Title case looks simple at first. Capitalize the big words, lowercase the small ones, and you are done. In practice, almost every writer makes the same handful of mistakes, and most of them come from confusing rules across style guides or from misreading which words count as "major" inside a title.
This guide covers the seven mistakes that show up most often in real titles, the rule that fixes each one, and the style-guide differences that explain why writers slip up.
Quick Reference: Common Mistakes and the Fix
| Wrong | Right | Why |
|---|---|---|
| The Catcher In The Rye | The Catcher in the Rye | "in" is a preposition and "the" is an article, both lowercase mid-title |
| Love it or List it | Love It or List It | "It" is a pronoun and stays capitalized |
| Pride And Prejudice | Pride and Prejudice | "and" is a coordinating conjunction, lowercase mid-title |
| Spider-man: Homecoming | Spider-Man: Homecoming | Both parts of a hyphenated compound capitalize when they are principal words |
| A guide to Modern Cooking | A Guide to Modern Cooking | The first word ("A") is always capitalized, even if it is an article |
| How to Be a Better writer | How to Be a Better Writer | The last word ("Writer") is always capitalized |
| Notes On Editing | Notes on Editing | "on" is a preposition and stays lowercase mid-title |
Table of contents
How Title Case Works
First and Last Words Are Always Capitalized
Capitalize the first word of every title regardless of its part of speech. Capitalize the last word for the same reason. Even articles like "a" and "the" or prepositions like "to" get capitalized when they fall in either of those positions. A Tale of Two Cities starts with a capital "A" because it is the first word, even though "a" would be lowercase mid-title.
Proper Nouns and Proper Adjectives
Names of people, places, organizations, brands, and products stay capitalized everywhere they appear, including the middle of a title. Adjectives derived from proper nouns (American, Shakespearean, French) follow the same rule. Title case does not change how proper nouns work.
Major Words Get Capitalized, Minor Words Stay Lowercase
Major words are nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. Capitalize all of them, regardless of length. Minor words are articles ("a", "an", "the"), coordinating conjunctions ("and", "but", "or", "nor", "for", "so", "yet"), and short prepositions ("at", "by", "in", "of", "on", "to", "up"). They stay lowercase unless they fall in the first or last position.
The Seven Most Common Mistakes
Mistake 1: Capitalizing Every Word
The most common mistake is the "capitalize everything" approach. Writers see that most words are capitalized in a title and assume all of them should be. They are not. Articles, coordinating conjunctions, and short prepositions stay lowercase mid-title. The Catcher in the Rye is correct. The Catcher In The Rye is wrong in every major style guide.
Mistake 2: Lowercasing the Wrong Short Words
The reverse mistake is treating every short word like an article. "Is", "Be", "Do", "We", "It", "He", and "She" are short, but they are verbs and pronouns, not articles or prepositions. They stay capitalized. Love It or List It is correct because "It" is a pronoun. Love it or List it looks like a mid-title lowercase, but pronouns do not follow that rule.
Mistake 3: Mishandling Prepositions
Prepositions split the style guides. Chicago and MLA lowercase prepositions of any length, so "with", "from", "about", and "between" all stay lowercase mid-title. APA, AP, AMA, and the New York Times capitalize prepositions of four or more letters, so "With", "From", "About", and "Between" all get capital letters under those guides. Pick one guide and apply it consistently. See title case prepositions: the 1 to 4 letter rule for the full breakdown.
Mistake 4: Capitalizing Coordinating Conjunctions
The seven coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, nor, for, so, yet) stay lowercase mid-title across every major style guide. Pride and Prejudice is correct. Pride And Prejudice is wrong. The trap is "for" and "so", which can also function as prepositions or adverbs, but in title-case context they almost always sit between two clauses and stay lowercase.
Mistake 5: Ignoring Hyphenated Words
Hyphenated words throw writers because each segment is technically a separate word. The standard rule: capitalize each part of a hyphenated compound unless the second part is a minor word. Spider-Man is correct because "Man" is a noun. Self-Help is correct because "Help" is a noun. One-on-One capitalizes the third "One" because it is a principal word, but lowercases "on" as a preposition. The full rules live in the hyphenated words guide.
Mistake 6: Inconsistency Across Headings
Within a single document or website, all headings of the same level should follow the same capitalization style. If H2 headings on the homepage are in title case, every H2 across the site should match. The most common slip is mixing title case for one heading and sentence case for the next, which reads as careless even to readers who could not name the rule.
Mistake 7: Using Title Case in Body Text
Title case belongs in titles, headings, and labels. It does not belong in normal sentences. Capitalizing principal words inside a paragraph makes the prose look like marketing copy or a parody of formal writing. Reserve title case for the title field, the H1, and any H2 or H3 you want to emphasize.
How to Stay Consistent
Pick One Style Guide
The fastest way to avoid title-case mistakes is to pick one style guide and apply it everywhere. AP is standard for news and blog posts. APA dominates the social sciences. Chicago covers most book publishing and long-form. MLA is the humanities standard. The four mostly agree, but they differ on prepositions, so a writer using two guides at once will produce inconsistent titles.
Apply the Rule Across the Site
Once you have picked a guide, document the choice somewhere your team can find (a style guide, a Notion page, an editorial wiki). Apply the same rules to blog posts, page titles, navigation labels, button copy, and email subject lines. Drift sneaks in fastest when different writers contribute without agreeing on the rule.
Proofread for Capitalization
Title-case errors hide because the brain reads past them. Two tricks for catching them: read titles out loud (capitalization mistakes often turn into reading stutters) and check your own titles against a converter tool. Pasting a draft title into the title case converter and comparing the output to what you wrote surfaces mistakes in seconds.
Try the Free Converter
The free title case converter on the homepage applies APA, Chicago, MLA, and AP rules to any title you paste in. It also flips the result to lowercase, uppercase, or hyphenated formats if you need a different output. For deeper guides on specific words, see is "to" capitalized in a title, is "with" capitalized in a title, and the rest of the per-style guides.
