⚡ Quick summary
Both titled and entitled are used as past tense verbs to mean “to be called by a particular title.” In modern usage, titled is the more commonly used word in this sense. The word entitled is more commonly used as an adjective to mean “assuming one has a right or claim to a special privilege.”
Let’s say that your favorite movie is The Godfather. If you held a copy of it in your hand, would you use the word titled or entitled to say what the name of the movie is? Which word is correct? Are they both correct?
In this article, we will break down the difference between titled and entitled, explain how they are typically used, and give example sentences that show how we use both words.
When to use titled or entitled
The word titled is almost always used as the past tense and past participle form of the verb title, which means “to give a distinguishing name (title) to.” If someone says that a movie is titled Jurassic Park, for example, they are saying that the name of the movie is Jurassic Park. While titled can also be used as an adjective to mean “having a distinctive or honorary name (title),” this usage is uncommon.
The word entitled has several meanings. As an adjective, it’s most often used to mean “assuming one has the right to do something or has a claim to a special privilege.” As an adjective, entitled can also mean “called by the given distinguishing name (title)” or “having a legitimate right to something.”
Here are examples of these senses:
- The older generations often accuse millennials of acting entitled.
- My favorite Star Wars movie is entitled Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
- According to the will, the billionaire’s daughter, not his son, is legally entitled to the family fortune.
Entitled is also the past tense and past participle form of the verb entitle. In this sense it means “to call by a particular title or name,” making it a synonym for the past tense verb titled.
For example:
- There is a lot of speculation as to why the song is entitled “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.”
Until the 2000s, the word entitled was much more commonly used to refer to the title of things. Today in casual usage, both titled and entitled are used to refer to the titles of things, but titled is more commonly used. However, modern style guides often differ on whether both titled and entitled can or should be used to refer to the titles of things. For example, AP Stylebook states that only titled can refer to actual titles, while The Chicago Manual of Style allows for both words but seems to prefer titled.
