What is Sentence Case? Rules, Examples & When to Use It
Learn what sentence case is, its rules, and when to use it over title case. Includes examples, comparisons with other capitalization styles, and a free converter tool.
What is Sentence Case?
Sentence case is a capitalization style where only the <strong>first word</strong> of a heading or title is capitalized, along with any <strong>proper nouns</strong>. Everything else is lowercase — exactly as you would write a normal English sentence. The name comes from the fact that it follows the same rules as capitalizing sentences in body text. If you write a sentence normally, you are already using sentence case.
Sentence Case Examples
Notice that "React" remains capitalized in the third example because it is a proper noun (the name of a specific JavaScript library). The word "internet" is lowercase because it is now generally treated as a common noun in modern style guides (including AP Style since 2016).
The Rules of Sentence Case
Sentence case has three simple rules: If a title contains a colon, the word immediately after the colon is treated as a new sentence and capitalized: "Content marketing: A practical guide for small businesses." <strong>Capitalize the first word</strong> of the title or heading, always. <strong>Capitalize proper nouns</strong> — specific names of people, places, organizations, products, languages, days, and months. <strong>Everything else is lowercase</strong>, including nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs that are not proper.
What Are Proper Nouns in Sentence Case?
The trickiest part of sentence case is remembering which words are proper nouns. Here are the most common categories: Words like "internet", "website", "web", and "email" are now generally written in lowercase in modern style guides — they were once treated as proper nouns but are no longer. <strong>People's names:</strong> Einstein, Shakespeare, Serena Williams <strong>Place names:</strong> Paris, the Amazon River, Mount Fuji <strong>Organizations & brands:</strong> Apple, the United Nations, Wikipedia <strong>Software & tech:</strong> JavaScript, Python, GitHub, WordPress <strong>Lan
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