Learning how to effectively add keywords and meta descriptions in WordPress can enhance your website’s SEO, leading to increased traffic, and more leads and sales for your business.
We have found that these elements play a crucial role in informing search engines about the content of our pages, improving our site’s visibility in search results.
Despite sounding technical, this article will show you how tools like All in One SEO make using keywords and meta descriptions in WordPress surprisingly easy.
Why Add Keywords and Meta Descriptions in WordPress?
Keywords and descriptions allow you to tell search engines more about the content of the posts and pages on your WordPress website.
Keywords are important words or phrases that people are likely to search for to find your content. A meta description is a brief description of what your page or post is about.
Your meta title, description, and keywords show up in Google search results:
Meta keywords and meta descriptions are HTML meta tags. They form part of your website’s header code. They don’t appear on your page or post for visitors to see. However, search engines and browsers can use them.
WordPress SEO tools and plugins make it super easy for you to add them from your WordPress admin area for each post and page on your website.
How Important Are Meta Keywords and Meta Descriptions for SEO?
Like most WordPress users, you are probably wondering whether adding meta keywords and meta descriptions will improve your WordPress SEO rankings.
While search engines don’t exactly share how much weight they assign to keywords or descriptions, SEO experts always recommend adding a proper meta description and keywords for on-page SEO optimization.
Meta descriptions are widely used by search engines. In Google’s search results, they appear below your content’s title, with the search term shown in bold.
An effective meta description will encourage users to click through and read your post content. And we know that a good click-through rate means Google will likely rank your content higher.
When it comes to meta keywords, most modern search engines either assign very little importance or don’t use them at all. The main exception is the Russian search engine Yandex.
Instead, search engines prefer that you add your focused keywords in your title, description, and throughout your content. This is why SEO plugins like AIOSEO come with a TruSEO score that helps you optimize your content for focused keywords and keyphrases.
Our Recommendations for Meta Keywords and Meta Descriptions
We recommend adding a meta description for all the posts and pages on your site, including your homepage, category pages, and tag pages.
Note: Google customizes the description based on the search query, so it will only use your meta description some of the time. However, it’s still worth creating a meta description. It will appear in around 30% of searches, and it can help your SEO.
When it comes to meta keywords, it’s up to you whether or not to use them. They will not harm your site, but they may not be of much benefit either.
That being said, let’s take a look at how to add keywords and meta descriptions in WordPress. Use the links below to jump to the section you are interested in:
- Installing and Activating All in One SEO for WordPress
- Enabling Meta Keyword Support in All in One SEO
- Adding Keywords and Meta Descriptions to Your WordPress Posts and Pages
- Adding Keywords and a Meta Description for Your Homepage
- Adding Keywords and Meta Descriptions to WordPress Category and Tag Archives
- Bonus: Track Your Keyword Performance with All in One SEO
How to Add Keywords and Meta Descriptions in WordPress (Video Tutorial)
If you prefer the written tutorial, then please continue reading.
Installing and Activating All in One SEO for WordPress
For this tutorial, we will be using All in One SEO (AIOSEO), which is the best WordPress SEO plugin on the market. It allows you to easily optimize your entire WordPress site for better SEO and comes with a comprehensive set of tools to grow your business.
First, you will need to install and activate the All in One SEO plugin. For more details, see our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, All in One SEO will take you through a simple setup wizard. Just follow the step-by-step instructions to get everything set up for your site. Alternatively, you can follow our guide on how to set up All in One SEO for WordPress correctly.
After completing the setup, simply click the ‘Finish Setup and Go to the Dashboard’ button.
Enabling Meta Keyword Support in All in One SEO
All in One SEO comes with built-in support for meta descriptions and keywords. However, the meta keywords feature is turned off by default. This is because many search engines give little or no importance to keywords in their rankings.
To enable it, go to All in One SEO » Search Appearance » Advanced in your WordPress dashboard. Then, switch the meta keywords toggle from No to Yes.
After enabling meta keywords in WordPress, you will see some additional options.
You can generate a post’s keywords from its categories and/or tags. Also, you can dynamically generate relevant keywords on your WordPress blog posts and archive pages.
It’s up to you whether you want to use these automated options or not. Regardless, you will always be able to manually define keywords for each post and page.
Don’t forget to click the ‘Save Changes’ button at the bottom of the page to store the changed settings.
