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.