Amazon recently announced a major update to the shopping experience and the way you have to approach content optimisation.
As you’ve probably already heard, from the 27th of July (27/07/26), Amazon will be limiting the length of product titles to 75 characters, with an additional 125 characters of ‘item highlights’ appearing underneath the title in search results. If you fail to update your titles in-line with the new policies by the deadline, Amazon will start implementing AI-generated titles instead.
The news has been met with everything from indifference to full-blown panic, as ecommerce brands try to figure out exactly what this will mean for the catalogues they’ve worked so hard to curate.
In this guide, we’ll explore what’s actually changing, the impact it will have, and what you should do to adapt to the new title format.
On the 11th of June, Amazon announced that it was updating its catalogue policy to apply a new, two-part structure for product titles across all categories except media.
Starting on the 27th of July, product titles will be capped at a maximum of 75 characters including spaces, and a new field known as “item highlights” will be introduced, offering an additional 125 characters which will appear underneath the product title. While the title is now intended to provide a succinct, basic summary of the product, the “item highlights” section will allow you to list detailed variables like materials or recommended use cases.
As the previous title limit was 200 characters, you’re not losing any of the total space you had previously to convey information and communicate the reasons why your customers should click through. However, you will have to think carefully about what goes where, and how best to prioritise key product details.
Why exactly is Amazon doing this? Well, there are few reasons:
Amazon already truncates product titles to the first 75 characters in its mobile view, and it has done for a while. With the new mandatory limit, they’re able to guarantee that titles will display perfectly on mobile layouts, and match clean browsing standards found on other ecommerce platforms.
Splitting the title element into two parts like this is also probably aimed at making titles across the platform more readable. For a long time now, Amazon titles have had a tendency to become long, rambling “word salads”, where brands tried to game the search algorithm by cramming in as many keywords as possible into the available 200 characters. This probably didn’t do their click-through rates any favours, but brands did it anyway, creating a shopper experience that was less than ideal.
Another likely reason for Amazon’s change is rooted in the increasing role of AI both on Amazon’s side and in the shopping experience.
Amazon is increasingly relying on AI-powered systems to understand products semantically, rather than relying on exact keyword matches like older iterations of its search algorithms.
Meanwhile, Amazon’s AI shopping assistant is playing an increasingly large role in the shopper experience, designed to answer customer questions, help them compare items for different use cases, and discover products in a conversational format.
When product information is provided in structured fields, it becomes much easier for Amazon to interpret.
A keyword-stuffed title like “Nike Running Shoes Men Lightweight Breathable Road Running Trainers Gym Fitness” could potentially make it harder for an AI to fully understand what a product is and its key attributes.
On the other hand, a more structured title broken down into more specific attributes makes it considerably easier for Amazon’s AI algorithms to build a more complete picture of the product and what it’s best suited for, e.g:
Product: Nike Running Shoes
Attributes: Lightweight and breathable
Use Case: Running, gym
Audience: Men
Of course, the new policy of splitting titles doesn’t guarantee every brand on Amazon will suddenly start writing titles using more logically-structured data. What it does do, however, is provide Amazon with cleaner, more parsable product data, which in theory will help it match products to the people looking for them more effectively.
Worried about revising your titles ahead of the update? Our ContentStudio service gives you access to a team of Amazon SEO experts, who will efficiently tackle your content optimisation while making sure you’re aligned with key best practices.
The new titles format is part of an increasing bank of evidence that the Amazon search experience is moving away from the more traditional, keyword-based queries.
Instead, we’re looking towards a future governed by a smarter, more conversational type of search, where shoppers can ask AI precise, natural questions similar to how they’d talk to a human shopping assistant. Less “portable charger usb-c android long battery life”, and more “Find me a portable charger that’s compatible with Android and good for long-haul flights.”
The headline here is that simply including keywords in the title is no longer enough to get your products seen in organic search. Now, you have to optimise listings in a way that will frame your product as the best choice for a certain audience or use case.
For now, the most practical way to adapt your Amazon SEO best practices is:
Historically, a guiding principle of Amazon SEO was to get as many popular keywords as possible into your title, and therefore maximise the ASIN’s chances of appearing for these search terms.
With the new title format being rolled out, you have a great opportunity to align your titles with a more conversational, AI-driven search by placing emphasis on unique attributes and use cases.
Bear in mind that the title restructuring is only one sign of the general shift towards more sophisticated, AI-driven search, and we’re not all the way there yet. The normal Amazon search bar is still in use, and the AI search experience still has some issues to iron out.
In other words, keywords are still important, but shouldn’t be treated as the be-all and end-all of organic performance on Amazon.
You’ll have less space to play with following the title update, but you should still have ample space to include the core details of what your product is, and include a primary keyword that shoppers use to discover products like yours.
The structure we recommend using is:
[Brand Name] + [Primary Keyword] + [Main Differentiator USP]
Note that you can swap around the keyword and USP depending on what’s more natural in the context of your product.
Here are some examples of this structure abiding the 75-character limit:
For the item highlights section, you should try to balance any secondary keywords you’ve surfaced through keyword research with more precise details related to use cases that might help visibility in AI search.
Here’s what this might look like when added to the titles we wrote earlier:
Like most brands, you probably have at least some products in your catalogue that aren’t compliant with Amazon’s new title format. With the July 27th deadline fast approaching, it’s crucial that you have an efficient strategy to get your titles compliant.
If you’re managing a catalogue with hundreds or even thousands of ASINs, this shouldn’t be treated as a fresh copywriting project where every title is manually rewritten from scratch.
