Purplelink
← All guides

How-to

How to import your publications into Faculty180 from Google Scholar, Zotero or a BibTeX file

By · · Last checked October 17, 2026

Short answer: in Faculty180, open an activity input form, choose Generic (RIS/BibTeX), pick BibTeX as the format, and upload the file or paste the text. Then select the records to import, resolve any possible duplicates, and fill in the follow-up questions each imported item generates. Imports create scholarly contributions only. Your campus controls which importers are on, and the screens differ a little by school.

Disclosure up front: I am an assistant professor and I make Vitae, a free Mac app for keeping an academic record, which is one of the ways to get a BibTeX file in step 1. The steps come from Interfolio's help articles and from the University of Toledo's published instructions, linked below. I do not have a Faculty180 login and have not run these steps on a live account, so check each screen against your campus's own guide.

Before you start

Step 1: get a BibTeX file

Pick whichever source you already keep. All of them give a file that Faculty180 reads the same way. The Toledo steps below come from the University of Toledo's Faculty180 import instructions.

From Google Scholar

  1. Sign in at scholar.google.com and open your profile. Clean it up first: sort by title and merge duplicate entries, because every duplicate you export becomes one more record to review.
  2. Tick the box at the top of your list to select all, or tick the papers you want.
  3. Choose Export, then BibTeX. Scholar shows your citations as BibTeX text on a page.
  4. Either copy the whole page, or save the page as a file with your browser's Save Page As.

From Zotero, EndNote or another reference manager

Export the collection or the selected references as BibTeX. In EndNote that is File, Export, saved as a text file with the BibTeX output style. Toledo's instructions advise against RIS for Faculty180, because several citation elements seemed to be missing or out of place after import.

From Vitae

In Vitae's CV & Packages, choose Annual Review and a period (a calendar year, an academic year or custom dates), then Export for Annual Report, which writes a folder with BibTeX and RIS files. Export, Publications in This CV, BibTeX also works. Or export every publication under Settings, Import & Export. The file lists title, authors in order, venue, year, volume, issue, pages, publisher, DOI and URL. Vitae stores a year, not a month, so the file has no month, and a paper can land in the neighbouring period of an academic year. Works with no year recorded stay in the list, so check for them. Vitae's own menu says the file imports into Interfolio, but I have not tested one against Faculty180.

Step 2: open the import screen

  1. Log in to Faculty180 through your campus portal.
  2. Go to Activities, then the publications or scholarly contributions section. At Toledo the path is Activities, then Publications and Scholarly Contributions, with an Add button under your list. Interfolio's article describes it as the Activity Input Form: add a new activity.
  3. Under Import, choose Generic (RIS/BibTeX) and select Continue.

Step 3: upload and select

  1. Set the format to BibTeX.
  2. Choose Copied Text and paste the BibTeX, or choose File and browse to the file you saved. Then Save.
  3. Faculty180 lists what it found. Tick the citations to import, or the top box to select all, and choose Import Selected.

Step 4: resolve duplicates

If the importer thinks an item matches one you already have, Toledo's guide says you pick an action for it: import it as new, replace the existing record, or discard the imported one. Interfolio says its duplicate check compares type, date, journal, location, number, pages, publisher, title, volume, year and authors, and that the check only runs if your campus enabled the de-duplicator. If a paper changed title between preprint and publication, it can slip through as new, so look for pairs yourself.

Step 5: finish the follow-up tasks

Importing is not the end. Per Toledo's guide, each imported item generates a task asking for details the file could not supply, such as the type of peer review, the type of activity and whether an undergraduate was an author. Budget time for it. Check authors, dates and publication status while you are in each record.

If something goes wrong

I could not find an Interfolio article that describes how individual BibTeX fields map to Faculty180 fields. That is why this guide tells you to review each record and does not promise what lands where.

Frequently asked

Can Faculty180 import from a Google Scholar profile directly?

Not by signing in to Scholar. Interfolio documents the BibTeX file route for Google Scholar, and says that route needs the generic import to be on. Direct pulls from ORCID, Web of Science, PubMed and arXiv exist but are enabled through Interfolio.

Will this import my courses, grants or service?

No. The generic import creates scholarly contributions. Interfolio describes courses taught as an administrator's bulk upload, and grants and service are typed in. See what each system can import.

Should I choose RIS or BibTeX?

BibTeX. Faculty180 accepts both, but the Toledo guide advises against RIS and the Google Scholar route produces BibTeX anyway. That is one campus's report, so if RIS works for you, use it.

Can I import only last year's papers?

I found no date filter on the importer in Interfolio's article, so filter before you export, or tick only the records you want on the selection screen. Vitae's Annual Review export does this for a calendar year, an academic year or custom dates.

Related guides