Control your site’s social media previews

Social media previews display information about your site when you share a link to social networks like Facebook, LinkedIn, and X (formerly Twitter). In this guide, you will learn how to control how your content appears when shared on social media.

WordPress.com automatically adds Open Graph meta tags (og:title, og:description, og:image) to all your posts and pages. When someone shares a link to your content on social media, these tags tell the social network what image, title, and description to display in the preview.

When sharing individual posts or pages, WordPress.com creates previews with this information:

• Title: The title of the page or post being shared.
• Description: The excerpt set for the page or post. If no excerpt is set, the first 195 characters of the content.
• Image: The featured image set for the page or post. If no featured image is set, social networks will look for images in this order:
  • An image from a slideshow.
  • An image from a gallery.
  • Any other image on the site.
  • An image linked from another website.
  • Your profile photo.
  • Other images found on the page, such as an image from the header, footer, or sidebar.

The Link preview section in the Jetpack sidebar lets you see how your post’s link will appear on social networks and in Google search results. This preview shows the title, description, and image that each platform will display based on your post’s Open Graph tags.

To preview your link appearance, follow these steps:

1. Navigate to Posts in your dashboard and create or edit a post.
2. Click the green Jetpack icon at the top-right of the editor.
3. Scroll down to the Link preview section.
4. Click the Preview button.
5. In the Previews modal, click the icon for each platform (Google, X, Facebook, Threads, LinkedIn, Nextdoor, Tumblr, Mastodon, or Bluesky) to see how your link will appear there.

If the preview doesn’t look right, check the “Fix preview issues” section below.

When sharing your site’s home page or archive pages (posts, categories, etc.), WordPress.com creates previews with this information:

• Title: Your site’s title.
• Description: Your site’s tagline.
• Image: Social sites will use:
  • The featured image of the front page, or
  • Your site icon if no featured image is set, or
  • Your site’s logo on sites with the Business plan or higher.

This section of the guide applies to sites with our WordPress.com Premium, Business, and Commerce plans. For free sites and sites on the Personal plan, upgrade your plan to access this feature.

You can control how your posts appear on each social network before you share them. The Jetpack Social panel in the editor lets you write custom messages, choose images, and preview your social posts — all in one place.

The Preview and customize modal lets you see how your post will look on each connected social network and make changes before you publish. This feature is available on the Premium, Business, and Commerce plans.

To preview and customize a social post, follow these steps:

1. Navigate to Posts in your dashboard and create or edit a post.
2. Click the green Jetpack icon at the top-right of the editor.

3. Under “Share to social media,” click the Preview and customize button.

3. In the modal that opens, write a custom message in the MESSAGE field.
4. On the right side, review the live preview of your post as it will appear on the selected social network.
5. Toggle the share switch next to each account to include or exclude it from sharing.
6. Click the Close button when you are finished.

The live preview updates as you make changes, so you can see exactly what your audience will see before your post goes live.

This section of the guide applies to sites with the WordPress.com Business and Commerce plan. If you have a Business plan, make sure to activate it. For free sites and sites on the Personal and Premium plans, upgrade your plan to access this feature.

You can write a different message and choose a different image for each connected social network instead of sharing the same content everywhere.

To customize your post for each network, follow these steps:

1. Open the Preview and customize modal using the steps above.
2. Click the Customize each tab at the top of the modal.
3. Click a social network icon at the top to select the account you want to customize.
4. Write a custom message and select media for that specific account.
5. Repeat for each network you want to customize.

This section of the guide applies to sites with the WordPress.com Business and Commerce plan. If you have a Business plan, make sure to activate it. For free sites and sites on the Personal and Premium plans, upgrade your plan to access this feature.

The Media section in the Preview and customize modal lets you choose what image appears with your social post. This feature is available on the Business and Commerce plans. Click the Select button to see your options:

Under FOR LINK PREVIEW:

• Use template: Create an image using the Social Image Generator with your post title and a template layout.
• Use featured image: Use the featured image set on your post.

Under FOR ATTACHMENT:

• Generate image: Generate an image using Jetpack AI.
• From Media Library: Select an image or video from your media library, or upload a file.

If you do not select any media, social networks will use the defaults described in the “Understand default social previews” section above.

This section of the guide applies to sites with the WordPress.com Business and Commerce plan. If you have a Business plan, make sure to activate it. For free sites and sites on the Personal and Premium plans, upgrade your plan to access this feature.

The Social Image Generator creates images with text overlays for your social posts. This feature is available on the Business and Commerce plans. Before you can use the Use template option in the media picker, turn on the Social Image Generator in your site’s settings.

To turn on the Social Image Generator, follow these steps:

1. Visit your site’s dashboard.
2. Navigate to Jetpack → Social.
3. Make sure you have at least one social network connected.
4. Toggle the setting next to “Social Image Generator” to ON.

You can configure the default image template and fallback image that apply to all posts.

To set default social image settings, follow these steps:

1. Visit your site’s dashboard.
2. Navigate to Jetpack → Social.
3. Make sure the Social Image Generator is turned on.
4. Click the “Change defaults” button.
5. Select a default template and add a default image to use for all posts when a featured image isn’t present.
6. Click the Save button to save your changes.

If your shared links aren’t appearing correctly, try clearing the cached social previews and verify that your image meets social media specifications.

Social networks cache social previews, meaning they save a previous version of your post’s details and don’t immediately update with the latest details if you have changed something. If you have modified your page or post settings, you can clear cached social previews to request the social network check your post again for the latest information.

Facebook and WhatsApp:

WhatsApp uses Facebook’s preview system, so fixing Facebook previews will also fix WhatsApp previews. Follow these steps to clear cached social previews on Facebook and WhatsApp:

1. Visit Facebook’s Sharing Debugger.
2. Paste your URL in the input field.
3. Click the Debug button.
4. Review the tags and preview information.
5. Click the “Scrape Again” button to refresh Facebook’s cache.

X (Twitter):

X (Twitter) re-indexes the card tag information on your page roughly every seven days. They offer some additional suggestions in the “Refreshing a Card in a Tweet” section of their troubleshooting guide.

LinkedIn:

1. Visit LinkedIn’s Post Inspector.
2. Enter your URL in the input field.
3. Click Inspect.

Follow these general guidelines when selecting the image you’ll use for your social previews:

• Recommended size: 1200 × 630 px works well across most social networks, and minimizes the risk of cropping issues.
• Aspect ratio: 1.91:1 is generally recommended.
• File types: JPG or PNG.
• Max file size: Keep under 5 MB; while some platforms may allow larger file sizes, 5 MB is the safest standard.
• Center important content: Prevent cropping on smaller viewports.

More information for specific social networks:

• Facebook Image Thumbnail
• LinkedIn Image Thumbnail