The Ideal Length for Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, & LinkedIn Posts

Relating to writing text to your blog and social media posts, many marketers wonder, “But what is the character limit?”

It’s never a straightforward query — sometimes, it’s answered by parameters established by certain channels. And on other occasions, it’s more an issue of what is ideal.

For instance, you most likely know the character limit for a tweet is 140, but did you recognize that the perfect length is definitely lower than that? (Hold tight — we’ll explain why.) 

While we have written before about optimizing your actual content, we thought it will be helpful to collect the numbers of character limits — each enforced and ideal — for various online channels, multi function place.

Below, you will find a more detailed guide to character limits and ideal character counts for posts in your blog, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, SnapChat, and YouTube.

The Length & Character Count for The whole lot on the Web

1. Blog Posts

Source: Medium

Quick reference:

• Post length: 1,400 – 2,100 words
• Title: Under 60 characters
• Meta Description: Under 155 characters

Featured Resource: 6 Free Blog Post Templates

Post Body

Relating to the length of blog posts, there are a couple of different items to contemplate. For instance:

• Based on Medium, posts with a mean read time of seven minutes captured essentially the most attention. Though the information on that is from 2013, this number remains to be widely cited. 
• The common reading speed of native English-speaking adults stays commonly cited as 200-300 words per minute, based on the outcomes of several studies.
• At that reading rate, the perfect post length is 1,400 to 2,100 words.
• That aligns with research previously conducted by Capsicum Mediaworks, which indicated that, on average, the highest 10 results for many Google searches are between 2,000 and a couple of,500 words.

Source: Capsicum Mediaworks

But that is just the post body — let’s have a have a look at the opposite areas of text that comprise a full blog post.

Title

The length of your title relies on your goals, and where it can appear.

Let’s start with search engine optimisation. Do you wish this post to rank rather well in search? It seems, that usually has to do with the size of every entry on a search engine results page (SERP).

For Google, titles of search results are frequently contained at a length of 600 pixels — which Moz measures as having the ability to display the primary 50-60 characters of a title tag.

So, in the event you don’t desire your title to get cut off within the search results, it is likely to be best to maintain it under 60 characters.

But when doubtful, you possibly can double-check the length of your meta description and title tags with this handy tool from HigherVisibility, or you need to use Moz’s title tag preview tool.

For Moz’s title tag tool, type in your headline and the tool will show you ways it will appear in Google results. 

Then, there’s optimizing your title for social sharing. On Twitter, for instance, consider that every tweet has a limit of 280 characters — nevertheless, in the event you include a picture, that does not count toward the limit.

But consider that even the common shortened URL takes up about 23 characters — that leaves you with about 257 characters left for the title and any accompanying text.

In our own evaluation at HubSpot, we found that headlines between 8–12 words in length got essentially the most Twitter shares on average, while headlines with either 12 or 14 words got essentially the most Facebook Likes.

Meta Description

A meta description refers back to the HTML attribute that explains the contents of a given webpage. It is the short description you see on a SERP to “preview” what the page is about. 

Moz notes that Google seems to chop off most meta descriptions — sometimes called snippets — after roughly two lines of text. Nonetheless, there’s some conjecture that, like title tags, it’s actually based on pixel count.

In any case, it amounts to about 160 characters, though this particular outlet recommends keeping it at 155.

Again, you possibly can double-check the length of your meta description and title tags with this handy tool from HigherVisibility.

Image Source

2. Facebook

Quick reference:

• Status updates: 63,206-character maximum | Ideal length is 40 characters
• Video: 120-minute maximum | Ideal length is 2 minutes

Facebook’s character limit on status updates is 63,206. Nonetheless, that is removed from ideal, says former HubSpot Social Media Marketing Manager Chelsea Hunersen.

“The social gurus will throw across the number 40 characters,” she says. “That data appears to be backed up by BuzzSumo’s rating of HubSpot’s own Facebook Page.“

But why 40, specifically?

“Ideally,” Hunersen says, “you will need to make use of the copy in a standing update to offer context for whatever you are linking to.”

That said, she notes, the copy of the status update itself is not as necessary because the copy within the meta title or meta description that gets pulled in if you insert a link into your post. That is right — social media posts have their very own meta data too.

“Often, people have a look at the image of the article after which directly down on the meta title and meta description for context clues,” she explains. “Loads of people do not realize you possibly can change those.”

Even on Facebook, it’s still best to maintain your meta title to fewer than 60 characters, and to 155 for meta descriptions.

There are some resources available to those accustomed to coding that permit you mess around with social media metadata character counts, like these templates. But unless you are a developer, we recommend keeping it short and sweet.

Video

While Facebook allows a maximum of 240 minutes for many videos (excluding Stories and Reels), we would not advise posting anything that long, unless you are doing a special, social-media-only screening of a full-length film.

Image source

Facebook recommends keeping videos short to about 15 seconds so viewers usually tend to watch to the tip. 

3. Twitter

Quick reference:

• Tweets: 280-character maximum
  • Doesn’t include images, videos, or polls
  • Ideal length is 240-259 characters
• Hashtags: Not more than two
• Videos: Maximum length is 2 minutes and 20 seconds

Featured Resource: How to Use Twitter for Business

Marketers in all places rejoiced when Twitter finally eased up on its character count parameters, and such media as images, videos, and polls, in addition to quoted tweets, ceased counting toward its 140-character limit.

