APA Headings Format: All Five Levels With Examples

TL;DR — APA 7 has five heading levels. Level 1 is centered and bold; Level 2 is flush left and bold; Level 3 is flush left, bold, and italic; Level 4 is indented, bold, and ends with a period; Level 5 is indented, bold italic, and ends with a period. All use title case. Start at Level 1, go down only when a section has at least two subsections, and never put a heading on the introduction.

Two different things get called "APA headings," and the first job is to separate them.

A heading is a title for a section of your paper: “Method,” “Participants,” “Limitations.” APA formats these in five levels so the reader can see which sections sit inside which.

A header is the band at the top of each page. In APA it holds the page number, and in professional papers the running head as well.

This guide covers the headings first, in full, then the header, then a skeleton of a paper with both in place.

The five levels

Level	Format	Where the text starts
1	Centered, Bold, Title Case	New paragraph on the next line
2	Flush Left, Bold, Title Case	New paragraph on the next line
3	Flush Left, Bold Italic, Title Case	New paragraph on the next line
4	Indented, Bold, Title Case, Ending With a Period.	Same line, right after the period
5	Indented, Bold Italic, Title Case, Ending With a Period.	Same line, right after the period

Rendered in a document, with the paragraph text in place, the levels look like this:

                              Method                              ← Level 1

The study used a within-subjects design across two lecture formats.

Participants                                                      ← Level 2

Sixty-two first-year biology students took part.

Recruitment and Consent                                           ← Level 3

Students were recruited through the course announcement page.

     Exclusion Criteria. Students who had taken the course before   ← Level 4
were excluded from analysis.

     Late Withdrawals. Two participants withdrew after the second   ← Level 5
session and were removed.

Every level keeps the same font and size as the body text. Nothing is underlined, nothing is enlarged, nothing is in all capitals. Headings are double-spaced like the rest of the paper, with no extra blank line before or after them. If a heading lands at the bottom of a page with no text after it, move it to the next page.

Using the levels in the right order

Headings work like an outline. The rules for choosing levels come straight from that idea.

Start at Level 1 and go down in order. The main sections of the paper are Level 1. Subsections within a Level 1 section are Level 2. Subsections within those are Level 3, and so on. You cannot skip from Level 1 to Level 3 because a section “feels smaller.”

Use as many levels as the paper needs, and no more. A short essay might use only Level 1. A journal-length article typically uses two or three. Four and five exist for long, deeply structured reports. The number of levels is not a measure of effort.

A section with subsections needs at least two of them. If “Participants” has only one subsection, the subsection heading is doing nothing; fold its content into the section. This is the same rule that applies to outlines, where an “A” implies a “B.” Outline Examples shows the parallel structure on the outline side.

Different sections can go to different depths. The Method section might run to Level 3 while the Discussion stays at Level 1. Depth depends on the section’s content, not on symmetry with other sections.

The introduction has no heading. The first page of text begins with the paper’s title, bold and centered, and the opening paragraphs follow. Because the introduction comes first, readers know what it is. A Level 1 heading reading “Introduction” is a common error carried over from other formats.

Section labels are Level 1 headings. “Abstract,” “References,” “Appendix A,” and similar labels are formatted like Level 1: centered, bold, on their own line at the top of a new page. In APA 7 these labels are bold; they were plain in the sixth edition.

Inside the introduction you may still use headings for subsections, and when you do, they begin at Level 2, because the paper title is functioning as the Level 1 heading above them. This is a fine point that even many instructors miss, and if yours wants Level 1 headings inside the introduction, do what the instructor says.

Title case, exactly

Every heading level uses title case, and title case has rules that go beyond “capitalize the big words.”

Capitalize:

the first word of the heading, and the first word after a colon, em dash, or end punctuation within the heading
every major word: nouns, verbs (including short ones like Is and Be), adjectives, adverbs, pronouns
every word of four letters or more, whatever its part of speech: With, From, Into, Than, Over
both parts of a hyphenated major word: Self-Report, Long-Term

Lowercase:

articles: a, an, the
short conjunctions: and, but, or, nor, for, so, yet
prepositions of three letters or fewer: of, to, in, on, at, by, for, off, via

Applied:

Effects of Note-Taking Method on Recall in a First-Year Course
Working With Adolescents Who Have Been Through Care
Is the Advantage Stable Over Time?

The same rules apply to the paper’s title on the title page and to titles of works mentioned in the text. Reference list entries use sentence case instead, which is a different system covered in the reference-list rules.

The word “header” in APA has a narrower meaning than in Word or Google Docs. The APA page header contains one or two items and nothing else.

Page number. Every page, including the title page, carries a page number flush right in the header, half an inch from the top of the paper. The title page is page 1. Use the automatic page number field; do not type numbers by hand.

Running head (professional papers only). A shortened title, in all capital letters, flush left in the header on the same line as the page number, on every page. It may be up to 50 characters long, spaces included. Do not put the words “Running head:” in front of it; that label was a sixth-edition feature and is gone.

