Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Capital letters

Wikipedia avoids unnecessary capitalization. Most capitalization is for proper names, words or phrases derived from proper names, acronyms, initialisms, and titles of persons. Where it is not clear from the provisions on this page whether a word or phrase ought to be capitalized, Wikipedia consults reliable sources.

Do not use for emphasis

Initial capitals or all capitals should not be used for emphasis. If wording alone cannot provide the required emphasis, italics should be used:

Not recommended: it is not only a LITTLE learning that is dangerous

Not recommended: it is not only a Little learning that is dangerous

Recommended: it is not only a little learning that is dangerous.

For more information, see Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Text formatting.

Section headings

Main page: Wikipedia:Manual of Style § Section headings

Use sentence-style capitalization, not title-style capitalization, in headings. Capitalize the first letter of the first word, but leave the rest lower case (except for proper nouns and other items that would ordinarily be capitalized in running text). Thus Rules and regulations, not Rules and Regulations.

The same applies to the titles of articles; see Article title format in the policy on article titles.

Linking is easier if titles are in sentence case; it is easier for articles to be merged or split if headers resemble titles.

Initial letters in sentences and list items

The initial letter in a sentence is capitalized. This does not apply if the sentence does not begin with a letter (101 people were killed.), or if it begins with a symbol or item which is always left uncapitalized (such as eBay; see Items that require initial lower case below), although here it may be preferable to recast the sentence.

When a sentence contains non-final punctuation such as a dash or semicolon, there is no reason to capitalize the following letter, even if it begins a grammatically separate sentence: His father was a blacksmith; his mother was a milkmaid. The same usually applies after colons, although sometimes the word following a colon is capitalized, if that word effectively begins a new grammatical sentence, and especially if the colon serves to introduce more than one sentence. See Colons on the main MoS page.

In a list, if each item of the list is a complete sentence, then it should be capitalized like any other sentence. If the list items are sentence fragments, then capitalization should be consistent – sentence case should be applied either to all or none of the items. See Bulleted and numbered lists at the main MoS page.

Proper names

Proper names of specific places, persons, etc. are capitalized in accordance with standard usage: Winston Churchill, John de Balliol, Wales, Tel Aviv, etc.

Most adjectives derived from proper names should be capitalized, e.g. the English people, the London commuter belt, the Kantian imperative, with occasional established exceptions such as teddy bear.

Capitalization of "The"

Generally do not capitalize the definite article in the middle of a sentence. However, some idiomatic exceptions, including most titles of artistic works, should be quoted exactly according to common usage.

Incorrect	(generic):	an article about The United Kingdom
Correct	(generic):	an article about the United Kingdom
Incorrect	(title):	J. R. R. Tolkien wrote the Lord of the Rings.
Correct	(title):	J. R. R. Tolkien wrote The Lord of the Rings.
Incorrect	(title):	Homer wrote The Odyssey.
Correct	(title):	Homer wrote the Odyssey.
Incorrect	(exception):	public transport in the Hague
Correct	(exception):	public transport in The Hague

For capitalization of "The" in band and album names, see Names (definite article) on the MoS Music page.

Titles of people

Offices, positions, and job titles such as president, king, emperor, pope, bishop, abbot, executive director are common nouns and therefore should be in lower case when used generically: Mitterrand was the French president or There were many presidents at the meeting. They are capitalized only in the following cases:

• when followed by a person's name, when they can be considered to have become part of the name: President Nixon, not president Nixon;
• when a very high ranking office is used to refer to a specific and obvious person as a substitute for their name, e.g. the Queen, not the queen, referring to Elizabeth II;
• when the correct formal name of an office is treated as a proper noun; it is correct to write Louis XVI was King of France or Louis XVI was the French king. Exceptions may apply for specific offices.

When a compound title such as prime minister or chief executive officer is capitalized (unless this is simply because it begins a sentence), each word begins with a capital letter: After the war, Prime Minister Churchill was defeated in the 1945 election. This does not apply to unimportant words such as the "of" in White House Chief of Staff.

