Feature Request: Increase the Character Limit for Deck Titles
The Problem
The current 60-character limit for deck titles is just too little to put on a decent descriptive title.
For example, this year I shared a deck, and I could barely fit the title in the 60-character limit (this is 58 chars):
“[zh] Chinese: Commonly Used Sentences w/ Word Explanations”
That leaves virtually no room for versioning, author tags, or any other small but important details.
The Rationale
I get why big flashcard companies like qu*zlet will not let you make deck titles longer than ~60 chars, or deck descriptions longer than 100 chars. This is because those companies cater to people whose attention span has been fried by social media; they don’t want their users to read anything longer than 9 words so they can retain users or something like that……………
As we all know already, Anki has a different design philosophy from them. The Anki ecosystem is built for dedicated learners who appreciate detail and control. This is why AnkiWeb has no limit to the deck description – it trusts the user to provide as much information as is necessary. The current restrictive title limit feels out of place with that philosophy.
The Solution
So I put here my feature request for longer deck title limits. Something like 120 characters is probably enough to give creators the flexibility they need for properly descriptive titles.
I think you are mistaking what a title should be used for. You might want to put more in the title, but that doesn’t mean longer titles serve users/searchers. It’s not about attention span – it’s about how much information is meaningful.
You can probably at least shorten that to Chinese: Common Sentences w/ Explanations.
Using emojis (e.g. ) can help make the title shorter as well as making it easier to spot in the list of decks. You can include “German” in the description to make it searchable.
My primary goal was consistency. The longer the limit, the more variability between brief titles and verbose ones, making the list appear messier, and harder to read on devices with narrow screens. 60 was an arbitrary number, and I’m not opposed to tweaking it if the majority of people want that.
I’m a bit torn on the use of emojis to be honest. They are visually attention-grabbing, so deck authors that use them are likely going to get more views. That feels unfair to other deck authors, and feels like it might encourage more widespread use of them to compete.
) can help make the title shorter as well as making it easier to spot in the list of decks. You can include “German” in the description to make it searchable.