Web Design/Titles

Titles of web pages can be put between the HTML tags  and. These are also commonly called page titles or title tags. Page titles can be seen on search engines results pages, on web browser tabs and their hover tooltips, and in some operating systems' taskbar.

Choosing Page Titles
Titles should always be chosen wisely and distinctive, to allow the user to:
 * Navigate through open tabs more easily.
 * Find items in the browsing history more easily.
 * Provide users with a clearer idea of what to expect from a link received through text messengers or found on social media sites or through URL shorteners which preview the page title but not the target URL.
 * Well written title can help with.
 * Page titles are one of the most keyword sensitive areas of a web page for SEO.

As such, page titles benefit from containing the title of a post (e.g. text, video, or audio) or search query, the author, the area of the site (e.g. a name, or "Preferences"), a page number where applicable, and the site name, optionally with a slogan.

If no post title is available, a snippet of the text (or "post body") can be used for descriptiveness, as Twitter and Instagram do.

Page Title Examples

 * Search query pages should contain the search query itself in the page title.
 * “Search Query – Search – My Website”
 * Preferrably, titles should contain the page number.
 * “Gallery (Page 2) – My Website”
 * User setting pages should contain the name of the active submenu in the title, if the setting pages are accessed via separate URLs.
 * “Settings: Account details • My Website”
 * Home pages should contain the primary keyword for the site in the page title.
 * Business Name: Primary Keyword in City, State
 * Kool Daddy: HVAC Company in Tampa, Florida
 * Service pages should contain the primary keyword for that page.
 * Page Keyword in City, State - Business Name
 * A/C Repair in Tampa, FL - Kool Daddy
 * File sharing sites may include the file size: Document.rtf (638 KB).
 * Social media sites may include a user follower count to signify popularity: User (@username) – 7,183 followers.

Google
The search query is contained in the page title.

One mistake that Google does is using the exact same page title for the main as for different areas such as.

Bing
The main web search uses, without the name "Bing". Other areas happen to have the name "Bing" in the title, e.g.  and , both with the latter word in lowercase.

YouTube
On watch pages, YouTube uses, omitting the author (channel name). On channel pages, it uses. On search pages, it uses.

The slogan "Broadcast Yourself" was formerly included.

Twitter
Both the display name and the content of tweets are included in the page title:.

When viewing profile pages, the page title contains display name and user name:.

Reddit
Reddit is composed of communities which are referred to as "subreddits" for discussing specific topics. As of 2021, users are able to share URLs, title-only posts, text posts (title + body), photos, videos, and polls.

On post pages, the title format is, and on profile pages, the title format is.

SoundCloud
During playback in the audio player desktop web app, the title reads  even while the track's page is not opened. The play symbol "▶" was added in December 2021, signifying that a track is playing. While paused or stopped,  is indicated on track pages and   on artist pages (i.e. user profiles, equivalent to "Channel pages" on video platforms). In comparison, video platforms usually only indicate the video title without the channel name in the page title.

Instagram
On standalone post pages, Instagram formerly included a date and time, e.g. . At some point between 2018 and 2020, it has been replaced with a text snippet of the image description:.