Adding Keywords and Meta Descriptions to Your WordPress Posts and Pages
First, you need to edit a post or page where you want to add your meta keywords and meta description. AIOSEO works in both the WordPress block editor and the classic editor.
Once you are on the content editor screen, scroll down to the ‘AIOSEO Settings’ box below the content area.
Adding a Meta Description to Your Post or Page Using AIOSEO
You will see your site’s SEO title and an automatically generated description as the snippet. Below that, you will see the ‘Meta Description’ field.
Go ahead and enter a description into the ‘Meta Description’ field. All in One SEO will let you know how many characters you have used. This is important because Google will only show 160 characters on search results pages (SERPs).
You will see that your snippet preview automatically updates as you type in your meta description.
Once you have finished, simply save or publish your post to save the changes to your meta description.
Using All in One SEO’s Dynamic Tags in Your Meta Descriptions
Optionally, you can add tags to your meta description. The ones that All in One SEO offers by default are Page Content and Separator, but you can add other dynamic tags as well.
For example, we have added the author’s name to our meta description here.
To add a tag, simply type the ‘#’ character into the meta description box.
You will then see a dropdown menu of available tags.
You can choose from tags like Category Title, Current Year, Post Date, Post Title, Site Title, Post Excerpt, and more.
Using All in One SEO’s ChatGPT Integration to Automatically Generate Meta Descriptions
If you want to save time, then you can also use All in One SEO’s AI-powered Title / Description Generator. It uses ChatGPT to automatically craft high-quality meta descriptions based on the main theme of your content.
To get started, simply click on the robot icon in the ‘Meta Description’ field.
If you haven’t used this feature before, you will be prompted to create an OpenAI account.
Enter your email address and follow the easy steps in the setup wizard to create your account and connect it to All in One SEO.
Once that’s done, you can click on the robot icon again.
This will generate 5 meta description suggestions.
You can select the meta description you want by clicking on the ‘+’ button. Then, it will be automatically added to the meta description field, where you can tweak it according to your needs.
Adding Meta Keywords to Your Post or Page Using AIOSEO
To add your meta keywords, you need to click the ‘Advanced’ tab for your AIOSEO settings.
Simply type in your keywords and press ‘Enter’ after each one. It’s important to only use keywords that are relevant to your content. Adding irrelevant keywords will not give you any SEO benefits.
Tip: Meta keywords are completely separate from your focus keyword. You can set a focus keyword under the General tab so you receive recommendations about improving your content. The focus keyword doesn’t automatically become a meta keyword for your post or page.
Adding Keywords and a Meta Description for Your Homepage
You can also add meta keywords and a meta description for your website’s homepage in WordPress. Here is how to do that using All in One SEO.
First, go to Search Appearance » Global Settings in your WordPress admin. Then, scroll down to the Home Page section.
On this screen, you can easily enter a meta description and keywords, just like you would for a post or page.
All in One SEO will use your tagline as your meta description by default. You can leave that in there, or you can customize it.
You can also click on the other options to add those tags to your meta description. Alternatively, you can add different tags by typing the ‘#’ character in your meta description, as described above.
Tip: It’s better to use these tags rather than manually typing your site title, tagline, or separator character. This is because your meta description will automatically be updated if you later make changes to any of those.
Make sure you click the ‘Save Changes’ button at the bottom of the page after adding your meta description and keywords.
Adding Keywords and Meta Descriptions to WordPress Category and Tag Archives
You can also add keywords and descriptions to your category and tag archive pages.
First, you need to visit the Posts » Categories page. Take your mouse over to the category you want to edit, and then click on the ‘Edit’ link.
Next, you should scroll down on the category’s page to the AIOSEO Settings box.
Here, you just need to enter a meta description for your category. Again, you can use All in One SEO’s tags within this if you want to.
To add keywords, simply click on the ‘Advanced’ tab like you would for any post or page.
Make sure you save the changes to your category before moving on.
Your meta description and keywords will now be used for the category page, which is the archive of posts in that category.
You can repeat the process to add meta keywords and descriptions to your blog’s tags and other custom taxonomy archive pages.
All in One SEO integrates seamlessly with other popular WordPress plugins. This allows you to add keywords and meta descriptions for your WooCommerce product pages, SeedProd landing pages, MemberPress course pages, and more.
