SERP Snippet Preview
Type a title and description and watch where Google would actually cut them. Measured in pixels, the way Google does it.
How it would look
Why character counts are the wrong measure
Most snippet tools count characters and tell you to stay under 60 for a title. That advice is a rough proxy for something Google does not do. Google truncates on rendered width: it lays the text out in a font at a size inside a container, and cuts where it runs out of room.
The difference is not academic. In Arial at 20 pixels, a lowercase l is about 4 pixels wide and an uppercase W is about 18. A title of 60 narrow characters comfortably fits a space that 45 wide ones overflow. If your titles are near the limit, a character count will be wrong in both directions: telling you to cut text that fits, and passing text that will be truncated.
This tool measures with an HTML canvas, the same text-measuring machinery a browser uses to lay out a page. It wraps on word boundaries the way a browser does, and shows you the lines that would actually be displayed.
The limits it uses
| Font | Width | Lines | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Desktop title | 20px Arial | ~600px | 1 |
| Desktop description | 14px Arial | ~600px | 2 |
| Mobile title | 18px Arial | ~400px | 2 |
| Mobile description | 14px Arial | ~400px | 3 |
These describe Google's layout as measured on 21 September 2026. Google changes its result page without announcing it, and font rendering differs a little between operating systems, so a result sitting right on the boundary should be read as close to the boundary rather than as a precise verdict. The date is on this page so you can judge how stale the numbers might be.
Check mobile, not desktop
Google indexes the mobile version of your site and most searches happen on a phone, so the mobile preview is the one that matters. It behaves differently in a way that catches people out: titles get two lines rather than one, so a long title that is cut on desktop may survive on mobile, and descriptions get three lines instead of two.
If you only check one, check mobile.
Google may rewrite it anyway
This is the part most snippet tools quietly omit. Google rewrites titles on a substantial share of results. It does this when it judges your title a poor match for the query, when the title is stuffed with keywords, when it is boilerplate repeated across the site, or when your H1 simply reads better.
So the preview shows what you supplied, not a guarantee of what appears. Writing a clear, specific, query-relevant title makes a rewrite less likely. Nothing prevents one. If you find Google consistently replacing a title, that is feedback: the replacement is what it thinks the page is about, and the gap is worth understanding.
Descriptions are rewritten far more often than titles, because Google frequently pulls a passage from the page that matches the query better than any fixed description could. A missing description is not a fault; it means Google writes one. You simply lose control of the wording.
Getting more from an existing ranking
Titles and descriptions are the cheapest win in search, because they do not move your position — they change how many people click the position you already hold.
The way to find the opportunity is in Search Console. Open the Performance report, sort by impressions, and look for pages with high impressions and a low click-through rate. Those are results people see and do not click. The ranking is fine; the result is unappealing. Rewriting a title there can pay off within days, which almost nothing else in SEO does. Search Console covers finding these.
What tends to work: put the distinctive words first, because the beginning survives truncation and the end does not. Say what the page actually is rather than what you wish people searched for. Make it specific enough that someone can tell your result apart from the nine others on the page.
A note on duplicates
If a crawl shows dozens of pages sharing a title, that is a template problem rather than a writing problem, and it is worth fixing first. Identical titles across a section make every one of those pages harder to tell apart, both for a person scanning results and for Google deciding which to show. The same goes for descriptions copied across a category.
Frequently asked questions
Why pixels instead of a character count?
Because Google truncates on rendered width. A title of 60 narrow characters such as "illiterate limitations" can fit where 50 wide ones such as "MAXIMUM WARRANTY" cannot. Character counts are a rough proxy that is wrong at exactly the point you care about, which is the boundary.
Will Google definitely show what I typed?
No, and this is worth knowing before you spend an hour polishing. Google rewrites titles on a large share of results, using your H1, your site name or anchor text from links when it judges those a better match for the query. A good title makes a rewrite less likely; nothing prevents it.
Does the description affect my ranking?
Not directly. It is not a ranking factor. It affects whether people click on a result you already have, which is a real and often faster win than trying to move up a position.
Are the pixel limits exact?
They are close, and dated on this page so you can see how current they are. Google adjusts its layout without announcement, and font rendering differs slightly between operating systems. Treat a result near the boundary as near the boundary rather than as a precise verdict.
Why does the preview not fetch my page?
Reading your live page would mean sending the URL to a server, and everything here runs in your browser. Paste the title and description you plan to use, or copy them out of your page source.