Honorifics and styles of nobility should normally be capitalized, e.g. Her Majesty, His Holiness.

Religions, deities, philosophies, doctrines and their adherents

Names of organized religions (as well as officially recognized sects), whether as a noun or an adjective, and their adherents start with a capital letter. Unofficial movements, ideologies or philosophies within religions are generally not capitalized unless derived from a proper name. For example, Islam, Christianity, Catholic, Pentecostalist and Calvinist are capitalized, while evangelicalism and fundamentalism are not.

Proper nouns and titles referencing deities are capitalized: God, Allah, Freyja, the Lord, the Supreme Being, the Messiah. The same is true when referring to important religious figures, such as Muhammad, by terms such as the Prophet. Common nouns should not be capitalized: the Norse gods, personal god. In a biblical context, God is capitalized only when it refers to the Judeo-Christian deity, and prophet is generally not capitalized.

Transcendent ideas in the Platonic sense also begin with a capital letter: Good and Truth. Nouns (other than names) referring to any material or abstract representation of any deity, human or otherwise, are not capitalized.

Pronouns for deities and figures of veneration are not capitalized, even if capitalized in a religion's scriptures: Jesus addressed his followers, not Jesus addressed His followers (except in a direct quotation).

The names of major revered works of scripture like the Bible, the Qur'an, the Talmud, and the Vedas should be capitalized (but are often not italicized). The adjective biblical should not be capitalized. Koranic is normally capitalized, but usage varies for talmudic, vedic, etc. Be consistent within an article.

Do not capitalize terms denoting types of religious or mythical beings such as angel, fairy or deva. The personal names of individual beings are capitalized as normal (the angel Gabriel). An exception is made when such terms are used to denote ethnicities in fantasy fiction, in which case they are capitalized if the source capitalizes them.

Philosophies, theories, doctrines, and systems of thought do not begin with a capital letter, unless the name derives from a proper noun: lowercase republican refers to a system of political thought; uppercase Republican refers to a specific Republican Party (each party name being a proper noun). Even so, watch for idiom: Platonic ideas, or even Ideas, as a combination of proper nouns, but platonic love. Doctrinal topics or canonical religious ideas that may be traditionally capitalized within a faith are given in lower case in Wikipedia, such as virgin birth (as a common noun), original sin, transubstantiation.

Science and mathematics

In the names of scientific and mathematical concepts, only proper names (or words derived from them) should be capitalized: Hermitian matrix, Lorentz transformation. However some established exceptions exist, such as abelian group and Big Bang theory.

Calendar items

The names of months, days, and holidays always begin with a capital letter: June, Monday, Fourth of July, Michelmas, Ides of March.

Seasons start with a capital letter when they form part of a proper name (Autumn Open House) or when they personify: I think Spring is showing her colors; Old Man Winter. However, in the general sense, they do not start with a capital letter: This summer was very hot.

Animals, plants, and other organisms

See also: Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of Life § Article titles, Wikipedia:Naming conventions (fauna), and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (flora)

Scientific names for genera and species have an initial capital letter for the genus, but not for the species (The tulip tree is Liriodendron tulipifera; All modern humans are Homo sapiens.) Taxonomic groups higher than genus have an initial capital (gulls are in the family Laridae, and we are in the family Hominidae). For more detailed guidelines on titles with taxonomic terms, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of Life#Article titles.

Common names of species are mostly not capitalized, but there are exceptions. Common names of fauna are decided by individual wikiprojects, see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (fauna). For example, the common names of birds are always capitalized. Common names of flora have currently no consensus on how to capitalize them; see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (flora).

The common name of a group of species should be written in lower case (oak, lion).