Still, the “Quote Tweet” feature stays available, providing even greater character-saving measures. That happens if you press the rotating arrow icon to retweet a post, after which add a comment within the text box provided. You’ve got still got 280 characters all to yourself to comment.

 

Ideal Length Overall

Twitter differs from other platforms within the sense that longer tweets tend to perform better and get essentially the most engagement.

Based on search engine optimisation expert Kurt Gessler, tweets with 240-259 characters are likely to get essentially the most likes. 

Image source

The identical goes for hashtags. Twitter recommends keeping your hashtags short, easy to recollect, and straightforward to spell. The platform also suggests sticking to only one or two hashtags at essentially the most.  

Videos

You possibly can post a video on Twitter by importing a video or recording it using the Twitter app. In any case, the utmost video length is 2 minutes and 20 seconds in the event you’re not subscribed to Twitter Blue.

Twitter Blue subscribers can upload videos of as much as 60 minutes when posting from the web site, and subscribers on the app can post videos of as much as 10 minutes.

4. LinkedIn

Profiles

Here’s a handy list of a few of LinkedIn’s most vital profile character maximums :

• Skilled headline: 120
• Summary: 2,000
• Position title: 100
• Position description: 2,000 (200 character minimum)

LinkedIn Post Character Limit

LinkedIn statuses on company pages might be as much as 700 characters while individuals can post updates as much as 1,300 characters long.

Foote also notes that, “in the event you select to also post on Twitter from LinkedIn, only the primary 140 characters will show in your Twitter post.”

Featured Resource: How to Use LinkedIn for Business & Marketing

Original Content

With LinkedIn’s publishing platform, users can now compose and share original written content with their networks, or publicly. After all, that comes with its own character counts, in keeping with Foote:

• Post headline: 100
• Post body: 40,000

5. Instagram

Quick reference:

• Bio: 150
• Hashtags: As much as 30
• Captions: Ideal length is under 125 characters

Instagram Caption Character Limit

Instagram captions allow using 2,200 characters, nevertheless there are limits when hashtags are involved.

Since Instagram is, firstly, a platform for sharing photos and videos, the first focus is often your visual content. Nonetheless, it is often helpful to offer some context, and let users know what they’re taking a look at.

On condition that, listed below are some helpful character counts for the text you include together with your visual content:

While Instagram doesn’t appear to specify a maximum total variety of caption characters, it does note that, inside users’ feeds, the caption is cut off after the first three lines. For that reason, it’s advised to limit captions to 125 characters.

Nonetheless, don’t pass over necessary information only for the sake of keeping your entire caption visible. As an alternative, frontload it with crucial details and calls-to-action, leaving any hashtags, @mentions, or extraneous information for the tip.

As for Instagram Stories, there doesn’t appear to be a ton of detail on character limits there, either. Nonetheless, since the text overlays the visual content — which is the main target — don’t obscure an excessive amount of of the photo or video with a caption.

Here’s a fast example of a brief Instagram bio from my colleague.

6. Snapchat

Quick reference:

• Character limit: 80 per post

Speaking of not obscuring visual content — that brings us to Snapchat.

Instagram Stories was, many consider, an effort to emulate the features of Snapchat, to create a possibility for users to share quickly-disappearing photos and videos.

And again, because the main target here is on the visual, you will need to stop distracting viewers from it with an excessive amount of text.

Based on Teen Vogue, Snapchat’s character limit is 80 per post, which is greater than double its previous 31-character limit.

And, in the event you’re on the lookout for more guidance, just look to this particular app’s name, and remember the “snap” element of it — a word that suggests brevity — and check out to not ramble. Here’s an excellent example of how SXSW uses its captions efficiently:

7. YouTube

Featured Resource: YouTube for Business – A 30-Day Roadmap

Here now we have one more network that is focused on visual content, leading some to incorrectly assume that accompanying text — like titles and descriptions — don’t matter as much.

That is not entirely false — as a video-hosting platform, YouTube should primarily be used to showcase a brand’s quality videos. Nonetheless, like several other visual content, it needs context. People have to know what they’re watching, who it’s from, and why it matters.

Unfortunately, YouTube doesn’t appear to offer any specific parameters over its character counts — apart from your channel description, which in keeping with the official help site is proscribed to 1,000 characters.

But aside from that, it appears that evidently the one guideline available is the alert display that lets you recognize, “Your [title or description] is just too long,” in the event you’ve entered an excessive amount of text in either of those fields.

On this case, we might advise taking the identical approach as adding text to support your visuals on Instagram and Snapchat.

Like the previous, a video’s description is cut off after the primary line or two, so frontload a very powerful descriptors and CTAs, leaving extra details for the tip.

Show Your Character

As you set out to find out the length of your text, whatever the platform, remember to achieve this with the user in mind.

Lots of these channel-mandated character limits are established for that reason — to maintain audiences from becoming bored or overwhelmed.

Like anything in marketing, nevertheless, it’s never an exact science, despite one of the best data. We encourage you to follow these guidelines, but do not be afraid to experiment in the event that they don’t all the time work.

Test different amounts of text inside your various channels, and keep track of how each post performs.

From there, you possibly can make decisions about which forms of content, in addition to its accompanying titles and descriptions, are essentially the most well-received out of your audience.

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in January 2016 and was updated in December  2019 for accuracy and comprehensiveness.