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Title tag

The title tag is the page's headline in the HTML head. It is the strongest on-page relevance signal and the text most often used as the clickable link in results.

A focused view of books on a library shelf featuring various titles in soft lighting, illustrating the SEO definition of Title tag
The title tag is the page's headline in the HTML head. It is the strongest on-page relevance signal and the text most often used as the clickable link in results.Photo: Josh Sorenson / Pexels

Google rewrites titles on a meaningful share of queries, usually when the original is stuffed with keywords, duplicated across a template or unrelated to the query it matched. Writing a clear, specific title that reads like a human wrote it is the most reliable way to keep your own version displayed.

Aim for roughly 50-60 characters before truncation, put the distinguishing term first, and make every title unique across the site. Duplicated titles across hundreds of pages are one of the strongest signals of a thin template — and one of the fastest wins available, because fixing them changes click-through without changing rankings.

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