There are some exceptions:

1. Where the vernacular name contains a proper noun, such as the name of a person or place, the initial letter is capitalized (The Amur tiger may have a range of over 500 square kilometres; The Roosevelt elk is a subspecies of Cervus canadensis).
2. In a very few cases, a set of officially established common names is recognized only within a country or a geographic region. Those common names may be capitalized according to local custom, but not all editors have access to the references needed to support these names; in such cases, using the general recommendation is also acceptable.

Create a redirect from an alternative capitalization to that used in an article title.

Use a consistent style of capitalization for species names in articles covering two or more taxonomic groups. This could involve the use of:

• scientific names throughout (often appropriate for specialist articles);
• title case for common names of species throughout, and lower case for common names of groups of species (the Golden Eagle is a relatively large eagle; see WP:BIRDS); or
• lower-case initial letters for common names, which may work well for non-specialist articles that refer to different taxonomic groups.

Celestial bodies

The words sun, earth, moon and solar system are capitalized (as proper nouns) when used in an astronomical context to refer to a specific celestial body (our Sun, Earth, Moon and Solar System): The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System; The Moon orbits the Earth. They are not capitalized when used outside an astronomical context (The sky was clear and the sun felt warm), or when used in a general sense (Io is a moon of Jupiter). However they are capitalized in personifications, as in Sol Invictus ("Unconquered Sun") was the Roman sun god.

Names of planets, moons, asteroids, comets, stars, constellations, and galaxies are proper nouns and begin with a capital letter (The planet Mars can be seen tonight in the constellation Gemini, near the star Pollux). The first letter of every word in such a name is capitalized (Alpha Centauri and not Alpha centauri; Milky Way, not Milky way). In the case of compounds with generic terms such as comet and galaxy (but not star or planet), follow the International Astronomical Union's recommended style and include the generic as part of the name and capitalize it (Halley's Comet is the most famous of the periodic comets; Astronomers describe the Andromeda Galaxy as a spiral galaxy).

Compass points

Points of the compass (north, southwest, etc.), and their derived forms (northern etc.) are not generally capitalized: nine miles south of Oxford, a northern road. They are capitalized only when they form part of a proper name, such as Great North Road.

Doubts frequently arise when referring to regions, such as eastern Spain, Southern California. If these have attained the status of proper names (as with North Korea, Southern California, Western Europe), then the direction word is capitalized. Otherwise it is not, as with eastern Spain or southwest Poland. If you are not sure whether a region has attained proper-name status, assume it has not.

Follow the same convention for related forms: a person from the Southern United States is a Southerner.

(Notice that compound compass points are usually concatenated in American English, for example northwest, while in British English they are written as separate words or hyphenated, as in north-west. This also affects names of regions such as Southeastern United States and South East England.)

Institutions

• Names of institutions (George Brown College) are proper nouns and require capitals. The word the at the start of a title is usually uncapitalized, but follow the institution's own usage (a degree from the University of Sydney; but researchers at The Ohio State University).
• Generic words for institutions (university, college, hospital, high school) do not take capitals:

Incorrect	(generic):	The University offers programs in arts and sciences.
Correct	(generic):	The university offers programs in arts and sciences.
Correct	(title):	The University of Delhi offers programs in arts and sciences.

• Political or geographical units such as cities, towns, and countries follow the same rules: as proper nouns they require capitals; but as generic words (sometimes best omitted for simplicity) they do not.

Incorrect	(generic):	The City has a population of 55,000.
Correct	(generic):	The city has a population of 55,000.
Correct	(title):	The City of Smithville has a population of 55,000.
Correct	("city" omitted):	Smithville has a population of 55,000.
Correct	(exception):	In the medieval period, the City was the full extent of London.

Military terms

The general rule is that wherever a military term is an accepted proper noun, as indicated by consistent capitalization in sources, it should be capitalized. Where there is uncertainty as to whether a term is generally accepted, consensus should be reached on the talk page.