Student papers have only the page number in the header unless the instructor asks for a running head.

Student paper, every page:
                                                                   4

Professional paper, every page:
NOTES AND CONCEPTUAL RECALL                                        4

Nothing else goes in the header: not your name, not the course, not the date. Those belong on the title page, which APA Title Page Format lays out line by line.

A paper skeleton with headings in place

This is the section structure of a fictional empirical student paper, showing where each level falls. Body text is abbreviated to a line.

                                                                   2
     Handwritten Versus Typed Notes and Conceptual Recall          ← title, bold, centered

     [Introduction paragraphs, no heading]

                              Method                               ← Level 1

Participants                                                       ← Level 2
     [text]

Materials                                                          ← Level 2
     [text]

Lecture Recordings                                                 ← Level 3
     [text]

Recall Test                                                        ← Level 3
     [text]

     Scoring. Two raters scored each response blind ...            ← Level 4
     Rater Agreement. Agreement was calculated ...                 ← Level 4

Procedure                                                          ← Level 2
     [text]

                              Results                              ← Level 1
     [text]

                            Discussion                             ← Level 1

Limitations                                                        ← Level 2
     [text]

Implications for Instruction                                       ← Level 2
     [text]

                             References                            ← Level 1, new page

Read the headings alone and they form an outline. If yours do not, either the headings or the outline needs work. The chapter on how the parts of a research paper fit together, in Writing an APA Research Paper, pairs well with this skeleton.

Word-processor settings that keep headings consistent

Manual formatting drifts. By the third heading you will have forgotten whether Level 2 was bold or bold italic. Two habits prevent that.

Define styles once. In Word or Google Docs, edit the built-in Heading 1, Heading 2, and Heading 3 styles to match APA (same font and size as the body, bold or bold italic, centered or flush left, no extra spacing before or after). Apply them by name instead of hand-formatting. Levels 4 and 5 are run-in headings and do not map cleanly to a paragraph style, so format those by hand; they are rare in student work.

Check spacing. Word’s default heading styles add space above and below. Set both to zero and set line spacing to double, or the headings will float.

An added benefit: styled headings produce a navigable document outline, which makes it easy to check that no level has a lone subsection.

Common mistakes

“Introduction” as a heading. Delete it. The title does the job.
Skipping a level. Level 1 straight to Level 3 because the subsection seemed minor. Levels reflect position, not size.
A single subsection. One Level 2 heading under a Level 1 section. Either add a second or remove the one.
Level 4 and 5 headings on their own line. These are run-in: the paragraph starts on the same line, after the period.
Sentence case headings. “Effects of note-taking on recall” is sentence case, which belongs in the reference list, not in headings.
Headings in all caps, underlined, or a larger font. The only signals APA uses are position, bold, and italics.
Extra blank lines around headings. Double-space and move on.
A heading stranded at the foot of a page. Move it to the top of the next.
“Running head:” label in the header, or a running head on a student paper that was not asked for.
Numbered headings. Not APA unless the instructor requires them.

Checklist

Level 1: centered, bold, title case.
Level 2: flush left, bold, title case.
Level 3: flush left, bold italic, title case.
Level 4: indented, bold, title case, period, text on the same line.
Level 5: indented, bold italic, title case, period, text on the same line.
Same font and size as body text; double-spaced; no extra spacing.
No heading on the introduction; paper title serves instead.
Levels used in order, with at least two subsections wherever a level is used.
Section labels (Abstract, References, Appendix) formatted as Level 1.
Page number top right on every page; running head only for professional papers or by instructor request, all caps, 50 characters or fewer, no label.

Headings are the part of APA formatting that a reader notices before reading a word, and the part that instructors can check in seconds. The five formats above are the entire system; the discipline is in applying them consistently.

Frequently asked questions

How many heading levels should a short student paper use?

Usually one or two. A five-page essay with three main sections needs only Level 1 headings. Add Level 2 only when at least one section splits into two or more real subsections. Levels 3 to 5 exist for long reports and theses; using them in a short paper makes it look chopped up rather than organized.

Does the introduction get a heading in APA?

No. The paper’s title, bold and centered at the top of the first text page, acts as the introduction heading, and the opening paragraphs follow it directly. Writing the word “Introduction” above them is a leftover from other styles. The first actual heading appears when the introduction ends, for example “Method” or the first topical section.

Can I number my headings, like 1, 1.1, 1.2?

Not in APA Style. The manual uses formatting alone (bold, italics, position) to show the hierarchy, and numbered headings are not part of the system. Some instructors, particularly in engineering or business programs, ask for numbering anyway. If yours does, follow the instructor and keep the APA formatting for each level otherwise.

What is the difference between a heading and a header in an APA paper?

A heading is a section title inside the text, such as “Method” or “Participants.” The header is the strip at the top of every page that holds the page number and, in professional papers, the running head. Searches for “APA header format” usually mean the page header: page number flush right on every page, running head flush left only when required.