Get headline capitalization right without memorizing the rules. Main words are capitalized; short articles, conjunctions and prepositions stay lowercase unless they open or close the title.
Title case examples
the lord of the rings: the return of the king
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
how to build a state-of-the-art home office
How to Build a State-of-the-Art Home Office
WHAT TO DO WHEN YOUR WIFI IS SLOW
What to Do When Your Wifi Is Slow
a beginner's guide to SEO and HTML
A Beginner's Guide to SEO and HTML
The title case rules we apply
- Capitalize nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns and longer prepositions (over, with, from, about).
- Lowercase articles (a, an, the), coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, nor, for, so, yet) and prepositions of three letters or fewer (at, by, in, of, off, on, per, to, up, via), plus “as” and “vs”.
- Always capitalize the first and last word, and the first word after a colon, dash or sentence end.
- Hyphenated words are treated part by part: “state-of-the-art” becomes “State-of-the-Art”.
- Acronyms such as SEO or HTML stay in capitals, unless the whole title is typed in capitals.
These rules follow the short-word convention used by AP-style headlines. Other guides differ in small ways — Chicago, for example, lowercases all prepositions regardless of length — so check your publication's guide for edge cases.
Title case in other languages
Choose Language rules above the text box to switch the list of small words. Spanish, Portuguese and German rarely use title case for normal headlines — sentence case is more common there — but the option is useful for book titles, product names and bilingual content.
AP, APA, Chicago and MLA title case
Style guides agree on most words but differ on short ones. Pick a style under Title style above the text box. The same title in each style:
| AP style | A Guide to Living With Less: What We Learned From Moving Into a Tiny House |
|---|---|
| APA style | A Guide to Living With Less: What We Learned From Moving Into a Tiny House |
| Chicago style | A Guide to Living with Less: What We Learned from Moving into a Tiny House |
| MLA style | A Guide to Living with Less: What We Learned from Moving into a Tiny House |
| Style | Kept lowercase | Last word | Used for |
|---|---|---|---|
| AP | Articles, and conjunctions and prepositions of 3 letters or fewer | Always capitalized | News, blogs, marketing |
| APA | Articles, and conjunctions and prepositions of 3 letters or fewer | Follows the same rule as other words | Psychology and social-science papers |
| Chicago | Articles, all prepositions (with, from, about…), and, but, or, nor, for | Always capitalized | Books and publishing |
| MLA | Articles, all prepositions, all coordinating conjunctions incl. so and yet | Always capitalized | Humanities papers |
Some words can be a preposition or another part of speech (“look up”, “turn off”). An automatic converter can't always tell, so check phrasal verbs by hand.
Frequently asked questions
Which words should not be capitalized in a title?
Articles (a, an, the), short coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or) and short prepositions (in, on, of, to) — unless they're the first or last word.
Is “is” capitalized in title case?
Yes. “Is” is a verb, and verbs are always capitalized in title case, even short ones like “is”, “be” or “go”.
What's the difference between title case and capitalized case?
Title case keeps small words lowercase; capitalized case capitalizes every word without exception.