• Military ranks follow the same capitalization guidelines as given under Titles of people above. For example, Brigadier General John Smith, but John Smith was a brigadier general.
• Formal names of military units, including armies, navies, air forces, fleets, regiments, battalions, companies, corps, and so forth, are proper nouns and should be capitalized. However, the words for types of military unit (army, navy, fleet, company, etc.) do not require capitalization if they do not appear in a proper name. Thus, the American army, but the United States Army. Unofficial but well-known names should also be capitalized (the Green Berets, the Guard).

  Correct: the Fifth Company; the Young Guard; the company rallied.

  Incorrect: The Company took heavy losses. The 3rd battalion retreated.

• Accepted full names of wars, battles, revolts, revolutions, rebellions, mutinies, skirmishes, risings, campaigns, fronts, raids, actions, operations and so forth are capitalized (Spanish Civil War, Battle of Leipzig, Boxer Rebellion, Action of July 8, 1716, Western Front, Operation Sea Lion). The generic terms (war, revolution, battle) take the lowercase form when standing alone (France went to war; The battle began; The raid succeeded). As a rule of thumb, if a battle, war, etc. has its own Wikipedia article with capitalized name, the name should be capitalized in articles linked to it as it is in the article name.
• Proper names of specific military awards and decorations are capitalized (Medal of Honor, Victoria Cross).

Musical and literary genres

Names of musical or literary genres do not require capitalization at all, unless the genre name contains a proper noun such as the name of a place. For example:

Incorrect: They are a Psychedelic Rock band.

Correct: They are a psychedelic rock band.

Incorrect: Asimov is widely considered a master of the Science-Fiction genre.

Correct: Asimov is widely considered a master of the science-fiction genre.

Radio formats such as adult contemporary or classic rock are also not capitalized, unless they are abbreviated. For instance, if a radio station's format is given as "adult album alternative", do not capitalize, but if AAA, a common abbreviation for this format, is used instead, then do capitalize the abbreviation.

Acronyms and initialisms

Many acronyms and initialisms are written in all capitals, such as NATO, BBC, JPEG. However some acronyms have gained common usage as ordinary, lowercase words; for example, we write scuba and laser.

Expanded forms of abbreviations

Do not apply initial capitals in a full term that is a common noun just because capitals are used in its abbreviation.

Incorrect	(not a name/proper noun):	We used Digital Scanning (DS) technology
Correct:		We used digital scanning (DS) technology
Correct:	(name/proper noun):	produced by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

Similarly, when showing the source of an acronym, initialism, or syllabic abbreviation, emphasizing the letters that make up the acronym is undesirable:

Incorrect: FOREX (FOReign EXchange)

Incorrect: FOREX (foreign exchange)

Correct: FOREX (foreign exchange)

If it is necessary to do so, for example, to indicate the etymology, use italics: FOREX (from "foreign exchange").

All caps

Avoid writing with all capitals. Reduce them to one of the other title cases or normal case, as appropriate.

• Reduce newspaper headlines and other titles from all caps to sentence case or title case. For example, replace the headline "WAR BEGINS TODAY" with "War begins today" or "War Begins Today".
• Reduce track titles on albums where all or most tracks are listed in all capitals. For which words should be capitalized, see Composition titles below.
• Reduce court decisions from all caps. Write Roe v. Wade, even though the decision when issued was "ROE v. WADE".
• Reduce proclamations, such as those for the Medal of Honor, from all capitals.
• Reduce text written in all capitals in trademarks – see Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Trademarks.
• Reduce Latin quotations and terms from all capitals. See also Foreign terms in the text formatting guideline.
• Change small caps to title case.
• Avoid writing with all capitals for emphasis; italics are preferred (see Do not use for emphasis above).

All capitals are naturally used in many abbreviated forms such as NATO, FBI, etc.; see Acronyms and initialisms above.

Trademarks

Main page: Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Trademarks

Trademarks should be written in a way that follows standard English text formatting and capitalization rules. For trademarks that are given in mixed or non-capitalization by their owners (such as adidas), follow standard English text formatting and capitalization rules for proper nouns (in this case, Adidas). The mixed or non-capitalized formatting should be mentioned in the article lead, or illustrated with a graphical logo.

