Google Shopping product descriptions: 5,000 characters, and why Google asks for 500 to 1,000

How long a Google Shopping description can be, and how long to make it

Google gives three numbers for the description, all on its own help pages. The product data specification and the description attribute page set the cap at 1 to 5,000 characters, plain text. The description page asks for the most important details in the first 160 to 500 characters. And the page on fixing text that is too long recommends around 500 to 1,000 characters, because Google displays only a limited number of characters in Shopping ads and free listings.

So 5,000 is room, not a target. A description of 500 to 1,000 characters has room for size, material, use and care, and keeps the decisive facts where a shopper sees them before clicking. Past 5,000, Google truncates the description and lists the product as having text that is too long under Products, Needs attention, in Merchant Center.

Check the title against Google's 150 characters and the 70 it shows →

Sources: Google Merchant Center Help: Product data specification (description, max 5,000 characters), checked 1 November 2026 · Google Merchant Center Help: Description [description] and structured description [structured_description], checked 1 November 2026 · Google Merchant Center Help: How to fix: Text too long (500 to 1,000 characters recommended), checked 1 November 2026

What goes in the first 160 to 500 characters

Google's description page lists what to include: the product's most relevant features and visual attributes. It names size, material, intended age range, special features and technical specifications, then shape, pattern, texture and design, and variants such as colour or flavour. For a customised product it asks you to describe the options, and for a bundle or multipack, the whole bundle.

The order inside the first 500 is ours, not Google's: one sentence that says what the product is with its key specification, then size and material, then how it is used. A shopper who reads only the opening, and Google matching a search to it, both get the facts that decide the click.

• First sentence: the product type in a shopper's words, plus the specification that decides the purchase.
• Then the details Google names: size, material, intended age range, special features.
• Then use and care, and for variants the one line that differs, such as the ink colour of a pen.
• Not the title again: the description says what the title had no room for.

Paste a title and description for a free 0–100 score →

One description, built to Google's numbers

Here is a description for an example product, a stoneware coffee dripper, written to the order above. It is 595 characters in four short parts, inside Google's recommended 500 to 1,000, and its first sentence ends at 140, inside the 160 where Google asks the most important details to start.

What Google keeps out of a description

Google's description page is specific about what does not belong, and most of it has a home elsewhere in the feed or in Merchant Center's settings. Its title page says breaking these rules can get a product disapproved, and the same rules are listed for the description.

• Only this product: no details about other products, accessories or compatible items.
• No comparisons with other products.
• No category paths: Google has google_product_category and product_type for that.
• No links to your store or other websites: the landing page goes in link.
• No promotional text: no price, sale dates or shipping. Those go in price, sale_price and the shipping settings.
• Nothing about your company: not its name, its history or its policies.
• No capitals for emphasis, and no symbols or characters used to draw the eye.

Sources: Google Merchant Center Help: Description [description] (what not to include), checked 1 November 2026 · Google Merchant Center Help: Title [title] (disapproval for promotional text and gimmicks), checked 1 November 2026

Written with AI? Google wants it in structured_description

Google's description page says all descriptions created using generative AI must be sent in the structured_description attribute, with digital_source_type set to trained_algorithmic_media and the text in content. A description you wrote yourself stays in description. If a product has both, Google uses only description, so an older text left there is the one shoppers see.

Sellura writes with AI, so a description pasted from it into a Merchant Center feed falls under this rule. We haven't checked how each store app or feed tool sends structured_description. Look for the field in yours, or in a supplemental feed, before you paste.

• Same limit: 5,000 characters in content, as in description.
• Same rules: only this product, no links, no promotions.
• In a text feed it reads trained_algorithmic_media:"your description".

How to sell on Google Shopping: the setup, step by step →

Source: Google Merchant Center Help: Description and structured description (descriptions created with generative AI), checked 1 November 2026

Product highlights: the points the description doesn't have to carry

Merchant Center has a separate attribute for short feature points, product_highlight. Google's page on it sets 1 to 150 characters per highlight, with a minimum of 2, a recommended 4 to 6 and a maximum of 100, and asks for points about the product's main features that don't repeat the title or description. It also says not to list keywords or search terms in them.

That frees the description to read as prose. The specifications a shopper scans, such as capacity or what is in the box, can go in highlights, and the description explains use, material and care.

Source: Google Merchant Center Help: Product highlight [product_highlight] (1 to 150 characters each; minimum 2, recommended 4 to 6), checked 1 November 2026

What Sellura writes here, and what it doesn't

Describe the product once and Sellura returns a plain-text Google Shopping description whose first 160 characters say what the product is and its key specification, then size, material, use and care, with no price, shipping, store name or link. With it come a title inside Google's 150 characters with the product named in the first 70, 6 product highlights of up to 150 characters, and 8 search phrases to work into the text. The 8 phrases are ours: Google has no keyword field. Each generation comes with a 0–100 score that is deterministic, the same listing always getting the same number, and one fix per weak factor written for that listing.

The score and the title preview are free on every generation, with no card, and so are the Google Shopping title checker and the Listing checker. A credit unlocks one finished listing: Starter is $15 a month for 25 credits or $150 a year, and Pro is $24 a month for 65 credits plus bulk, or $240 a year. Sellura doesn't connect to Merchant Center, submit feeds, run Shopping ads or track rankings, and it has no keyword research database.

Write the Google Shopping listing, score and title free → · Plans and credits →