Nouns Edit

Highlight: Capitalize proper nouns. Don’t use verbs as nouns or nouns as verbs.

A noun is a word used to identify people, places, or things (common noun), or particular person, place, or thing (proper noun).

Proper nouns

Proper nouns are unique people, places, and things. Always capitalize proper nouns in sentences.
Proper nouns include:

  • Names and titles of individuals.
  • Names of places.
  • Brand names, names of organizations and companies.
  • Software, product, application, and service names.
  • Names and titles of works such as books, articles, songs, etc.
  • Trademarks and standards.

For more information about capitalizing words and proper nouns, see Capitalization.

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Common nouns

If there is more than one thing, then it is a common noun. Don’t capitalize common nouns unless they are at the beginning of a sentence, or if the sentence implements title case capitalization. For example, there are multiple websites, so website is a common noun. But, WordPress is a unique website out of all of them, therefore, it is a proper noun.

Common nouns include most product categories, devices, features, and technology concepts such as email, laptop, machine learning, website, and server.

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Verbs as nouns

Don’t use verbs as nouns or nouns as verbs.

Examples

Not recommended: Get the download.

Recommended: Download the document.

Not recommended: Calculate the estimate.

Recommended: Calculate the estimation.

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Additional resources

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