can go at the end of the document or after each chapter (each Heading 1), numbered 1, 2, 3 or i, ii, iii or a, b, c. Markers link to their notes, so hovering over one in Docs shows the note. They're ordinary text and paragraphs, so the notes print and export to Word and PDF as they look.

Which to use

	By hand	Footnotes, then convert	Live Endnotes
Renumbers after edits	No	Until you convert	Yes, on Rebuild
Notes per chapter	By hand	By hand	Yes
Clickable markers	If you add bookmarks	Depends on the converter	Yes
Cost	Free	Free	Free up to 10 notes per document, then £3.99 a month

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