SEO On-Page: Twitter Cards

Guides implementation of Twitter Card meta tags for X (Twitter) link previews. Twitter falls back to Open Graph if Twitter-specific tags are missing; add both for best results.

When invoking: On first use, if helpful, open with 1–2 sentences on what this skill covers and why it matters, then provide the main output. On subsequent use or when the user asks to skip, go directly to the main output.

Scope (Social Sharing)

• Twitter Cards: X-specific meta tags; control how links appear when shared on X/Twitter

Card Types

| Type | Use case | |------|----------| | summary | Small card with thumbnail | | summary_large_image | Large prominent image (recommended; 1200×675px) | | app | Mobile app promotion | | player | Video/audio content |

Recommended Tags (summary_large_image)

<meta name="twitter:card" content="summary_large_image">
<meta name="twitter:title" content="Your Title">
<meta name="twitter:description" content="Your description">
<meta name="twitter:image" content="https://example.com/image.jpg">
<meta name="twitter:site" content="@yourusername">
<meta name="twitter:creator" content="@authorusername">
<meta name="twitter:image:alt" content="Alt text for image">

| Tag | Guideline | |-----|-----------| | twitter:card | Required; summary_large_image for most pages | | twitter:title | Max 70 chars; concise title | | twitter:description | Max 200 chars; summary | | twitter:image | Absolute URL; unique per page | | twitter:site | @username of website | | twitter:creator | @username of content creator | | twitter:image:alt | Alt text; max 420 chars; accessibility |

Image Requirements

| Item | Guideline | |------|-----------| | Aspect ratio | 2:1 | | Minimum | 300×157 px | | Recommended | 1200×675 px | | Max | 4096×4096 px | | File size | Under 5MB | | Formats | JPG, PNG, WebP, GIF (first frame only); SVG not supported |

Common Mistakes

• Missing Twitter Card tags (Twitter won't display images properly without them)
• Using relative image URLs instead of absolute https://
• Images too small or wrong aspect ratio
• Title/description too long (gets truncated)

Implementation

Next.js (App Router)

export const metadata = {
  twitter: {
    card: 'summary_large_image',
    title: '...',
    description: '...',
    images: ['https://example.com/twitter.jpg'],
    site: '@yourusername',
    creator: '@authorusername',
  },
};

HTML (generic)

<meta name="twitter:card" content="summary_large_image">
<meta name="twitter:title" content="Your Title">
<meta name="twitter:description" content="Your description">
<meta name="twitter:image" content="https://example.com/image.jpg">
<meta name="twitter:site" content="@yourusername">
<meta name="twitter:image:alt" content="Alt text">

Testing

• X (Twitter): Card Validator

Related Skills

• social-share-generator: Share buttons use Twitter Cards for X previews when users share; Cards must be set for share buttons to show proper previews
• open-graph: OG tags; Twitter falls back to OG if Twitter tags missing
• title-tag: Title tag often mirrors twitter:title
• meta-description: Meta description often mirrors twitter:description
• page-metadata: Hreflang, other meta tags
• twitter-x-posts: X post copy and engagement (different from link previews)
• twitter-card-image-generator: Programmatic Twitter Card image generation — 1200×675px, 2:1 ratio, player card posters, dark mode adaptations for ~40% of X users, timeline-safe zone design for mobile 1:1 crop, all 6 visual styles from og-image-generator. This skill covers how to SET the twitter:image tag; twitter-card-image-generator covers how to CREATE the image.