A numbered citation pill linking a claim to its source

Assistant answers earn trust by showing their sources. A source chip sits inline after a sentence or in a wrapping row under the answer: a small numeral or icon, then the source name, truncating before it can crowd the text around it.

Numbered citations

The citation number sits in its own small circle, so a run of chips reads as a numbered list at a glance.

1Design tokens quarterly2Theming layered systems3The primitives handbook

As links

With an href the chip renders as an anchor. The pill shape is the affordance: hover deepens the background and text instead of adding an underline.

With icons

An icon can take the leading slot when there is no numbering, for a lone citation or a source type glyph. If both an index and an icon are passed, the index wins.

Interface annual reviewThe primitives handbookLayout systems memo

Under an answer

The intended home: a wrapping sources row in the footer of an assistant answer, each chip linking one claim to where it came from.

Semantic tokens resolve to primitives, so overriding a single primitive cascades through every component that references it. That is what makes whole-system retheming a one-file change.