Most of us have at least a rough idea of what meta titles and meta descriptions are, but we are often less clear about what they are for and, above all, how to optimise them.
In this article we look at what a meta description does and what it can do for your website. Then we go through some SEO copywriting techniques for writing meta description copy that actually earns the click.
Meta description code example
The meta description tag is an HTML element that is not shown on the page users see: it goes inside the source code of the web page.
How do you add a meta description? In HTML, like this:
<head>
<meta name= "description" content="example of a meta description tag, this is the text shown on the results page."
</head> .
Why does the meta description matter?
Before going further, it helps to be clear about what a meta description is. The idea is simple: meta description tags are HTML attributes that provide a short description of the content of a page.
They are not displayed on the page itself. Search engines use them to show a preview of the page to people who are searching, a preview that Google often rewrites, title included.
The meta description works as a kind of business card for a web page: it tells the user what the page contains, tries to show how it relates to their query and gives them a reason to click.
Site owners often spend most of their time (and budget) optimising product pages, landing pages and ads, and leave the meta description copy until last.
This happens mainly because the SEO value of the meta description is a matter of debate.
It is not a ranking factor
Google has confirmed that the meta description does not directly affect the algorithm that decides where a page ranks in the SERP. Still, well-written meta description copy has a clear effect on click-through rate, exactly like the title you show in the SERP.
In other words: the meta description does not change where your page ranks on the results page, but it has a big influence on CTR.
So you need copy that is optimised for search engines and persuasive for people at the same time. Let's look at some practical techniques for writing a meta description that works.
How long should a meta description be?
There is no fixed length limit for the meta description tag, but long text can be shortened when needed, for example to fit a smartphone screen.
If you pack too much into your description, the most important sentence may be the one that gets cut. The usual advice is to stay within 155-160 characters to avoid truncation. Strictly speaking, Google does not count characters but the pixels the text takes up, so the meta description should be under 930px.
How do you measure a meta description in pixels? With a tool such as SERP simulator.
The length question gets asked a lot: in the UK "meta description length" is searched around 320 times a month, against 590 for "meta description" itself (DataForSEO, Google UK, September 2026).
How to optimise the meta description:
Good meta description copy has two basic requirements: optimisation and persuasion.
Although it does not directly affect rankings, Google and the other search engines have still set out what an optimised meta description should look like.
First of all, as we have just seen, the character count matters.
Include the focus keyword
When the words of a user's search query appear in a description, Google highlights them in bold to show that the result matches the query. This draws the user's eye and tells them your page has the answer they are looking for.
One meta description per page
Google is clear on this point: it asks for a unique description for each page, because identical or near-identical descriptions across a site do not help users tell pages apart in the results.
If you do not have time to write a meta description for every page on your site, it is better to leave this meta tag empty than to fill it with duplicates.
Writing a unique, optimised description for every page of a domain can be slow work, especially for e-commerce sites and blogs with hundreds of pages. If that is your situation, there is a fallback.
When no meta description is set, Google generates one automatically, pulling passages of text from the page and building a description for you.
Avoid double quotes
This is a technical detail that matters: the content of the tag sits between double quotes in the HTML, so a double quote inside the description closes the attribute early and the text after it is cut off. To avoid this, do not use double quotes or unusual non-alphanumeric characters in the description.
It must reflect the page content
The whole point of a meta description is to present the content of a page, yet this still needs saying.
Some websites try to win clicks by promising content that is not on the page. This may lift your CTR, but it will also push up your bounce rate.
In other words, users who do not find what they were looking for will leave your site without interacting with it.
Add a CTA
Remember to invite users to click through by ending with a call to action. Some examples you could use in your meta descriptions:
- Buy now
- Find out more
- Download
- View
They are all imperatives that tell the user to do something. They work well at the end of a page description, but do not overdo it.
Include key facts and specifications
Give users a small taste of what they will find if they click. For a product page you can include key details such as price, technical specifications, brand and so on. For a blog post you could include a figure or an interesting quote from the text, so the reader wants to carry on.
The main rules for a good meta description:
Summing up what we have covered, these are the 5 main points for writing a good meta description tag:
- Length: the first thing to check, because the limits are fairly precise.
- Uniqueness: Google does not like duplicates, so make sure every meta description is unique.
- Relevance: descriptions should present the content of the page. Being generic does not work here.
- Focus keywords: they catch the user's eye and show that your site is what they were looking for.
- Call to action: a short prompt to act helps, as long as your meta description does not turn into an ad.
Examples of good meta descriptions
Now that we have seen how to write a good meta description, let's look at some examples to see why this tag matters.
Here are two results for the query "budget airlines uk" (DataForSEO, Google UK, September 2026). The snippet for cameltravel.co.uk reads like a written description: "Which airlines give you the best luggage allowance? How much do they charge for seats? How much can I take on board as cabin baggage?". It tells you in one line what the page answers. The top organic result, flightspro.co.uk, shows a passage Google lifted from the body of the page instead: a 2019 date followed by "4. Vueling Flights. Vueling is a low-cost airline...", with a "Read more" link that jumps to that paragraph. It starts in the middle of a list and does not say what the page is about. This is the "business card" role of the meta description in practice.
Which result would you click?
The same pattern shows up on other queries. For "guacamole recipe", Mob (mob.co.uk) shows a clean two-sentence description: "Guacamole can make or break a Mexican recipe. Make sure you've got nice and creamy avocados and you'll be all set." Several other results on the same page show ingredient lists cut from the recipe card and ending in an ellipsis. In less than two lines, the written description tells the user what they will find on the site.
For a search for a specific product, a well-optimised meta description should contain all the necessary elements:
- the focus keyword
- key facts and specifications (about the product, and about delivery too)
- a call to action (find out more)
- all without going over the character limit
Adding a meta description with Yoast SEO
Adding a meta description directly in the HTML can be awkward if you are not technical. Fortunately most CMSs have a dedicated field for it.
If you use WordPress and write copy for it, you probably already know the WordPress SEO by Yoast plugin. It is one of the most widely used SEO plugins on the platform.
Once installed, Yoast SEO is easy to use. It gives you ready-made fields that you simply fill in with plain text. It also helps you improve the optimisation of the page for your chosen keyword, with a score and suggestions.
Do you need a meta description for every page?
Do you have to write a meta description tag for every single page of your website?
We touched on this earlier, but it is worth repeating. You do not need a meta description for every page, especially on sites with thousands of pages: in some cases it is better to let Google generate it automatically.
Our advice is to write optimised descriptions for the most important pages, such as the homepage and category pages. A good approach is to use Google Search Console to find the pages on your site that rank best and start with those.
Now that you have our main SEO copywriting tips for meta descriptions, pick out the best-ranking pages on your site and start writing descriptions for them first. Have another tip to add? Let us know in the comments.
