What are title tags and meta descriptions?
The title tag is the title element in a page's head. Browsers show it in the tab, and Google uses it as the main source for the blue headline in search results. The meta description is a meta name="description" tag: a short summary Google may show under that headline.
<head> <title>Boiler Repair in Leeds | Example Plumbing</title> <meta name="description" content="Boiler repairs across Leeds from Gas Safe registered engineers. Fixed call-out fee, no hidden extras."> </head>
Neither decides exactly what Google shows. Google writes snippets mainly from the page's content and uses your meta description when it describes the page better. It can also rewrite a title that is missing, too long, stuffed with keywords or out of date.
How long should they be?
Google sets no character limit for either. It shortens them to fit the screen, by width rather than by count. As a working guide, and the ranges our own site audit uses: titles of 30 to 60 characters, meta descriptions of 120 to 160. Put the words that matter most at the start, so they survive if the end is cut off.
How to write good ones
- One of each per page, written for that page. Google says identical descriptions across a site aren’t helpful, and repeated boilerplate titles make pages hard to tell apart.
- Lead with what the page is about: the service or product, then the place if you serve a local area, then your name. For example, “Boiler Repair in Leeds | Example Plumbing”.
- Don’t stuff keywords. One clear phrase reads better than five near-identical ones, and Google may rewrite a stuffed title.
- Write the description as a reason to click: what the page offers and what sets you apart, in plain words.
- Keep them current. If a title still promises last year’s price list, Google may swap it for text from the page.
Problems this checker looks for
A missing title or description; one too short to say much, or long enough to be cut off; more than one title or description tag, which usually means a theme and a plugin are both adding one; and a noindex robots tag or header, which keeps the page out of Google whatever its title says. It also looks at the Open Graph tags that set how the page looks when it is shared on social media.