Question 1

What is a WordPress excerpt and how is it used?

Accepted Answer

A WordPress excerpt is a short summary of a post, typically 150–300 words. It's used in several ways: (1) Blog archive pages — shows a preview below the post title instead of the full content; (2) Search results — WordPress theme search result pages display the excerpt; (3) RSS feeds — readers and aggregators receive the excerpt instead of the full post; (4) Related posts sections — many themes and plugins use the excerpt for teaser text. If no manual excerpt is set, WordPress auto-generates one by stripping HTML and taking the first ~55 words of the post content. Manual excerpts let you control exactly what appears.

Question 2

Does the WordPress excerpt affect SEO?

Accepted Answer

The WordPress excerpt field itself doesn't directly affect search engine rankings because WordPress doesn't output it as the meta description by default. However: (1) If you use Yoast SEO, Rank Math or AIOSEO without setting a custom meta description, these plugins use the post excerpt as the fallback meta description — so a well-written excerpt can become your Google snippet; (2) The excerpt appears in archive pages that Google crawls — duplicate or auto-generated excerpts can create thin content issues; (3) A compelling excerpt improves click-through rates on archive pages, which can indirectly signal quality. Best practice: always write a unique, keyword-rich excerpt 150–160 characters long.

Question 3

How long should a WordPress excerpt be?

Accepted Answer

The ideal WordPress excerpt length depends on use case: (1) For meta description fallback (via SEO plugin) — 150–160 characters, so it doesn't get truncated in Google search results; (2) For archive/blog pages — 2–3 sentences or 55–80 words, enough to interest the reader without giving away the full post; (3) For RSS feeds — 50–100 words is typical. WordPress's default auto-excerpt is 55 words (configurable via excerpt_length filter). The excerpt generator targets SEO-optimized length with the primary keyword in the first sentence.

Question 4

How do I display the excerpt instead of the full post on my blog page?

Accepted Answer

Most modern WordPress themes have a setting for this: Appearance → Customize → Homepage Settings or Blog/Posts settings — look for 'Post Content' and select 'Excerpt' instead of 'Full text'. For classic themes, edit the loop in index.php or archive.php: replace the_content() with the_excerpt(). For block themes, use the Post Excerpt block in the Query Loop instead of the Post Content block. You can customize the auto-excerpt length by adding to functions.php: add_filter('excerpt_length', function() { return 30; }, 999);

AI Excerpt Generator

What the AI optimizes for

Keyword placement

Optimal length

Compelling tone

Meta description ready

RSS-friendly

No auto-truncation

Frequently asked questions

Related WordPress tools

Turn any post into a Google-ready snippet