Bonus: Track Your Keyword Performance with All in One SEO
Want to know how effective your keywords are? All in One SEO doesn’t just let you add keywords in WordPress, it helps you track their performance too.
With All in One SEO’s Search Statistics and Keyword Rank Tracker feature, you can easily see how your chosen keywords are ranking in search results, right from the WordPress dashboard.
This includes valuable information like keyword position, clicks, average click-through rate, impressions, position history, and much more.
By tracking these metrics, you can see what’s working and what’s not. This will help you adjust your keyword strategy so that you can improve your rankings and drive more traffic to your site.
For more details, see our guide on how to check if your blog posts are ranking for the right keywords.
Expert Guides on WordPress Meta Data
We hope this article helped you learn how to easily add keywords and meta descriptions to your WordPress posts and pages. You may also want to see some other guides related to adding metadata in WordPress:
- How to Display Blog Post Meta Data in Your WordPress Themes
- How to Customize WordPress Excerpts (No Coding Required)
- How to Add Custom Meta Boxes in WordPress Posts and Post Types
- How to Add Custom Meta Fields to Custom Taxonomies in WordPress
- How to Add Facebook Open Graph Meta Data in WordPress Themes
- What Is rel=”noopener” in WordPress? (Explained)
- How to Hide a WordPress Page From Google
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Olaf
Since I started using SEO plugins (first Yoast SEO and then AIO SEO), I’ve realized how simple and enjoyable SEO can be in WordPress. Adding meta descriptions to individual content with AIO SEO is really intuitive and creative. It’s great how it also keeps track of the keywords in what you write in the description. I didn’t want to say it for a long time, but I truly believe that an SEO plugin is a must-have that every WordPress site should install among its first plugins.
Hema
Can someone please let me know if AIOSEO plugin is free to use? When I try yo open an account with them, it tells me to subscribe to their paid plan.
Thank you
WPBeginner Support
The plugin is free to use, the simplest way to find the free version would be to go under Plugins>Add New and search for AIOSEO. That should allow you to Install and then activate the plugin on your site
Admin
Dennis Muthomi
You said that Google uses the submitted meta descriptions around 30% of the time, for the other 70%, does editing the meta description serve any purpose if Google changes it anyway in the search results?
WPBeginner Support
It helps Google understand what the content of the post/page is so it can appear in search results and be modified if users ask a question that is close and could be answered with a mild change to your description.
Admin
Caroline
Thanks for sharing this informative blog.
WPBeginner Support
You’re welcome
Admin
Amit
Hey
Before Commenting, I want to say thank you for providing this great information. I feel too good to read this awesome blog.
I have one question about meta title and descripton.
What could be the reason behind Google displaying an incorrect meta title and description?
WPBeginner Support
Glad you found our blog helpful!
For the title and description, if they are set properly on your site and Google has crawled it then it could be Google changing it for the specific search that the user has done to be more relevant to the user.
Admin
Ram E.
The meta title and description, especially the latter, are not directives to Google. While you can set them however you like, Google may change the final description if it thinks it’s best for the user. It’s best practice to write a meta description that can boost CTR, but you don’t have to do it seriously for every page of your site.
Mike Simpson
Please explain why this article seems to be about “All in One SEO” yet most comments are about Yoast? It makes no sense. What happened?
WPBeginner Support
An older version of this article was done using Yoast, after Yoast removed the feature we updated our article to show how to do so using All in One SEO
Admin
Andy
On many sites I read about how to write seo-title correctly, but in many respects the situation remained not very clear to me. After reading your article, I received all the answers to the questions that interested me. Thank you, now I can use this information for my site.
WPBeginner Support
Glad our guide was helpful
Admin
Chelsea
Thanks for this! By chance, are you using the paid version of AIOSEO? I’m not able to edit the meta description or titles for my categories or tags. It says I need to upgrade. Thanks!
WPBeginner Support
Yes, we are using the paid version in our guide.
Admin
Joe
You need to point out that this is only available with the premium service.
WPBeginner Support
Unless we hear otherwise, this tool is no longer available on any version of Yoast.
Admin
Dian Pramono
how to use meta keyword tag in Yoast seo Premium 14.2?
WPBeginner Support
Yoast has currently removed this setting and we will update this article once we found a replacement we would recommend
Admin
Totti
Hi, Could you recommend me another method for adding meta keywords in wordpress because Yoast SEO doesn’t support this option anymore?