Trademarks beginning with a one-letter lowercase prefix pronounced as a separate letter, followed by a capitalized second letter, such as iPod and eBay, are written in that form if this has become normal English usage. For considerations relating to such items, see the following section.

Items that require initial lower case

In contexts where the case of symbols is significant, like those related to programming languages or mathematical notation (for example, the mathematical constant e is not equivalent to E), the correct case should always be retained, even in situations where normal rules would require capitalization, such as at the beginning of a sentence. Try to avoid putting such lowercase symbols at the start of a sentence within running text. (See also Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Mathematics.)

Some individuals do not want their personal names capitalized. In such cases, Wikipedia articles may use lower case variants of personal names if they have regular and established use in reliable third-party sources (for example, k.d. lang).

For proprietary names such as eBay, see Trademarks above.

If an article title begins with such a letter that needs to be in lower case (as in the above examples), use the {{lowercase}} template or equivalent code. Note that it is not currently possible to make categories display with an initial lowercase letter in an article's category box. Hence the link to Category:eBay at the foot of the article eBay must display as "EBay". Similarly the article title eBay will be displayed as "EBay" in the category listing.

Anglo- and similar prefixes

Most words with prefixes such as Anglo-, Franco-, etc., are capitalized. For example, Anglo-Saxon, Anglo-French and Anglo-Norman are all capitalized. However, there is some variation concerning a small number of words of French origin. In French, these words are not capitalized, and this sometimes carries over to English. There are variations by country, and since editors often refer to only one dictionary, they may unwittingly contravene WP:ENGVAR by changing usage to that of their own country. In general terms, Americans are most favourable to capitalization and Canadians least favourable, with other countries falling somewhere in between. The main exceptions to the capitalization rule are the following.

• anglicism, gallicism, etc. These words are often, but not always, capitalized. Anglicism is less likely to be capitalized in Canada.
• anglicize, gallicize, etc. Anglicize is often capitalized in the U.S., and sometimes in other countries. Gallicize is often capitalized in the U.S., and usually capitalized in other countries.
• anglophile, francophile, etc. Words in this category are usually capitalized both as nouns and adjectives, except in Canada where they sometimes are.
• anglophobe, francophobe, etc. Words in this category are capitalized in all countries except Canada, where they sometimes are. The same applies to anglophobic.
• anglophone, francophone, etc. These words are often capitalized in the U.S. as adjectives, and usually as nouns. They are usually not capitalized in other countries, whether as nouns or adjectives.

Composition titles

In the English titles of compositions (books and other print works, songs and other audio works, films and other visual media works, paintings and other artworks, etc.), every word is given an initial capital except for certain less important words (as defined below). The first and last words in a title are always capitalized.

The words that are not capitalized (unless they are the first or last word of the title) are:

• articles (a, an, the);
• short coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, nor; also for, yet, so when used as conjunctions);
• prepositions containing four letters or fewer (of, to, in, for, on, with, etc.; but see below for instances where these words are not used as prepositions);
• the word to in infinitives.

This means that the following words should be capitalized:

• the first and last word of the title;
• every adjective, adverb, noun, pronoun (Me, It, His, etc.) and verb, including all forms of the verb to be (Be, Am, Is, Are, Was, Were, Been);
• prepositions that contain five letters or more (During, Through, About, Until, etc.);
• words which have the same form as prepositions, but are not being used specifically as prepositions:
  • particles of phrasal verbs (e.g. "Give Up the Ghost", "Walk On");
  • the first word in a compound preposition (e.g. "Time Out of Mind", "Get Off of My Cloud").

In hyphenated terms, capitalize each part according to the applicable rule. Capitalize parenthetical phrases in titles as if they were separate titles (e.g. "(Don't Fear) The Reaper").

For titles in languages other than English, the capitalization used in the original language is applied, rather than applying English capitalization rules.

External links

• Chicago Style Q&A on caps