Do You Italicize Movie Titles? The Simple Rule and the Exception

Do you italicize movie titles? Short answer: yes, in almost every style you are likely to use. Movie titles go in italics. The longer answer covers the one big exception and what to do when you cannot italicize at all.

The Simple Rule

In MLA, APA, and Chicago style, movie titles are italicized: The Godfather, Parasite, Spirited Away. This follows a broader principle in English: titles of large, standalone works are italicized, while titles of smaller works that live inside something larger go in quotation marks.

• Italics — movies, books, TV series, albums, video games, newspapers
• Quotation marks — TV episodes, short stories, songs, articles, poems

So the series is Breaking Bad, but a single episode is "Ozymandias." The album is italicized; the song is in quotes.

The One Big Exception: AP Style

Here is what trips people up. Associated Press (AP) style puts movie titles in quotation marks, not italics: "The Godfather." AP is used by journalists, news sites, and a lot of marketing teams, and it largely avoids italics. So if you are writing for a publication, check which style it follows before you assume italics.

What About Capitalization

Regardless of italics or quotes, use title case: capitalize the first and last words and all the major words in between. Short articles, conjunctions, and prepositions such as a, an, the, and, of, and in stay lowercase unless they are first or last.

When You Cannot Italicize

Plenty of places do not support italics: plain-text email, many chat apps, social media captions. When you cannot italicize, the accepted fallback is quotation marks: I finally watched "Dune" last night. In handwriting, underline the title, which is the old typewriter-era stand-in for italics.

Why It Is Easy to Get Inconsistent

The rules are simple, but applying them consistently across a long document is where it falls apart: one title in italics, the next in quotes, a song accidentally italicized. A tool like WunderType can apply consistent formatting and catch the slips as you write, in any app. It works alongside the same checks behind a good grammar checker and AI proofreader, and for essays our academic polish guide and comma checker cover the rest of the style details.

So: italicize movie titles in MLA, APA, and Chicago, use quotes in AP or plain text, and keep it consistent throughout. That is the whole rule.

Download WunderType from the Mac App Store and keep your titles formatted right.