ISO 690:2010 gives guidelines for the preparation of bibliographic references. It also gives guidelines for the preparation of citations in Latin scripts in works that are not themselves primarily bibliographical. It is applicable to bibliographic references and citations to all kinds of information resources, including but not limited to monographs, serials, contributions, patents, cartographic materials, electronic information resources (including computer software and databases), music, recorded sound, prints, photographs, graphic and audiovisual works, and moving images. It is not applicable to machine-parsable citations. It is also not applicable to legal citations, which have their own standards.

ISO 690:2010 does not prescribe a particular style of reference or citation. The examples used in ISO 690:2010 are not prescriptive as to style and punctuation.

Explanations and examples of bibliographic references are also given in ISO 690:2010 to illustrate how to apply the requirements for referencing or citing printed and electronic information resources.