Title Case Rules: Which Words to Capitalise in a Headline

Updated: 2026-11-02

Should it be “How to Write a Headline” or “How to write a headline”? Both are correct, it depends on the style and the language.

Title case vs sentence case

• Title case capitalises the main words: “The Quick Guide to Better Headlines”. Common in American English headlines and book titles.
• Sentence case capitalises only the first word and names: “The quick guide to better headlines”. Common in British news, scientific papers and user interfaces.

The title case rules

1. Always capitalise the first and last word.
2. Capitalise nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs and pronouns, including short ones like “Is”, “Be” and “It”.
3. Keep articles (a, an, the), coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, nor) and short prepositions (to, of, in, on, at, by, for) lowercase.
4. Capitalise the word after a colon.
5. In hyphenated words, capitalise both parts: “Step-by-Step”, “Long-Term”.

AP vs Chicago

The two main American guides differ on prepositions: AP style capitalises all words of four letters or more (“With”, “From”), while Chicago lowercases all prepositions regardless of length (“with”, “from”). Pick one and use it consistently.

Other languages

• French: only the first word and proper nouns (“Le guide rapide des titres”).
• Spanish: only the first word and proper nouns (“La guía rápida de titulares”).
• German: the first word and all nouns, as in normal German writing (“Der schnelle Leitfaden für Überschriften”).
• Arabic: there are no capital letters.

Convert any text in one click with the case converter.

Sources: The Chicago Manual of Style, 18th ed., §8.160; The Associated Press Stylebook; Académie française and RAE (Ortografía de la lengua española, 2010) guidance on capitals; Duden.

Guides

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