Meta description
A page-level summary in a `<meta name="description">` tag, used as a candidate for the search snippet but not as a ranking factor.
TechnicalTitle elementTitle link
Title tag
The `<title>` element describing a page, used as the primary input to the clickable headline in search results, which Google may rewrite.
In full
Google generates the 'title link' in results from the title element plus other on-page signals such as H1s, anchor text and site name, and rewrites titles it judges inaccurate, boilerplate or over-optimised. Practical guidance is to write descriptive, unique titles that front-load the distinguishing term and include the brand consistently; keyword-stuffed or templated titles invite rewriting. Display truncation is pixel-based rather than a fixed character count.
Example
`Waterproof Running Shoes for Men | Example` replaces `Home - Buy Shoes Online - Cheap Shoes - Example Store`, and Google stops rewriting it.
Related terms
Heading structure (H1-H6)
The hierarchy of HTML heading elements that conveys a document's outline to users, assistive technology and parsers.
Click-through rate
Clicks divided by impressions, expressed as a percentage; in search it measures how compelling a result is at the position and in the SERP…
SERP
The page a search engine returns for a query, combining organic results with ads, rich results, AI-generated answers and vertical modules.
Site name
The name Google displays for a website above the result URL, derived from WebSite structured data, og:site_name, the title element and…
Where to read more
- HTML Standard: Document Metadata · Standard · html.spec.whatwg.org