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Surfilby Adam Hafez
Free tool

Meta title and description checker with SERP preview

Meta title and description checker: measure title and meta description length in pixels and characters with a Google preview. Free, runs in your browser.

Runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you enter is uploaded, logged or stored.

Key takeaways

  • Google says title links and snippets are truncated as needed to fit the device width, and it publishes no character limit for either.
  • Google states there is no limit on how long a meta description can be; only the part shown in results gets cut.
  • Pixel width decides the cut, so a 45-character title in capitals can fill more space than a 51-character title in lowercase.
  • Google can build a title link from the h1, og:title or anchor text, and can replace the meta description with text from the page.
  • Everything is measured in your browser with a canvas text measurement, so nothing you type is sent anywhere.

What it takes

  • A page title
  • The page URL
  • The meta description

More tools

All of them free, all of them browser-only.

Browse the tools

How to use it

  1. 1Paste the titleUse the exact string in your title tag, not the H1. The two are often different, and the title tag is the text you are asking Google to show.
  2. 2Add the URL and descriptionThe URL becomes the breadcrumb line above the title, and the description is the text under it.
  3. 3Switch between desktop and mobileThe mobile budget is narrower for both lines, so check both before deciding a snippet fits.
  4. 4Read the pixel widthsGreen means the line fits the budget, amber means it will be cut. The character count is shown only as a rough second signal.

Paste a title tag, a URL and a meta description, and this checker shows how long each one is in pixels and in characters, then draws the result the way Google lays it out on desktop or mobile. Nothing leaves your browser: the measuring is done with a canvas on your own machine.

What the preview measures

Google does not publish a character limit for either line. Its title link documentation says the title “is truncated in Google Search results as needed, typically to fit the device width”, and its snippet documentation says the same of descriptions, adding that “there’s no limit on how long a meta description can be”. Width, not a count of letters, is what decides the cut.

So the checker measures width. It renders each line in Arial at the sizes used in results and compares the result with a budget for each device:

  • Title: 580px on desktop, 470px on mobile.
  • Description: 990px on desktop, 860px on mobile.

Those budgets are the tool’s working estimates of the space Google gives each line. Google does not state them, and it changes its layout without notice, so a line a few pixels under budget is a close call, not a guarantee.

How to read the results

Three figures sit under the preview:

  • Title width, for example “596px of 580px”. Green means it fits. Amber means the preview cuts it at the last whole word that fits and adds ” …”.
  • Description width, read the same way against the description budget.
  • Characters, the title and description length. It turns amber once the description passes 165 characters. That threshold is a rough house heuristic for people who think in characters, not a Google rule; the pixel figures above it are the ones to act on.

The preview itself shows the URL as a breadcrumb (the protocol and trailing slash removed, each path segment separated by ” > ”), the title in link colour and the description beneath it.

Worked example

The tool opens with a real headline from this site:

  • Title: “Search Console now reports impressions from Google’s AI features” (64 characters)
  • Description: 147 characters about the Search Console generative AI report

Measured in Chrome on a Mac, the title is 596px wide at the desktop size, 16px over the 580px budget, so the preview shows “Search Console now reports impressions from Google’s AI …”. On mobile it measures 537px against 470px and is cut one word earlier, after “Google’s”. The description is 958px, inside the 990px desktop budget but over the 860px mobile one.

The same check shows why character counts mislead. The 45-character title “WWW WORLD WIDE WEB MAGAZINE: WHAT WE WANT NOW” measures 580px, the whole desktop budget, while the 51-character line “illicit little lilies fill tiny hills in july light” measures 323px. More characters, a little over half the width.

How Google decides what to show

A passing preview shows what fits, not what Google will choose to display. Google says it builds title links from several sources: the title element, the main visible title, h1 elements, og:title, other prominent text, anchor text and links pointing to the page. It uses the meta description when that describes the page more accurately than on-page content would, and otherwise writes the snippet from the page.

Its advice for both lines is plain: give every page a title, keep it descriptive and concise, avoid keyword stuffing and repeated boilerplate, brand it concisely, and write a unique description that summarises that specific page. Changes are not instant either, because Google has to recrawl and reprocess the page, which it says can take a few days to a few weeks.

Common mistakes it catches

  • A title that only fits on desktop. The mobile budget is 110px narrower, so a title that just fits on a wide screen loses its last word or two on a phone.
  • A brand name pushing the topic off the end. Wide capitals in a brand suffix eat width fast; the preview shows which words survive the cut.
  • A description written to a character count. Two descriptions of the same length can differ by hundreds of pixels, so a “safe” length can still be cut.
  • Stuffing the description. A long string of keywords is what Google’s documentation says to avoid, and it is also what makes the preview hard to read.

If you need a hard cap on how much text Google shows, the max-snippet rule in a robots meta tag sets one; the robots meta tag validator below checks it.

Sources

  1. 1.Control your title links in search results - Google Search CentralPrimary
  2. 2.Control your snippets in search results - Google Search CentralPrimary
  3. 3.Robots meta tag, data-nosnippet, and X-Robots-Tag specifications - Google Search Central

Common questions

What is the right length for a meta title?

Google publishes no character limit. Its title link documentation says titles are truncated as needed, typically to fit the device width. This checker measures against a 580px budget on desktop and 470px on mobile at the font sizes results use. Those budgets are working estimates, not Google figures, so put the words that matter first.

How long should a meta description be?

Google states there is no limit on how long a meta description can be, but the snippet is truncated as needed to fit the device width. The checker measures against 990px on desktop and 860px on mobile. If you need a hard cap on snippet length, the max-snippet robots rule sets one.

Why is Google not showing my meta description?

Google uses the meta description when it describes the page more accurately than on-page text would, and otherwise builds the snippet from the page content. Descriptions that are identical across pages or are strings of keywords are the ones its documentation warns against.

Why is Google showing a different title from my title tag?

Google generates title links from several sources, including the title element, the main visible heading, h1 elements, og:title, anchor text and links to the page. A title that is descriptive, concise, free of boilerplate and consistent with the page's main heading gives it less reason to pick another.

Why do the widths differ from other snippet checkers?

Many checkers count characters. This one measures each line with a browser canvas in Arial at 20px for desktop titles, 18px for mobile titles and 14px for descriptions. The exact figure can move by a few pixels between operating systems, and Google changes its layout without notice, so treat it as a close estimate.

Should I write to the maximum width?

No. Write the clearest title, then check it fits. A truncated title that front-loads its meaning still works; a padded title that fits exactly rarely reads better than a short one.