What Is Title Case?

A definition in one sentence

Title case is a way of writing titles and headings in which the first letter of the main words is a capital letter and the first letter of small words stays lowercase. In "The Lord of the Rings", the words Lord and Rings are capitalized, while of and the stay lowercase. The first word is always capitalized, even when it is a small word, which is why the title starts with The.

The name is a little misleading, because the rule is used for more than titles of books. Newspapers use it for headlines, academic papers use it for the titles of sections, and companies use it for the names of products and web pages. In British and American English style guides it is often called headline style or headline-style capitalization. Editors also use the term "up style", in contrast to "down style", which means less capitalization.

Title case is different from capitalizing every word. If every word gets a capital letter, the result is Capitalize Each Word, sometimes called start case. Many web tools and spreadsheets use that simpler rule. Title case needs a list of small words, and that list is where the style guides disagree.

Which words are capitalized

All major words are capitalized. These are nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs. That includes short verbs such as is, are, be and do, which many writers wrongly lowercase because they look small. In "What Is a Case Converter?", the word Is is a verb and takes a capital letter.

Subordinating conjunctions such as if, because, although and while are usually capitalized as well, because they introduce a clause. The same goes for words that finish a phrasal verb: in "How to Sign Up for an Account", the word Up belongs to the verb sign up and is capitalized in most guides. Hyphenated compounds are written with a capital letter after the hyphen in most styles, so Well-Known and Self-Report are standard forms.

Two positions are special. The first word and the last word of a title are capitalized whatever they are. This rule overrides the small-word list, which is why "What Is This For?" ends with a capital For. Most guides also capitalize the first word after a colon, so "Title Case: A Short Guide" has a capital A.

Which words stay lowercase

The words that stay in lowercase are the small function words: articles (a, an, the), coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, for, nor, so, yet) and prepositions. The particle to in an infinitive, as in "How to Write", is lowercase in APA, Chicago and MLA.

The disagreement is about prepositions. Some guides lowercase only the short ones. APA and AP capitalize words of four or more letters, which means between, through and about are capitalized, while in, of and on are not. The Chicago Manual of Style lowercased prepositions of any length until its 18th edition in 2024. Since then it capitalizes prepositions of more than four letters, so with and from stay lowercase but between is capitalized. MLA still lowercases prepositions of every length.

The practical result is that the same headline can be correct in more than one way. "A Walk Between the Trees" is right in APA, AP and Chicago, and "A Walk between the Trees" is right in MLA. When you write for a publisher, a school or a company, the style guide you were given decides. The page on title case rules in this guide section compares the four styles in detail.

Title case in practice: examples

A few examples show how the rules work. "The Quick Brown Fox Jumps over the Lazy Dog" lowercases over in Chicago and MLA, while APA and AP write Over because it has four letters. "Ten Tips for a Better Night's Sleep" keeps for and a in lowercase and capitalizes the verb-related words. "Is It Time to Upgrade?" capitalizes Is and the last word Upgrade and leaves to alone.

Numbers and symbols are not capitalized, but the words around them follow the rules: "5 Ways to Save Money in 2026". Acronyms keep their capitals in every case style: "How NASA Plans the Next Mission". Brand names with their own capitalization, such as iPhone or eBay, are best kept as the brand writes them. Automatic converters cannot know these exceptions, so a quick check after conversion is worthwhile.

If you are unsure, test the title by reading it aloud. The words you naturally stress are almost always the ones that take a capital letter, while the quick, unstressed connectors stay small.

Title case versus sentence case

Sentence case is the alternative. Only the first word and proper nouns are capitalized, exactly as in an ordinary sentence: "What is title case?" Title case looks more formal and traditional, and sentence case looks more modern and is easier to apply because it needs no list of small words.

Many organizations have moved to sentence case for interface text and documentation, and many news outlets and publishers still use title case for headlines. Neither is more correct in general. What matters is consistency across a site or document. If one page says "Our Pricing Plans" and the next says "Our pricing plans", readers notice, even if they could not say why. The article on sentence case versus title case in this section goes through the trade-offs.

Why title case needs a tool

Applying title case by hand is slow and error-prone, because you must check every word against a list and treat the first and last words differently. Typical mistakes are capitalizing the small words in the middle, lowercasing short verbs such as is, forgetting the capital after a colon, and treating the last word as a small word.

A converter removes the mechanical part. You paste the text, choose a style and get a version that follows the rule. The converter on this page lowercases the text first, so a headline typed in all capitals is also fixed. It then capitalizes each word, keeps the small words of the chosen style in lowercase and always capitalizes the first word, the last word and the first word after a colon.

Tools still have limits. A converter does not know that a word is a proper noun, an acronym or a brand name, and it cannot tell whether up in your title is a preposition or part of a phrasal verb. Read the result once, correct the exceptions by hand and you are done.

A short checklist

Capitalize the first word and the last word. Capitalize all nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs, including is, are and be. Lowercase articles, coordinating conjunctions and short prepositions, with the exact limit given by your style guide. Lowercase to in an infinitive. Capitalize the first word after a colon. Capitalize both parts of a hyphenated major word.

Choose one style and keep it for every title in the same document or site. Keep acronyms and brand names as they are normally written. And when the title is for a reference list rather than for the text itself, check whether your style uses sentence case there, as APA does for the titles of articles and books in references.