WPBeginner Support
We do not have a recommended alternative at this time.
Admin
Daleen
I’m sorry
I don’t have the advanced settings pages under seo features on my site for some reason. How can I implement this tutorial?
Thanks
WPBeginner Support
Apologies for any confusion, at the moment Yoast has removed meta keywords from their plugin, we will look to update the article should we find an alternative we would recommend
Admin
Richard Clemmer
Thank you so much for this blog. It helped me A LOT
WPBeginner Support
Glad our article was helpful
Admin
Jose
Thanks for the article. Useful.
Jose
WPBeginner Support
Glad our article was helpful
Admin
Sirah Maja
I don’t find “Homepage” button like tutorial
WPBeginner Support
Apologies for any confusion, at the moment Yoast has removed meta keywords from their plugin, we will look to update the article should we find an alternative we would recommend
Admin
Hen
Yoast doesn’t look anything like this any more
I think you have to pay for it to get it looking like this. Boo.
WPBeginner Support
Yoast has changed its interface since this article was last updated, this is not the paid version of the plugin.
Admin
Rebecca
I’m using version 12.5 of Yoast SEO and it doesn’t resemble anything like the stages in this tutorial. Is it possible to get tutorial updated to the newer version of Yoast SEO.
WPBeginner Support
We will look into updating our articles as we are able, at the moment Yoast has removed meta keywords from their plugin
Admin
Andrew
HI, I think you need to update all your Yoast related articles, as the plugin has been updated since many of your articles/instructions were created.
WPBeginner Support
Thank you for letting us know, we will certainly take a look at updating our articles as we are able
Admin
Piyush Saini
really nice information thanks for the same but sir can you please tell me how to add more 50+ keyword for a single domain because im struggling with the same. please share the link for the same.
thanks in advance
WPBeginner Support
If you want to add keywords to each article then you would manually go through each article and add them
Admin
uday
now a days are meta keywords still working??
WPBeginner Support
Yoast has removed meta keywords since the last update of this article due to search engines not using them for rankings anymore
Admin
Zoe
Is there any way to create a meta description without using Yoast?
WPBeginner Support
Yes, there are, we just recommend Yoast as it is a beginner-friendly solution
Admin
Didier
Hi! I recently add YOAST in mi site, but it not adding metatag in the header of the page / post. Do you have any idea why it does not work? Or how could validate that its working
WPBeginner Support
Have you cleared all of the caching that is active on your site?
Admin
Rianne
Hi! My Yoast SEO looks totally different. It doesn’t have the meta+ titles tab. I have problems with setting the description for my homepage. Anyone who can help??
WPBeginner Support
Yoast has updated their interface since this article was created and have removed the meta keyword.
Admin
Rianne
So, it is no longer possible to add the meta description for your homepage?
WPBeginner Support
The meta description for your home page would be set in the Search Appearance section of Yoast’s settings
sadaf
how to update meta tage in description page while there is no option
WPBeginner Support
We do not have a recommended method at the moment, Yoast removed the meta keyword option as they say at the moment it does not affect ranking.
Admin
Chitra
Is that not possible to add meta description in wordpress themes without Yoast ?
WPBeginner Support
Without using a plugin you would be required to edit the theme files normally to add that content. That’s why we recommend this method
Admin
Surendar
How long yoast seo take time to update meta description in google??
WPBeginner Support
That would depend on Google, you can request Google recrawl a url to attempt to force the update
Haroon elahi
Great information!
Also write an article on ” upload Meta and Description file upload in FTTP”
WPBeginner Support
Thank you, we’ll certainly look into other post ideas such as that one.
Admin
chika
is this a premium YOAST? because i cant find this setting in mine but mine isn’t premium.
WPBeginner Support
If you mean the keywords then that would be because it was removed after we created this article. The meta description if not below your content, you should be able to click the three dots in the top right of your editor to bring up the option in the block editor.
Admin
Aaditya Sharma
yoast plugin removed keyword add option, now how I can add keywords in page or woocommece products? any plugin or idea
WPBeginner Support
Unless I hear otherwise, we do not have a recommended method/plugin at the moment.
kiya
Titles & Metas not showing under the SEO…..how can i do it now
WPBeginner Support
Yoast no longer offers meta keywords with their plugin but you should still be able to click the title in your Yoast section of the post to allow you to edit it.
Admin