Text case
Sentence case everywhere, with capitals only where the words need them.
On this page
Use sentence case
Write interface text in sentence case: capitalise the first word and any proper names. Keep other capitals only where the words need them. This applies to:
- headings, captions and eyebrows
- labels, legends and hint text
- table headers and summary list keys
- tags and badges
- buttons and links
Write “Date of birth”, not “Date Of Birth”, and “Save and continue”, not “Save And Continue”.
Capital letters remove the shape of words, so text in capitals is harder to recognise at a glance. Small or low-contrast text, such as eyebrows, badges and table headers, is the hardest to read in capitals, and is also where capitals are most often used.
Do not transform text to capitals
Do not set text in capitals with CSS (text-transform: uppercase), a utility
class, or by changing the string in code. Write the text in sentence case and
show it as written.
Do not add letter-spacing to sentence-case text. Wide tracking is a
correction for capitals, so it goes when they do. The slight negative tracking
on large headings (--govbb-letter-spacing-heading) is part of the
type scale and stays.
Keep capitals where the words need them
Sentence case does not mean lowercase. Keep capitals for:
- proper names, such as “Saint Michael” or “Barbados Revenue Authority”
- acronyms and initials, such as “PDF” or “NIS”
- codes and identifiers that are stored in capitals, such as a SWIFT/BIC code or a reference number