2.2. Titles and Meta Descriptions

The limit is not characters; it is pixels

Google does not publish an exact number. Its documentation explicitly states there is no character limit for the title tag and that links are truncated "to fit the device width"; it states the exact same thing for meta descriptions.

The numbers being tossed around come from measuring pixels. The title tag cuts off above about 600 px on desktop, between 50 and 60 characters; the description holds around 920 px, about 155 to 160 characters, which drops on mobile to 680 px and between 110 and 120. And letters aren't the same width: a W takes up almost three times as much space as an i, so "PIZZERÍA WOODFIRE" cuts off sooner than "pizza al horno de leña" with the exact same character count.

The operating rule: write for the mobile screen cut-off. The first 55 characters of the title and the first 110 of the description feature the dish, the area, and the differentiator; anything after that is a desktop bonus. Under 50 characters you say nothing, and over 160 you are writing for no one.

The formula for a pizzeria

The title tag is structured like this: dish or category, area, hyphen, name.

Great, 53 characters: “Wood-Fired Pizza in Downtown - Forno Querétaro”. Fits completely on mobile, leads with the search query, and the name survives the cutoff.

Poor, 83 characters: “Home | Forno | The best artisan pizzeria in Santiago de Querétaro and surrounding areas”. Three flaws: nobody searches for “Home”, “the best” cannot be verified, and above 70 characters, Google rewrites almost every time.

Use a hyphen, not a vertical pipe. In Zyppy's study of 80,959 titles, Google removed or replaced the pipe 41% of the time versus 19.7% for the hyphen, and deleted text in brackets 32.9% versus 19.7% for parentheses. And use a distinct title per page: menu, reservations, delivery, each location, and its own for each landing page promotional. If your manager repeats the same one everywhere and won't let you edit it, that gets fixed in the web design, not rewriting copy.

The description is two sentences. The first delivers the differentiator and the area within the first 110 characters. The second answers the question the searcher arrives with: hours, delivery, reservations, or price.

Great, 137 characters: “48-hour fermented dough and wood-fired oven in Downtown Querétaro. Delivery in Cimatario and Álamos; we take groups of up to 20.”

Poor, 131 characters: “Welcome to our pizzeria, a place where you'll find the best quality and the best service for the whole family. We look forward to seeing you.” Wastes on a greeting the 110 characters visible on mobile and mentions no city, dish, or differentiator.

Google is going to rewrite them

And frequently. Zyppy measured 61.6% of titles rewritten; for those over 70 characters, 99.9%. John McAlpin, reviewing 30,000 keywords from the first quarter of 2025, found 76.04% modified, with barely 35% of the words retained; 63% of those changes removed the brand name. The same happens with descriptions: Ahrefs measured 62.78% rewrites across 192,656 pages, and Portent found 71% on mobile.

Google says it straight: it uses your meta description "if it can provide users with a more accurate description of the page" than the snippet it pulls from the body text. And it compiles the title from whatever it uncovers: the H1, the og:title, prominent text, or the anchor text other sites use to link to you.

What measurably reduces rewrites: having the H1 say the same thing as the title tag—Zyppy saw the rewrite percentage drop across all measured variants when both matched—, staying between 51 and 60 characters, the range with the fewest changes (39 to 42%), using hyphens, and avoiding brackets. The query comes from the lesson 1.1 and you set the H1 on the lesson 2.1.

How to know if yours works

In Search Console, Performance, Pages tab: if a URL gathers impressions and almost no clicks, the problem is the snippet, not the rank. Change the title and description, note the date, and compare four weeks later; the dashboard is in the lesson 6.1. The snippet earns the click; turning that click into an order comes down to CRO.

With 68.01% of Google searches ending without a single click—SparkToro on the Similarweb US panel, January to April 2026—your snippet is often the only thing that person will ever read about you. Make sure it lists the neighborhood, the oven type, and the hours, not a generic "welcome."

Drafting 30 or 40 pairs of titles and descriptions, one per page with no duplicates, takes a full day at your desk. It's included in the SEO service.