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You are here: Home / Google / New Mobile Title Tag Lengths for Google Search Results

New Mobile Title Tag Lengths for Google Search Results

May 16, 2016 at 5:20 am PST By Jennifer Slegg

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google mobile title tag lengthLast week, Google shook things up by increasing the width of the search results, and increasing the length of the title tags showing in the search results with it.  Google has also expanded the increased title tags to the mobile search results as well, and they have been expanded significantly more than in desktop.

Google has now increased the maximum length of the mobile title tag to about 78 characters.  This is an extra 8 characters – or a keyword or two – from the new length of the desktop title tag, which increased to about 70 characters this week.

Here is an example in the mobile search results of longer title tags.  What is especially notable is that the first example is a product listing, and those extra keywords can be pretty crucial when attracting clickthroughs with the potential for a sale.

mobile titles 3c

The Amazon example is 78 characters long before Google truncates it with (…).  Here is the desktop version, this with 60 displayed characters, as there would not be enough room to include both the next keyword and ellipses before running out of space in the line, as well as the fact Google uses pixel count for the width, while SEOs tend to use character count for approximation.

mobile titles 3b

And another example of a longer title, this one at 76 characters:

mobile titles 4

Here is an example of one at 70 characters, seemingly optimized for the new desktop title length:

mobile titles 5

Something that is notable is that the length of title tags also makes a difference in the amount of real estate a search result takes up on the page.  The top two results in this example had shorter title tags (less than 45 characters) while the third used a longer title tag.

mobile titles 8

Will the two significantly different title tag lengths impact how SEOs decide to implement mobile sites?  With such different title tag lengths being used for desktop and mobile, it might encourage some to go with a separate mobile implementation (ie. m.example.com) rather than responsive design, which is generally the go to option by many site owners.

With mobile getting more traffic than desktop, some might think it is worth optimizing title tags for mobile, and just letting the desktop title tags be truncated by Google with (…).  Before doing this, site owners should definitely look at their site’s traffic, and also from an ROI perspective.

But Google adding those extra characters to the mobile title tags definitely will make it interesting – as well as a strategic – decision for site owners to make.  Optimize for the 70 character desktop title or the 78 character mobile title?  The safe option would be using the 70 character option to prevent truncating, but for sites with the majority of traffic on mobile, the smarter decision might be going 78 characters instead.

Also, remember Google does use pixel length, so depending on character choice, the actual length could vary.  But 78 characters seems pretty standard without truncating on mobile.

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Jennifer Slegg

Founder & Editor at The SEM Post
Jennifer Slegg is a longtime speaker and expert in search engine marketing, working in the industry for almost 20 years. When she isn't sitting at her desk writing and working, she can be found grabbing a latte at her local Starbucks or planning her next trip to Disneyland. She regularly speaks at Pubcon, SMX, State of Search, Brighton SEO and more, and has been presenting at conferences for over a decade.
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Latest posts by Jennifer Slegg (see all)

  • 2022 Update for Google Quality Rater Guidelines – Big YMYL Updates - August 1, 2022
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  • Rethinking Affiliate Sites With Google’s Product Review Update - April 23, 2021
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Trackbacks

  1. SearchCap: Gboard SEO, Google PLAs & Project Tango says:
    May 16, 2016 at 1:00 pm

    […] New Mobile Title Tag Lengths for Google Search Results, thesempost.com […]

  2. New Title & Description Lengths for Google SEO in Search Results says:
    May 16, 2016 at 4:39 pm

    […] New Mobile Title Tag Lengths for Google Search Results – May 16, 2016 […]

  3. Google Extends Lengths of Title Tags in Mobile Search Results - Search Engine Journal says:
    May 16, 2016 at 4:42 pm

    […] news that Google has increased the widths of title tags and descriptions, is a new report by Jennifer Slegg who says Google has now increased the title tags on mobile search results as well. Not only have […]

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