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A title tag is a bit of HTML code used to specify the title of a webpage. It appears in Google’s search results, social media posts (if you don’t have OG tags), and in the browser tab.
Here’s an example of how the code looks:
<title>SEO: The Complete Guide for Beginners</title>
And here’s how it looks on social media:
… in the browser tab:
… and (sometimes) in Google’s search results:
For SEO, title tags are important for two reasons:
They’re a tiny ranking factor. Google’s John Mueller confirmed this in 2021.
They impact how many clicks you get. It doesn’t take a genius to work out that an enticing title tag will get more clicks than a dull and uninteresting one.
In this guide, you’ll learn how to craft the perfect title tag for SEO. I’ll also show you how to audit and improve the title tags you already have.
If you’re unfamiliar with Parent Topic, it’s the keyword sending the most traffic to the top-ranking page for your keyword. It’s often better to target this keyword to maximize your page’s traffic potential.
For example, let’s assume you put together a list of the best smart doorbells to target the keyword “best smart doorbell.” If you check this keyword’s Parent Topic, it’s “best video doorbell”:
These keywords basically mean the same thing, but it probably makes more sense to target “best video doorbell” as it has an estimated 19K monthly searches vs. just 1.5K for “best smart doorbell.”
Here’s our working title so far:
8 Best Video Doorbells
Not an Ahrefs user?
Google your target keyword and plug the top-ranking page into our free traffic checker. The first keyword on the list of “Top keywords” is the same as the Parent Topic:
Site Explorer and go to the Organic Keywords report.
For example, the top-ranking page for “best video doorbell” gets lots of traffic from keywords mentioning “camera”:
This is something we can naturally incorporate into our title tag:
8 Best Video Doorbell Cameras
The key word here is “natural.” Don’t shoehorn words into your title tags that make them sound weird. Ask yourself:
Does it make sense?
Does it read well?
Does it keep the meaning?
If you answer “yes” to all three questions, go ahead and add it.
Here’s an example of intent shifting from “how to” guides, to “free tools” compilations for the keyword “Website traffic” in Ahrefs Identify Intents tool.
If you ranked in this SERP, and your page title originally focused on “steps for checking website traffic”, you’d need to re-nose it on the topic of “traffic tools” to reclaim that lost traffic (providing your content covers that topic).
Prioritize title width over length
We all know the optimal length of a title tag is ~60 characters, but that’s not actually how Google determines the presentation of your page titles in the SERPs. Instead, it measures based on pixel width, and truncates or rewrites any titles that exceed 600 pixels.
As an example, the title of this very blog has a pixel width of 440, and a character count of 46, meaning there’s no risk of it being cut off in the SERPs.
Include power words
Power words evoke certain emotions in readers, which can trigger them to click.
Here are some examples of power words you can use in your own titles, as suggested by ChatGPT:
Urgency and exclusivity
Emotional appeal
- Now
- Love
- Limited
- Astonishing
- Exclusive
- Inspiring
- Instant
- Jaw-Dropping
- Hurry
- Shocking
Encouraging action
Authority and trust
- Boost
- Proven
- Increase
- Tested
- Discover
- Guaranteed
- Master
- Expert
- Learn
- Official
Curiosity and intrigue
Value and benefits
- Surprising
- Free
- Hidden
- Bonus
- Unknown
- Win
- Uncommon
- Value
- Little-Known
- Essential
Convenience and simplicity
- Effortless
- Simple
- Quick
- Easy
- Instant
Prioritize your “opportunity” pages
SEO titles have a huge impact on CTR and, in turn, rankings.
Using Google Search Console or Ahrefs Organic Keywords report, find pages sitting in middling positions (e.g. rankings 4 - 10). This is the kind of content that’s ripe for title tag optimization.
Don’t confuse SEO titles and post titles
Your page’s title tag and its H1 tag are two very different things. As you know, an SEO tag is HTML code that goes in the <head> section of a webpage, and determines how a title appears on search engine results pages.
A H1, on the other hand, is an on-page heading that’s located in the body of the webpage.
A title tag has a bigger impact on rankings. It’s the headline a user sees first in the SERPs, and ultimately determines whether or not they’ll click.
You can differentiate your title tag and H1 for keyword targeting, CTR, or branding reasons. If you do, just make sure they align in terms of topic and intent.
Site Audit that analyzes your website for 140+ SEO issues including various title tag issues. It’s completely free to use with an Ahrefs Webmaster Tools account, which means we have data on over a million websites.
When we analyzed this data, we found the most common title tag issues affecting site owners.
Let’s go through them, starting with the most common.
Gary Illyes was asked about Google’s incessant rewriting of title tags in 2016, he said:
We will never quit rewriting titles. We’ve seen so many sites whose title really suck. A lot of sites have no title; a lot of sites have a title saying “Top Page”.
In fact, Google almost always rewrites titles. We couldn’t provide useful results to our users if we quit rewriting titles. Experiments showed us users preferred written titles. So, we’ll continue to write titles.
In short, Google rewrites most titles and isn’t going to stop anytime soon. If you notice Google rewriting one of your titles to something less than ideal, all you can really do is rewrite them in the hope that Google will start to “trust” and use them again.
To see the pages on your site that this issue affects, look for the “Page and SERP titles do not match” notice in Ahrefs’ Site Audit:
Sidenote.
Google doesn’t always rewrite titles to the point of it being an issue. They often just cut the brand name or superfluous information. As frustrating as this might be, it’s rarely worth worrying about or trying to “fix” these issues.
says that Google treats extra title tags as extensions of the first title tag, and will probably just combine them. This isn’t ideal for obvious reasons.
To see the pages on your site that this issue affects, look for the “Multiple title tags” error in Ahrefs’ Site Audit:
helpful content system aims to reward content that gives visitors a positive experience. Overpromising in your titles and under-delivering in your content is a surefire way not to get rewarded.
Even worse, Google’s system generates a sitewide signal so even if you’re only doing this on a few pages, it could affect rankings of other pages, too.
Google’s spam policies, so doing it could trigger a Google penalty.
Again, this is not an issue we have data on, but it’s something I still see SEO beginners doing from time to time.
Ahrefs Evolve, Cyrus Shepherd told the audience to “brand everything” in the new Google reality.
Content with structured data, like title tags and schema markup, can provide helpful context for large language models.
Even if Google displays a modified version of your SEO title in search results, the original tag remains in the page’s HTML code, and can potentially work its way into AI training datasets, depending on the model’s data sources.
Managing your page titles, and including your brand name, may just influence how an AI recognizes and references your brand in customer conversations.
our beginner’s guide to learn how you can perfectly optimize your page for search every time.
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