Google drops the character limit for headlines in article structured data

Google has updated the article structured data help documentation to remove the hard character limit for the headline property. Instead of Google saying there is a 110-character limit, now Google just says you should be concise with your headlines for your articles.

The revision. Google’s article structured data help documentation used to write “The title of the article. The value should not exceed 110 characters.” It has been updated to say, “The title of the article. Consider using a concise title, as long titles may be truncated on some devices.”

Google noted that they have “removed the 110 character limit for the headline property in the Article structured data documentation.” “There’s no hard character limit; instead, we recommend that you write concise titles as long titles may be truncated on some devices,” Google added.

Why we care. If you struggled to fit your headlines into that specific limit, you no longer need to worry about it. If you go over by a few characters, you will be fine. The main thing Google wants you to consider is how the title or headline of the article will appear on the devices your users are consuming your content on.

You will no longer receive errors about your article headlines being too long with article structured data.

About the author

Barry Schwartz a Contributing Editor to Search Engine Land and a member of the programming team for SMX events. He owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry can be followed on Twitter here.