---
title: "How to change the content preview length in Drupal 8"
description: "As you customize the look of your site, you will pay special attention to the front page of your site. Once you promite node content to the front page, you may want to alter the length of the..."
url: https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/edu/drupal/change-content-length/
date: 2013-06-06
modified: 2021-08-16
author: "Scott Mitchell"
categories: ["Drupal"]
type: post
lang: en
---

# How to change the content preview length in Drupal 8

As you customize the look of your site, you will pay special attention to the front page of your site. Once you promite node content to the front page, you may want to alter the length of the excerpt.

## Changing the content preview length

1. [Log into your Drupal 8 interface](/support/edu/drupal/how-to-log-into-the-drupal-admin-dashboard/).
2. [![select menu option](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8__common-images_select-menu.png)](/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8__common-images_select-menu.png) From the upper menu bar, find and click on the **Menu** option.
3. [![select content menu option](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8__common-images_select-structure.png)](/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8__common-images_select-structure.png) From the new menu that appears, locate and click on the **Structure** option.
4. [![select content types list option](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_select-content-types.png)](/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_select-content-types.png) A list of structure types will appear. Find and click on the **Content Types** item in the list.
5. [![select the manage display option from the dropdown](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_select-manage-display.png)](/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_select-manage-display.png) The available content types will appear. Locate the one you want to work with and click on the dropdown for that row found in the *Operations* column. Click on the **Manage Display** option. For our example, we chose the *Basic Page*.
6. [![click on the teaser button in upper right corner](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_click-teaser.png)](/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_click-teaser.png) You are taken to the display management editing tab for the content type you selected. In our case, it is the *Basic Page*. Look to the upper right corner and you will see a button named **Teaser**. Click on that button to continue.
7. [![edit the trim length setting](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_edit-trim-length.png)](/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_edit-trim-length.png) This leads you to the Teaser, or excerpt settings. You will see a field named *Trim Length*. To adjust that setting, click the gear icon located to the right. This opens up an area where you can change the number of characters the excerpt displays. The default is 600 characters. In this example, we change it to 300. Click the **Update** button after entering your new value.
8. Click on the **Save** button to finalize and activate the settings. You can see below how changing the preview length setting changes the excerpt displayed on the front page. Before After [![excerpt with default length](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_before.png)](/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_before.png) [![after the excerpt length was changed to 300](https://www.inmotionhosting.com/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_after.png)](/support/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/edu_Drupal-8_103_change-preview-length_after.png)