The principle behind this page is one line long and it belongs to the caption guide: specific beats warm. The three rules of a caption that lands
This page is the inventory — the actual phrases that turn up in almost every book, what is wrong with each, and something to write instead. It is easier to recognise a cliché in a list than to catch it in your own writing at eleven at night.
The test
Before the list, the test that catches everything, including the phrases not on it.
Could this sentence appear in a stranger’s book, unchanged?
If yes, it is not a caption. It is decoration in the shape of one. Forever and always works in any book about any two people who ever existed; you cried at the dog advert works in exactly one.
Why these fail, in four categories
| Category | Example | What it actually says |
|---|---|---|
| Sentiment with no subject | Making memories | Nothing — it describes photography itself |
| Borrowed voice | My person | You have read this phrase somewhere |
| Ranking | The best day ever | An assertion nobody can check |
| Filler | Good times | The page needed words |
The most common is the first, and it is the hardest to see, because sentiment feels like content while you are writing it.
The twenty, with replacements
| Instead of | Write |
|---|---|
| Making memories | Three hours late and nobody minded |
| Good times | The evening the power went |
| Forever and always | Nine years next March |
| My person | You answer the phone at 2am |
| Partner in crime | You drove to Lonavala for a chai bet |
| The best day ever | The day the wedding car did not start |
| Time flies | She was this tall in the first one |
| So blessed | Everybody came, which had not happened in six years |
| Squad goals | The four of us, still, since 2014 |
| Living our best life | Day nine, out of money, extremely happy |
| Love you to the moon | You still cut my mangoes |
| Cherished moments | Sunday, before anybody woke up |
| Words cannot describe | (then describe it — this phrase is a decision not to) |
| Home is where the heart is | The flat with the broken geyser |
| Adventure awaits | We had no plan past Manali |
| Grateful hearts | Ma cooked for eleven and refused help |
| Golden hour | 6:40pm, the terrace, before the mosquitoes |
| Little moments | He fell asleep in the aisle |
| Journey together | From the Dadar flat to this one |
| Simply the best | Nobody else would have done it |
The right-hand column is not more poetic. It is more factual, and that is the entire difference — a fact could only come from someone who was there.
The two that are fine
A running phrase the people actually say. If squad goals is genuinely the joke between five friends, it is a fact about them rather than a cliché. Context decides this and nothing else does.
A blank. Not every photograph needs a caption, and an empty space is better than filler. When to leave a caption blank
The harder one: near-clichés
Some phrases are not on any list and still say nothing. An unforgettable trip. Someone truly special. A day we will always remember.
These pass a cliché check and fail the test at the top of this page, because they could still appear in a stranger’s book. When you are unsure, look for the noun: if the sentence contains no place, no year, no name and no object, it is probably decoration.
The same applies to adjectives doing the work of facts. Amazing, incredible, special and perfect are all assertions about how the reader should feel, and a reader decides that for themselves from the evidence. Replace the adjective with the thing that caused it — not an incredible evening but the evening the lights went and we ate on the floor. The second one earns the adjective without using it, which is the whole trick.
Where the clichés come from
Almost always from writing captions after the layout is finished, at the last moment, with a box to fill and a deadline. The phrases in the list are what the brain reaches for under exactly that pressure.
Writing them before the layout, from the photographs rather than into a template, removes most of the problem at source. Captions that make sense in thirty years
Frequently asked
What makes a photo caption generic? It could appear unchanged in a stranger’s book. If there is no place, year, name or specific object in it, it is describing photography rather than these people.
Are common phrases always wrong? No. If it is a phrase the people in the book actually use with each other, it is a fact about them and it works.
What if the specific version sounds less romantic? It usually is less romantic and more affecting. You still cut my mangoes does more than love you to the moon, and only one of them is evidence.
How many captions does a book need? Fewer than most people write. A blank is better than filler.
When should I write them? Before the layout, from the photographs. Clichés are what appears when you are filling a box at the last minute.
The whole page, in one line
| If your caption has… | Then |
|---|---|
| A place, a year, or a name | Keep it |
| A quality but no instance | Rewrite it as an instance |
| A phrase you have seen elsewhere | Cut it, unless they actually say it |
| Nothing you could only know | Leave it blank |
Part of our guide to writing captions. See also: short captions and long ones · using quotes in a photo book.
Written with a designer, not into a template: Photo magazines from ₹499 · All 11 keepsakes