Guide · 4 min read
How long should your page title and meta description be?
Your title and description are your ad on Google — the only two lines a searcher sees before deciding whether to visit you or a competitor. Get the length wrong and Google chops your pitch off mid-sente…
The short answer
| Element | Safe length | What happens if longer |
|---|---|---|
| Page title (title tag) | ~50–60 characters | Truncated with "…", or Google rewrites it entirely |
| Meta description | ~150–160 characters | Truncated with "…" — your call to action often dies here |
Strictly speaking, Google measures pixels, not characters — a title full of wide letters like W and M truncates sooner than one full of i's and l's. Character counts are the practical proxy: stay near 60 and 160 and you're safe on both desktop and mobile.
Writing a title that earns the click
- Put the main keyword near the front. "Handmade Friendship Bracelets — Maya's Shop" beats "Maya's Shop — Home Page".
- Make a small promise: a number, a benefit, a timeframe. "Free Shipping" or "Under $10" does more than any adjective.
- Brand at the end, after a separator:
Main Topic | Brand. - One title per page, each unique. Ten pages sharing one title compete with each other in Google's eyes.
Writing a description that backs it up
- Front-load the value. If truncation hits, the first 100 characters should still make sense alone.
- Include the keyword once — Google bolds matching words, which draws the eye to your result.
- End with a soft call to action: "See the collection", "Try it free".
- Know that Google may rewrite it. If your description ignores what the page is about, Google substitutes its own snippet. Descriptions that honestly summarize the page get kept.
Does the description affect ranking? Not directly — but it
strongly affects how many people click your result, and pages that get chosen more tend to
do better over time. Think of it as ad copy, not as an SEO checkbox.
Preview your snippet before Google does
Type your title and description into our free preview tool and see exactly what searchers will see — with counters that warn before the cut-off.
Open the Google result preview