How to Add Open Graph Tags in WordPress

Open Graph tags control how your content appears in social media previews. Without them, platforms guess the title, description, and image — often incorrectly.

Method 1: Yoast SEO (Recommended)

Yoast SEO automatically generates Open Graph and Twitter Card tags based on your content:

1. Install and activate Yoast SEO.


2. Go to Yoast SEO → Social.


3. Enable the Facebook and Twitter tabs.


4. Set default images for pages without a featured image.

For individual posts, use the "Social" tab in the Yoast meta box to customize the title, description, and image for social sharing.

Method 2: Manual Implementation

Add Open Graph tags via functions.php:

function add_open_graph_tags() {
    if (is_singular()) {
        global $post;
        $title = get_the_title();
        $description = has_excerpt() ? get_the_excerpt() : wp_trim_words($post->post_content, 30);
        $url = get_permalink();
        $image = get_the_post_thumbnail_url($post->ID, 'large');

        echo '<meta property="og:title" content="' . esc_attr($title) . '" />' . "\n";
        echo '<meta property="og:description" content="' . esc_attr($description) . '" />' . "\n";
        echo '<meta property="og:url" content="' . esc_url($url) . '" />' . "\n";
        echo '<meta property="og:type" content="article" />' . "\n";
        if ($image) {
            echo '<meta property="og:image" content="' . esc_url($image) . '" />' . "\n";
        }
    }
}
add_action('wp_head', 'add_open_graph_tags');

Best Practices

• Use images at least 1200x630 pixels for best display on Facebook


• Keep og:title under 60 characters


• Keep og:description under 200 characters


• Always set a featured image for every post

Verify with InspectWP

Run an InspectWP scan to verify your Open Graph tags are present and correctly configured.