Zotero AlternativesOnly apps categorised as Research Managers for Mac

There are many alternatives to Zotero for Mac if you are looking for a replacement. The best Mac Research Manager alternative is Mendeley, which is free. If that doesn't suit you, our users have ranked more than 50 alternatives to Zotero and eight of them are Research Managers available for Mac so hopefully you can find a suitable replacement. Other interesting Mac Research Manager alternatives to Zotero are JabRef, EndNote, Paperpile and ReadCube Papers.

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Zotero alternatives are mainly Research Managers, but if you're looking for Academic Research Tools or Document Managers you can filter on that. Other popular filters include Open Source, Mac, Research Manager and Free. You can also filter by region, for example EU-based alternatives if you prefer software developed in the European Union. These are just examples - use the filter bar below to find more specific alternatives to Zotero.
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Alternatives list

  1. Mendeley icon
     294 likes

    Mendeley helps manage and share academic knowledge: Mendeley Desktop is free academic software (Windows, Mac, Linux) for organizing and sharing research papers and generating bibliographies with 1GB of free online storage to automatically back up and synchronize your library...

    89 Mendeley alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Freemium
    • Proprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Online
     
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    2
  2. JabRef icon
     107 likes

    Bibliography reference manager. The native file format used by JabRef is BibTeX, the standard LaTeX bibliography format.

    57 JabRef alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source (MIT)

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Microsoft Edge
    • Vivaldi
    • Google Chrome
    • Mozilla Firefox
     
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    2
  3. EndNote icon
     45 likes

    Reference management tool supporting searching and importing from databases, auto-formatting citations, creating bibliographies, syncing libraries via the cloud, annotating PDFs, collaboration, deduplication of references, web-based access, and AI-powered assistance.

    51 EndNote alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Paid
    • Proprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Online
    • iPhone
    • iPad
     
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    2
  4. Paperpile icon
     59 likes

    Organize your research papers in a Gmail-like web app, sync your PDFs to Google Drive and cite your references in Google Docs.

    51 Paperpile alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Paid
    • Proprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Online
    • Android
    • iPhone
    • Android Tablet
    • iPad
    • Google Chrome
    • Microsoft Office Word
    • Google Drive
    • Google Drive - Docs
    • Google Scholar
     
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    1
  5. ReadCube Papers icon
     71 likes

    Papers helps you collect and curate the research material that you're passionate about. This award-winning reference manager will improve the way you find, organize, read, cite, and share.

    46 ReadCube Papers alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Paid
    • Proprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Online
    • Android
    • iPhone
    • Android Tablet
    • iPad
    • Microsoft Edge
    • Google Chrome
    • Safari
    • Firefox
     
  6. Paperlib icon
     4 likes

    An open-source and simple academic paper management tool.

    Cost / License

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Google Chrome
    • Mozilla Firefox
    • Safari
     
  7. A lightweight, elegant reference manager. Organize your library, extract annotations from PDFs, auto-enrich metadata, and export BibTeX or RIS — your data stays locally.

    Cost / License

    • Freemium
    • Proprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Mac
     
  8. PDF Search icon
     4 likes

    PDF Search is an app to search multiple documents insanely fast. It enables you to find any information in seconds within lots of documents. It uses its AI-powered algorithm to detect the best related pages. Just search your documents, reference books or notes using PDF Search.

    Cost / License

    • Paid
    • Proprietary

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • iPhone
    • iPad
     
8 of 8 Zotero alternatives