SERP Snippet Preview
See where a title and description get cut — measured in pixels, as search results are.
What you provide
How this calculation works
Search results truncate by pixel width, not by character count, which is why "Illinois Millionaire" and "WWW Womanhood" occupy very different amounts of space in the same number of characters. Each character is measured against a width table for the font search results are rendered in, and the title and description are cut at a word boundary once they exceed the width a result normally allows. Desktop and mobile are shown separately because mobile titles have noticeably more room.
What the results mean
- Title width
- In pixels against roughly 600 available on desktop. The character count is shown too, but it is the pixel figure that decides where the cut falls.
- Description width
- Across the two lines desktop results allow. Mobile gives three, so a description that is cut on desktop may show in full on a phone.
- Truncation point
- Where the ellipsis appears. Anything after it is invisible in the result, which is why the important words belong in the first two thirds.
- Rewriting
- What you write is a strong suggestion. Search engines replace the majority of titles when they judge a heading or link text a better match for the query.
Common problems and fixes
- My title is under 60 characters and still cut off
- Character count is a proxy for pixel width and a poor one. A title of capitals and wide letters runs out of room well before 60 characters.
- Search results show a title I did not write
- Expected, and common. Search engines rewrite titles they judge unhelpful for a query, usually taking the page's main heading instead. Making the title and the heading agree reduces it.
- My description never appears
- Descriptions are replaced by an extracted passage whenever the engine thinks it answers the query better. A description that reads as a summary rather than a slogan survives more often.
Frequently asked questions
How long should a title tag be?
Long enough to be clear, short enough to fit roughly 600 pixels on desktop — which is around 55 to 60 characters for typical text, and fewer for wide or capitalised words. The tool above measures the actual width. The more useful rule is to put the distinguishing words first, since that is what survives truncation.
Does the meta description affect rankings?
Not directly as a ranking factor, and materially through click-through. It is also frequently replaced: when an engine finds a passage on the page that answers the query better, it shows that instead. Writing a description that summarises rather than sells makes replacement less likely.
Why does my preview differ from what I see in search?
Because the result is assembled per query. Sitelinks, dates, breadcrumbs and rich enhancements all change the space available, query terms are bolded, and both the title and description may be rewritten. A preview shows what you wrote at the width a plain result allows.
Put this on your own site
Free to embed, no attribution required beyond the source link the frame carries itself. It runs entirely in your visitor's browser, sets no cookies and loads no third-party script.
<iframe src="https://runthetests.com/embed/serp-preview/" width="100%" height="560" style="border:1px solid #e5e5e5;border-radius:8px" title="SERP Snippet Preview" loading="lazy"></iframe>
Preview it at https://runthetests.com/embed/serp-preview/. Embedded pages are marked noindex, so yours stays the canonical copy — not this one.