Platform information checked 2026-10-19. JabRef is free MIT-licensed desktop reference management with no required subscription or server. Your computer, document storage and access to paywalled research remain separate. Stable 5.15 covers ordinary bibliography work; optional AI summarization and paper chat are in the public 6.0 beta and use a separately configured provider. Remote AI API usage can cost money; local models need your own memory, compute and electricity. It replaces common EndNote reference and citation workflows, with different integrations and collaboration features.
Collect and cite sources; optional beta AI has separate provider costs.
Free reference manager
JabRef is free MIT-licensed desktop reference management with no required subscription or server. Your computer, document storage and access to paywalled research remain separate. Stable 5.15 covers ordinary bibliography work; optional AI summarization and paper chat are in the public 6.0 beta and use a separately configured provider. Remote AI API usage can cost money; local models need your own memory, compute and electricity. It replaces common EndNote reference and citation workflows, with different integrations and collaboration features.
JabRef · provider documentation interface; not an AltStack installation testProduct image: JabRef authors · MIT · Original image; layout scaled to fit. provider documentation interface; not an AltStack installation test Full notice.Logo: JabRef authors · MIT · Original image; layout scaled to fit. Original provider artwork used for independent identification; no endorsement implied. Full notice.
About JabRef
Collect research references, organize BibTeX libraries and insert formatted citations into documents. Visit the project website to check the currently available deployment options.
Release status
Public desktop packages and current provider setup documentation were source-checked. AltStack did not install or execute the application.
Install on your computer · Instructions checked 2026-10-19
Open downloads.jabref.org or the official stable 5.15 release and choose the installer matching your desktop operating system and CPU.
On Windows, download the MSI, run it and follow its installation instructions. On macOS, choose the Intel or arm64 DMG/package matching your Mac and follow the installer.
On Linux, choose the stable DEB/RPM package or the portable archive. For a portable installation, extract the archive and start bin/JabRef, as documented in the installation guide.
For portable Windows, extract the ZIP and start JabRef.exe. For portable macOS, use JabRef.app from the archive when that route is provided.
Use the Getting started guide to create or open a bibliography library. If you separately choose the 6.0 beta for AI, review its prerelease status, provider settings and API/local-model costs first.
JabRef is free MIT-licensed desktop reference management with no required subscription or server. Your computer, document storage and access to paywalled research remain separate. Stable 5.15 covers ordinary bibliography work; optional AI summarization and paper chat are in the public 6.0 beta and use a separately configured provider. Remote AI API usage can cost money; local models need your own memory, compute and electricity. It replaces common EndNote reference and citation workflows, with different integrations and collaboration features. Choose only your OS route. Public 6.0-beta.1 is available; it is not labeled stable here. No installation or AI request was executed.
AI-powered research notebook with full privacy control.
This local edition needs no paid model API or required software subscription. Your computer, downloads, disk space and electricity are separate. Optional hosted services and remote models can charge. Cloud speech, podcast voices, paid models and hosted services are optional. Document Q&A does not establish NotebookLM audio-overview or all multimodal feature parity.
