What is the TikTok caption character limit?

2,200 characters. Hashtags and mentions count towards that number, so a caption with 30 hashtags is using a chunk of it on tags rather than words.

How long should a TikTok caption be?

Short enough that the point lands before TikTok cuts it off in the feed. In practice that means the hook in the first sentence, one or two lines of context, then hashtags. The rest of the 2,200 characters is there for search, not for the viewer.

Does the TikTok bio have a character limit?

Yes, 80 characters — much tighter than the caption. Most creators spend it on what the account is about plus a call to the link in bio.

Do hashtags count towards the caption limit?

Yes. Every #word counts as characters in the same 2,200. That is one of the reasons piling on 30 tags is a bad trade: it eats the space you could use for words people actually search for.

Do character limits change?

They do, and platforms rarely announce it loudly. The limits in this guide match the ones our caption checker uses, and it is worth re-checking after a big app update if your captions suddenly refuse to post.

Caption limits

TikTok Caption Character Limit: 2,200 Characters

The short answer: 2,200 characters per TikTok caption, with hashtags and mentions counted in that total. The bio is much tighter at 80 characters.

The limits, side by side

Caption length is not the same across platforms, and the number that matters is the one before the text gets cut. Here are the limits our caption checker uses:

Character limits for captions and descriptions by platform
Where	Characters	Worth knowing
TikTok caption	2,200	Hashtags included
TikTok bio	80	Link in bio does the work
Instagram caption	2,200	Up to 30 hashtags, 5–10 works better
Instagram bio	150	One line plus the link
YouTube description	5,000	First 150 characters show in search
YouTube title	100	Around 60 before it truncates
X (Twitter) post	280	Links count as 23
LinkedIn post	3,000	First ~200 before "see more"
Facebook post	63,206	Long limit, short posts perform better
Threads post	500	Text-first platform

What the 2,200 characters are actually for

Almost nobody reads a 2,200-character TikTok caption. In the feed, TikTok shows the first line or two before folding the rest behind a "more" tap. So the limit is not a target — it is room for two different jobs:

The visible part has to work as a hook. One sentence that adds to the video rather than repeating it, because the video already has the viewer's attention.
The hidden part is for search. TikTok's own search reads captions, so the words you would want someone to type to find this video belong in the caption, in plain language, not buried in tags.

That split is why "write a short caption" and "use the character limit" are both bad advice on their own. Front load the human part, back load the searchable part.

Hashtags are not free characters

Every hashtag eats into the same 2,200. Thirty tags at roughly 12 characters each — the word plus the space — is about 360 characters, or a sixth of the caption, spent on a list most viewers scroll past. Three to five specific tags usually do more than thirty generic ones, and they leave room for the words people actually type into search.

The bio is the tight one

80 characters is roughly this: "Weekly budget recipes. Free meal plan in the link." That is 57. It is enough for what the account is and what to do next, and not enough for a paragraph. If you find yourself fighting the bio limit, the thing that needs cutting is usually the second sentence — it belongs in a pinned video instead.

Check before you post

The free caption checker counts characters, shows what is left, and warns you when a caption is over the limit for the platform you picked. It runs in the browser, so you can keep a draft on the clipboard and check it without a tab that phones home.

Limits do change. If a caption that used to post suddenly refuses, check the count first — it is more often the limit than the app.