Which words are kept lowercase?

Articles (a, an, the), coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, nor, for, so, yet), and short prepositions (at, by, in, of, on, to, up, via) stay lowercase. Everything else, including verbs and longer prepositions, is capitalised.

Why is the first or last word always capitalised?

Both AP and Chicago style require the first and last word of a title to be capitalised regardless of part of speech. So a title like 'Something to Look Up' capitalises both the opening word and the closing 'Up'.

Does it handle hyphenated words?

Yes. Each part of a hyphenated compound is capitalised, so 'well-known' becomes 'Well-Known', following the common style for headlines and book titles.

How are subtitles after a colon handled?

The word immediately after a colon or semicolon is always capitalised, even if it is a small word, because a colon starts a new title-like clause. So 'a guide: the basics' becomes 'A Guide: The Basics'.

Will it ruin acronyms like NASA?

It capitalises the first letter and lowercases the rest of each non-acronym word, so all-caps acronyms you type may be partly lowercased. Re-type known acronyms after conversion if you need them preserved exactly.

English Title Case Converter

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Title case is the capitalisation style used for headlines, book and article titles, and headings. The widely followed AP and Chicago styles agree on the core rule: capitalise the important words and leave a small set of short function words lowercase, with the first and last word always capitalised.

How it works

Each line is split into words. A word is capitalised unless it is in the “small words” list — articles, coordinating conjunctions, and short prepositions — in which case it stays lowercase. Two exceptions override that:

- First word of the title  -> always capitalised
- Last word of the title   -> always capitalised
- Word after ':' or ';'    -> always capitalised (subtitle rule)
- Each part of a hyphenated -> capitalised individually

The algorithm walks the words, capitalising the first alphabetic character of each major word and lowercasing the rest, so ordinary words are normalised while the structural lowercase words are preserved.

Tips and example

The input “the lord of the rings: a guide to middle-earth” becomes “The Lord of the Rings: A Guide to Middle-Earth”. Notice that “of”, “the”, and “to” stay lowercase as small words, “A” is capitalised because it follows a colon, and “Middle-Earth” capitalises both halves of the hyphenated compound. If your house style differs — some publications also lowercase “as” or capitalise all prepositions over three letters — adjust the result by hand after conversion.