Should the word 'is' or 'be' be capitalized in a headline?

Yes. 'Is', 'Are', 'Was', and 'Be' are forms of the verb 'to be'. Under all major stylebooks (AP, Chicago, APA, MLA), verbs are ALWAYS capitalized in title case, regardless of how short they are.

Are prepositions capitalized if they are the first or last word of a title?

Yes. Under all style guides, the first and last word of a headline or subtitle are always capitalized, even if they are short prepositions or articles (e.g., 'In the End', 'What Are You Looking For?').

Productivity

Headline Capitalization & Title Casing Converter

The problem: Remembering which prepositions to capitalize across AP Style, Chicago, APA, and MLA leads to inconsistent editorial formatting.

ASG Privacy VerifiedVerified

100% In-Browser Execution. Zero server uploads. Your data never leaves this tab — disconnect your internet and the tool keeps working.

Style Standard

Associated Press

Strict editorial rules

Words Formatted

87 characters

Capitalized Words

Major parts of speech

Lowercased Words

Articles & short prepositions

Enter Article or Blog Headline

Keep Acronyms Uppercase (AI, API, SEO, SaaS, CSS)

Try sample headline:

Formatted Headline (Associated Press (AP) Stylebook)

The Ultimate Guide to Building Modern SaaS Apps With Next.js, Tailwind CSS, and AI Apis

ASG Privacy VerifiedVerified

All headline grammar transformations, stylebook casing algorithms, and acronym protections execute 100% locally in your browser memory.

Headline Capitalization & Title Casing Converter: the complete guide

The Headline Capitalization and Title Casing Converter automatically formats article titles, blog headlines, and research papers according to Associated Press (AP) Stylebook, Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS), APA 7th Edition, or MLA 9th Edition guidelines. Handle short prepositions, articles, coordinating conjunctions, hyphenated compound terms, and uppercase tech acronyms with zero-click grammatical precision.

Comparing Major Editorial Capitalization Standards

Choosing the correct title casing rule depends on your editorial medium. The **Associated Press (AP) Stylebook** is standard for news publications, tech blogs, and corporate PR. Under AP rules, all words with 4 or more letters are capitalized (including prepositions like 'With', 'From', and 'Over'), while prepositions of 3 or fewer letters ('in', 'on', 'at', 'by', 'for', 'to') remain lowercase.

Conversely, the **Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS)**—the authority for book publishing and long-form literature—mandates that ALL prepositions remain lowercase regardless of character length (e.g. 'between', 'throughout', 'without'). **APA Style** mandates capitalizing both elements in hyphenated compound words, while **MLA Style** closely aligns with Chicago conventions.

Handling Hyphenated Compounds, Subtitles, and Tech Acronyms

Standard algorithmic title casers fail on technical words: they lowercase acronyms into 'Ai' or 'Api', or break compound terms like 'zero-server' or 'state-of-the-art'.

Our specialized converter incorporates an exhaustive tech acronym preservation dictionary (protecting terms like AI, API, SaaS, SEO, CSS, JSON, and AWS) and correctly capitalizes the first word following a colon or em-dash indicating a subtitle.

Step by step: how to use Title Capitalizer

1
Select your preferred editorial style guide (AP Style, Chicago Style, APA 7th, or MLA).
2
Type or paste your raw headline into the text area in any casing.
3
Keep 'Keep Acronyms Uppercase' checked to protect technical terms like SEO, API, and SaaS.
4
Review the live transformed title with formatted word counts and capitalization metrics.
5
Click 'Copy Headline' to paste the grammatically sound title directly into your CMS or document editor.

Security & privacy

All text tokenizations, style guide rule matching, and dictionary lookups occur strictly in your local browser tab with zero data retention.