Chicago Style uses title case while APA Style uses sentence case. They are the standards for book publishing and social science research respectively, and they look very different.
Chicago Style capitalizes all major words and long prepositions while lowercasing short prepositions of four letters or fewer, articles, and coordinating conjunctions. It is the dominant style for American book publishing.
Chicago Style is required for most manuscripts submitted to book publishers, literary journals, and academic presses. Scholars in the humanities default to it.
Open Chicago Style converterAPA Style uses sentence case for titles in reference lists and most body contexts, capitalizing only the first word, the first word after a colon, and proper nouns. It is published by the American Psychological Association.
APA Style is required for papers in psychology, education, sociology, and public health. It is the standard for dissertations in most social science departments.
Open APA Style converterChicago Style is required for most manuscripts submitted to book publishers, literary journals, and academic presses. Scholars in the humanities default to it.
Prepositions of five or more letters are capitalized. Short prepositions like in, on, at, by, and of remain lowercase.
APA Style is required for papers in psychology, education, sociology, and public health. It is the standard for dissertations in most social science departments.
All words after the first are lowercase unless they are proper nouns or follow a colon. This makes APA titles look significantly different from title-case styles.
Choose Chicago Style for books, literary publications, and humanities scholarship.
Choose APA Style for social science research papers, journal submissions, and dissertations in psychology, education, and related fields.
The contrast is stark. A book title in Chicago Style has most words capitalized, while the same title in an APA reference list would have only the first word capitalized.