# What is a meta description and how to write one
> What a meta description is, when Google uses it as a snippet, how long it should be and how to write a different one for every product page in your store.
URL: https://clione.ai/glossary/meta-description/
Lang: en
The meta description is not the [product description](/glossary/product-description/), the text your customer reads on the [product page](/glossary/product-page/), and it is not the [meta title](/glossary/meta-title/), which is the blue link in the result. It is **the summary you write for the results page**, a line nobody sees in your store that may appear under that link when someone searches for what you sell. For a store it matters for a practical reason: it is the only text in the result that you write with the aim of convincing someone who has not come in yet, and if you don't write it, the search engine pulls it from wherever it can.
## How it works
In code, the meta description is a `meta` element with the name `description` inside the page's head. The HTML standard defines it as **free text that describes the page**, suitable for a directory of pages such as a search engine, and does not allow more than one per document.[^html-spec] What the standard does not say is what each search engine does with it, and that is where the important part is.
Google builds the result's snippet **mostly from the page's own content**, automatically. Sometimes it uses the meta description, when it can give searchers a more accurate description than a piece of the content.[^google-snippet] The snippet also tries to highlight the part of the page that best answers the specific search, so **the same page can show different snippets depending on what was searched**.[^google-snippet] Writing a meta description does not guarantee it will show; it raises the chances that the result says what you want for the searches that matter most to you.
Length is the most repeated doubt. Google says it plainly: **there is no length limit for a meta description**, but the snippet is truncated in the results when needed, usually to fit the width of the device.[^google-snippet] Shopify, in its help center, recommends using 160 characters for the search engine listing description.[^shopify-seo] It is a useful figure to keep the main idea from being cut off on the screen, not a requirement: what goes at the beginning is what is most likely to be read in full.
Google's recommendations for a good meta description fit into four rules:[^google-snippet]
- **One per page.** Identical or similar descriptions across all pages do not help when each one appears on its own in the results. If you can't write them all, start with the most important and most visited pages.
- **Concrete facts.** The description can pull together information that is scattered across the page: in its book example, the author, the illustrator, the price and the page count.
- **Generated, if they read well.** On large sites built on a database, generating descriptions automatically from each page's data is acceptable, as long as the result is readable and varied.
- **No keyword lists.** A description made only of keywords does not describe the page and has little chance of showing as a snippet.
Google also gives three controls for the opposite, limiting what is shown: `nosnippet` prevents the snippet, `max-snippet` sets its maximum length and `data-nosnippet` excludes a specific part of the page.[^google-snippet] They are the same controls Google points to for limiting what is shown from your pages in its AI features.[^google-ai-features] And it is worth knowing that to show up as a link in those features, a page has to be indexed and **be eligible to be shown in Search with a snippet**.[^google-ai-guide] A `nosnippet` set to control the meta description has consequences beyond the classic result.
## In a store
Three possible meta descriptions for the same backpack product page. This is a **fictional example**: the store and the product are made up to compare the three approaches against Google's recommendations.
| Version (fictional example) | Text | What goes wrong |
| --------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Generic | Online store for backpacks and travel accessories. Fast shipping. | Repeated across the catalog, does not tell this page from any other |
| Word list | backpack, urban backpack, laptop backpack, waterproof backpack, buy backpack | Describes nothing; little chance of showing |
| Specific | 20-liter waterproof urban backpack with a padded laptop sleeve. 24-hour shipping. | Says what it is, who it is for and what sets it apart, with facts from the page |
The third is the one Google asks for: unique, with concrete facts and readable. And it is the one that can be generated at scale, because each fact comes from the product's fields (capacity, material, compartment), not from the writer's inspiration. In the page's code it looks like this:
```html
Waterproof 20 L Urban Backpack
```
On [category pages](/glossary/category-page/) the same applies: a description that says what that category gathers, not the whole store's. Clione writes the meta description for each product page and carries the product's keywords into it, alongside the [JSON-LD](/glossary/json-ld/).
**Writing the meta description is not choosing the snippet.** Google builds the snippet mostly from the page's content and only sometimes uses the meta description, and it may show a different one for each search.[^google-snippet] If you see other text in the results, it is not a mistake on the store's side: it is the search engine's decision for that query. What is in your hands is making the description specific and having the page say the same thing.
## How to check it
1. **Open the source code of a published product page** and look for `name="description"`. There should be only one, and its text should be what you saved in the admin.[^html-spec]
2. **Compare three product pages in the same category.** If the three descriptions say the same thing, they are generic, even if well written.[^google-snippet]
3. **Search for the product page on Google with a product query** and see which snippet appears. Repeat with another query: the snippet can change from one search to another.[^google-snippet]
4. **Check that no important page carries `nosnippet` or a very short `max-snippet`** unless someone decided it, because it also limits what can be shown in Google's AI features.[^google-ai-features]
5. **In [Search Console](/glossary/google-search-console/), look at the [CTR](/glossary/ctr/) of your product pages with many impressions.** A low CTR at a good position is the sign that the result, title and snippet, is not convincing.
## Related concept: product description
The [product description](/glossary/product-description/) is the visible text on the product page: it is read by the customer who has already come in and can run to several paragraphs. The meta description sits in the head, is not visible on the page and is read by someone still on the results. One is written to decide the purchase; the other, to decide the click. They can share facts, and it is good that they do, because Google prefers the snippet that best describes the page; what you don't want is to copy the first paragraph of one into the other without thinking about who is searching.
To keep going, the [catalog and entities reading path](/learn/catalog-and-entities/) puts the rest of the product page terms in order, and the entry on [publication verification](/glossary/publication-verification/) explains how to check that the description you save is the one that reaches the page.