Blogger places a character limit of 39 characters for the filename of an article post (Post Page).

Since putting your most important keywords into the filename of a blog post is a key SEO strategy, you'll need to keep this mind when composing new blog articles. Here are some tips to keep in mind...

• Blogger uses your Post Title as the filename (you probably already know this)



• Blogger includes the spaces between words towards the character limit, it replaces them with dashes (you also probably know this)



• Blogger removes the words "the" "a" and "an", from the filename. So when counting the characters in your Post Title, don't count these characters.



• Blogger uses only whole words in the filename.
  
  So, if for example your Post Title is, "Maximizing Post Page Character Limitations",
  
  The 39 characters are, "Maximizing Post Page Character Limitati"
  
  The filename that Blogger will create is "maximizing-post-page-character.html".



• But if you assign one long word that exceeds 39 characters, Blogger will use that word as the filename, but will use only the first 39 characters.



• Blogger removes non-alphanumeric characters from the filename, with the exception of dashes.
  
  So if your Post Title is "$20.00 Will Not Get You Far",
  
  Blogger will create this as the filename, "2000-will-not-get-you-far.html"



• If you create two separate posts on the same day, and each post has the same exact title, Blogger will add "_01" to the filename of the second post. Interestingly, if your Post Title already reaches the 39 character limit, Blogger will actually expand the character limit to as many as 42 characters just to include the "_01".
  
  If your Post Title is, "Maximizing Blogger Filename Characters" (38 characters),
  
  Blogger will actually assign, "maximizing-blogger-filename-characters_01".html (41 characters).



• Blogger does not let you change the filename. That is, when you've saved a post, it will create a filename, and keep it permanent despite any future changes you might make.
  
  For example, if your Post Title is "Maximizing Blogger Filename Characters",
  
  Blogger will create the filename, "maximizing-blogger-filename-characters.html".
  
  But if you go back and change the Post Title to, "Maximizing Blogger Filename Limitations"...
  
  ...it won't change the original filename.



• Saving a post as "draft" does not assign a filename. You have to actually publish a post live to your blog, in order to get Blogger to assign a filename.
  
  But once a post has been published live, you can remove it from your live blog by going back to the Blogger editor, and resaving it as "draft". However, this will not allow you to change the filename; Blogger still keeps that original filename.



• To change a filename, you'll have to delete the post entirely, and create a new one.

My advice on maximizing your SEO value from this, is to compose a Post Title that only has the keywords in it. That is, strip out all the unnecessary words, and fit the most important keywords into the first 39 characters. Then publish the post live. Then, go back and change the Post Title to insert additional words to make it read grammatically correct.

For example...

1. If you want to write an article entitled, "What is the character limit on Blogger filenames?"



2. Create the Post Title instead, "Character Limit Blogger Filenames", and publish the article live.



3. Then edit the article, by changing the Post Title to "What is the character limit on Blogger filenames?". And republish live.



4. You'll still end up with a filename "character-limit-blogger-filenames.html", but your Post Title will actually read as "What is the character limit on Blogger Filenames?", and that title will be recorded as the Title on Google search results pages.

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