Mendeley Review
Import citations from databases, webpages, and library catalogs
Mendeley’s Reference Manager is connected to Mendeley’s database arm, allowing one to search for sources in Mendeley and then click a button below each article to add it to one’s Mendeley Reference Manager Library. If you add the source via Mendeley’s database interface, metadata is auto-populated (including the abstract), and a pdf of the article can be added to the source’s citation information page with one click.
The feature I most liked about Mendeley is their Google Chrome extension. When using the extension for citation managers like SciWheel, I often have to go into the SciWheel website to check and/or edit the metadata for a source. Mendeley’s extension fills in the metadata it can find, and then allows you in the extension dropdown to edit all the metadata fields. The extension detects metadata well on journal articles, but not so well on non-scholarly websites and content (e.g. NYTimes).
Your sources appear to automatically be “anonymously” shared with the Mendeley Web Catalog unless you opt out. The Web Catalog is currently a dead link, so it is unclear what data is being shared here, but this did make me pause.
Have the full-text content items (PDFs (full-text), html,) saved in Reference manager (easily); make annotations on articles in your collection; upload your existing digital collection of content (PDFs) from your computer to reference manager
Mendeley allows you to add sources manually, as well as import sources from your computer through uploading pdfs or through .ris, .xml, or .bib files. When uploading a pdf of a journal article, Mendeley is quite good at detecting and auto-populating the metadata. Conversely, I tried uploading an .ris file with two sources to Mendeley and could not get Mendeley to successfully complete the process (I was able to upload the file to Zotero, so I know the sources were indeed correctly connected to the file). Once attached, source pdfs can be highlighted in multiple colors and annotated with comments and general notes.
Create bibliographies in most output styles; format citations for papers
This sounds ridiculous to say of a citation manager, but the Mendeley Reference Manager on its own allows next to no citations. You can copy individual full (I believe APA) citations to your clipboard, but do not appear to be able to adjust the default citation format, copy multiple citations at once, or copy an in-line citation. For these capabilities, you have to download Mendeley Cite, a plugin for Microsoft Word. I did not find it clear at all that you need to download Mendeley Cite in order to create any citations at all. Citation managers like Zotero have Word plugins, but Zotero on its own is also able to output citations. I assumed Mendeley Cite would function similarly, and this is not the case. Mendeley Cite does include a fairly standard interface for adding in-text citations, with the full bibliography insertion requiring a little more click-through. Mendeley Cite can generate citations in numerous formats.
Manage, categorize, and organize citations;
Sources can be sorted into collections. Sources can be sorted directly into collections if using the Mendeley Google Chrome extension. If you are adding sources through uploading or through using Mendeley’s database, you have to sort the sources into the collections after initially adding them to your general library, which is a bit frustrating. You can also add notes and tags to the sources themselves. Tags must be added to each source individually.
The free version of Mendeley’s Reference Manager includes 2GB of storage space. For comparison, the free version of Zotero comes with 300MB and both RefWorks and EndNote require a subscription, making Mendeley’s 2GB a pretty good offer.
Web-based so you can use from multiple computers & work offline
Mendeley works as both a web and desktop app. The interface is the same for both, and your desktop version will sync with the online version. The desktop version can also be used when offline.
Share your article collection with others, view others’ article collections, interact socially with other researchers, & work as part of group
Sources can also be sorted into Private Groups, which allows you to share your source collections with others you know. This feature appears to be getting discontinued, following the coattails of Mendeley Groups (the public version of the above). I’ll say that despite having fairly strong familiarity with several citation managers, it took me some Googling and much frustration to figure out how to add people to a group. Aside from exporting a .ris, .xml, or .bib file of your references, it is unclear how you might share a public bibliography as you can with Zotero or socially interact with others citation collections if you are not personally connected to them.
Overall
As citation managers go, Mendeley is quite aesthetically pleasing and simple in appearance. I found the seeming simplicity of the interface, however, the greatest barrier to being able to use Mendeley. While the navigability of the Chrome extension metadata fields is excellent, the rest of the interface is unclear or just missing. Despite having familiarity with the interfaces of citation managers like EndNote, Zotero, and SciWheel, I found Mendeley quite difficult to navigate. It took me twenty minutes of searching to figure out that I needed to download an additional plugin in order to even create citations. I do think once somebody developed familiarity with the interface and plugin, Mendeley would work solidly for the creation of individual or small group bibliographies for those who tend to work in Microsoft Word. Mendeley, however, does not have (or certainly not a very apparent) capabilities for public bibliographies or social engagement within the reference manager, nor does it have the ability to create citations in a word processor outside of Word.