The real objective here is migrating your entire catalogue, while ensuring that you protect:
Here are the key steps to adapting your titles as efficiently as possible:
The first pitfall to look out for is immediately shortening titles without understanding what currently is and isn’t working.
Before you actually change anything, it’s a good idea to carry out a catalogue audit that will show you exactly what needs updating.
Start by exporting all the performance data you have available from Seller or Vendor Central analytics. From there, you can compare ASINs or product lines and decide which listings should be prioritised for updates.
Here’s an example ranking system you can use as a starting point to classify your products and schedule them for edits:
Tier 1: Revenue-Driving ASINs
Any products where ranking or conversion decline could seriously hurt revenue should appear at the top of your list.
Sub-groups might include:
Tier 2: High-Traffic Products
Some products may not drive masses of revenue, but still receive a significant number of impressions every month, indicating an audience interest you may be able to capitalise on in future.
For example, if you identify lines with strong PPC click-through, organic traffic on an upward trend, and copy with high-volume keywords, this should also be protected as a priority right after the revenue-driving products from the first tier.
Tier 3: The Long Tail of Your Catalogue
Any lower-volume products which didn’t make it into the top tiers can be placed here. Ideally, these products should be manually updated to preserve whatever visibility and clicks they have. However, they can often also be handled using:
When the new title limits are rolled out, the biggest risk for many catalogues will be accidentally removing valuable search terms.
Remember that adapting to shorter titles doesn’t mean abandoning SEO completely. Instead, it means moving from an attitude of “all popular keywords need to go into the title” to “important terms need to have their correct place in a listing”.
To keep your updates organised and preserve as much value as possible, it can be helpful to build a hierarchy of targeted keywords, for example:
Group 1 (high value terms, keep in title): Typically a major, high-volume keyword that acts as a key identifier for shoppers searching for a product like yours, e.g. “insulated bottle”.
Group 2 (less valuable, move into item highlights): Product details that support purchase decisions, and still get reasonable keyword volume, but aren’t important enough to consume title space, e.g. “leakproof”, “BPA free”, “for hiking”.
Group 3: (lower value, move into other fields): USPs and details with less overall importance to the product, but which still might influence the purchasing decision.
Using the previous phases, and our suggested framework for including elements in the title or item highlights, the next step is to formalise a title structure you can share with all involved team members and ensure consistency as the new title format is rolled out.
The format we suggested earlier ( [Brand Name] + [Primary Keyword] + [Main Differentiator USP] ) will serve most product types well. When it comes to the item highlights, it’s often useful to create a checklist of features that tend to be a deciding factor for people shopping in a particular product niche.
Items in this list might include:
Even when you’re using your resources as efficiently as possible, you may not be able to cover manual updates for your entire catalogue in time for the 27th of July deadline.
As part of the switchover, Amazon will be providing brand owners with AI-generated titles that are compliant with the new limits. After the 27th, any titles you have that still exceed 75 characters will be gradually updated to the AI-suggested versions automatically.
There’s already been complaints on the Seller Central forums about the so-called “enhancements” making titles worse, or even getting details about a product completely wrong. Like anything written by AI, it’s important to go through these suggestions with a fine-toothed comb before they’re allowed to appear under your brand name.
If you’re not able to review and update your titles manually before 27/07, here’s a checklist you can use to prevent anything slipping through the gaps:
When you’re down to the wire and lacking the bandwidth to properly revise each title individually, going through these essential checks will help you avoid any serious disasters when the changes actually start appearing in the Amazon shopping experience.
The new update to Amazon title lengths may not have arrived at the ideal time. Still, rather than getting into a mad dash for compliance before the deadline, you can treat this announcement as an opportunity to adapt to new search methods, future-proof your content optimisation, and find new, undiscovered ways to reach your target audience.
We hope this guide has cleared up some uncertainties around the new Amazon title format, and helped you strategise how you’ll prepare your catalogue for the switch.
We’ll wrap up with some FAQs about the new title format and what you should be doing about it.
For more support with your Amazon content optimisations, be sure to check out our other blog posts, or discover how our ContentStudio service can help you.
From the 27th of July 2026 (27/07/26), Amazon product titles will be limited to 75 characters (including spaces), with a new 125-character “item highlights” section appearing underneath the title in search results. This is aimed at providing a better experience for mobile shoppers, and likely reducing keyword-stuffing and providing a structured data format that’s easier to read for AI.
No. Amazon has said that currently active listings aren’t at any risk of suppression. However, if you don’t update titles by the July 27th deadline, Amazon will begin automatically implementing their own AI-generated titles, known as “enhancements”.
Your title should provide a clear summary of the product using a structure like:
[Brand Name] + [Primary Keyword] + [Main Differentiator USP].
The goal here is to prioritise the most important product details and most popular keywords, while keeping your title natural, easy to understand, and appealing to shoppers in your audience.
Absolutely. Keywords will still play an important role in helping shoppers discover your products, and the standard Amazon search bar isn’t going anywhere for the foreseeable future. However, titles should no longer be treated as a place to crowbar in as many keywords as possible. With the increasing push for AI search on both Amazon and general ecommerce, the focus should shift towards clearly communicating product attributes, USPs, and use cases.
Not necessarily. While ideally you’ll be able to review all your product lines and optimise them based on the upcoming changes, this isn’t going to be practical for all brands, especially if you’re managing a large catalogue with hundreds or thousands of ASINs. Make sure to audit your catalogue and prioritise revenue-driving listings, high-traffic ASINs, and flagship products to use your bandwidth efficiently.