A launch tagline says what the product does and who it's for in plain words, inside the form's limit (60 characters on Product Hunt). Formula and examples.
LLaunchScaler·Published ·8 min read
A product tagline for a launch site says what the product does and who it is for, in plain words, inside the form's character limit. Product Hunt caps it at 60 characters and asks for "no gimmicks or over-the-top language," so write a literal description, not a slogan: a verb or a category, the object, and the audience or the result.
Below is the formula, before-and-after rewrites with their character counts, the limits that apply on each form, and a test you can run in five minutes.
What is a product tagline on a launch site?
On a launch site, the tagline is the one line under your product's name in a list of dozens of others. Product Hunt calls it "typically the main element that drives someone to click on a product from the homepage and learn more." Its job is to let a scrolling reader decide in a second whether the product is for them.
That makes it different from a brand slogan. A slogan on a billboard can be abstract because the brand around it is already known. A launch tagline sits next to strangers' products and has no context, so it has to carry the description by itself. If you're writing a brand tagline for your own homepage, you have more room; on launch sites, literal wins.
Product Hunt's form shows what it expects from each field:
Field
Product Hunt's rule
What it means for you
Name
"Only the product's name, no description or emojis"
Don't sneak the tagline into the name
Tagline
"max 60 characters," "no gimmicks or over-the-top language"
One literal line
Questions, answered
What people ask about this
01
How do you write a good product tagline?
Say what the product does and who it is for, in words a stranger would use, with no adjective a competitor could also claim. Start with a verb or the product category, then name the audience or the result.
"max 500 characters" in the launch guide; 260 in the help center's posting article
The detail the tagline left out; write to 260
Launch tags
"up to 3"
Your category, so the tagline needn't name it
Its own examples draw the line. Allowed: "Send your friends a voicemail meow from a real cat." Not allowed: "The most ameozing app in the app store."
What is the formula for a product tagline?
Use a verb or category, the object, then who it is for or what they get: "[Do this] for [these people]" or "[Do this] without [the usual pain]." Each version names the job the product does. A reader who has that job clicks, and a reader who doesn't moves on, which is also what you want.
Category + audience + difference: "A CRM for freelancers that lives in your inbox."
Result + without the pain: "Find the pages Google stopped indexing, and why."
Known category + the twist: "Anonymous weekly check-ins for remote teams."
The verb pattern is usually the strongest because it describes an action the reader can picture. Use the category pattern when the category itself is the first thing a buyer looks for, such as CRM, password manager or time tracker.
What do good and bad taglines look like?
Bad taglines describe how the maker feels about the product. Good ones describe what it does. Each rewrite below keeps under Product Hunt's 60-character limit and removes every word a competitor could also use. Count your own with echo -n "your tagline" | wc -c.
Before
Chars
What's wrong
After
Chars
The ultimate AI-powered productivity platform
45
No job, no audience
Turn meeting recordings into a checklist of tasks
49
Revolutionize the way your team handles feedback
48
"Revolutionize" says nothing
Anonymous weekly check-ins for remote teams
43
Next-generation invoicing for modern businesses
47
Every invoicing tool says this
Send invoices from Stripe payments inside Slack
47
Supercharge your SEO with AI
28
Which part of SEO?
Find the pages Google stopped indexing, and why
47
A powerful, beautiful, all-in-one CRM
37
Three adjectives, no difference
A CRM for freelancers that lives in your inbox
46
Length barely changed. The rewrites spend about the same number of characters as the originals, and every one of them now says something a reader can check.
Which words should a tagline avoid?
Cut any word a competitor could also put in its tagline without changing a letter. "Powerful," "simple," "beautiful," "all-in-one," "next-generation" and "revolutionary" fit every product in a category, so they tell the reader nothing about yours. "AI-powered" joins them when most products in the category use AI.
Hacker News makes the same point for titles: its guidelines ask submitters not to make titles stand out "like using uppercase or exclamation points, or saying how great an article is." Apply it to every launch site. Also cut:
Superlatives you can't prove: "best," "fastest," "#1."
Jargon only your team uses: internal feature names, acronyms without context.
Questions: "Tired of messy invoices?" spends the characters on the problem and leaves out the product.
Emojis in the name, which Product Hunt disallows unless the emoji is part of the name.
What stays is concrete: verbs, nouns, the audience, and a number when it is true and checkable ("in two minutes," "for teams under 20").
How long should a tagline be on each launch site?
Check the limit in each platform's own form on the day you submit, because limits change. Product Hunt's submission guide sets the tagline at 60 characters; for the description it says 500, while its help center's posting article says 260. On Show HN the whole title, "Show HN: " included, has to fit Hacker News's 80-character title limit, which leaves 71 characters for the name and tagline.
Platform
Where the tagline goes
Limit, as published
Product Hunt
Tagline field
60 characters
Show HN
After "Show HN:" in the title
80 characters for the whole title, per a moderator
Other launch sites and directories
Tagline or short description field
Check the form; most show a counter
A practical approach is to write three lengths of the same sentence once and reuse them:
A 40-character version for tight fields and social bios.
A 60-character version for Product Hunt and most launch sites.
A 140 to 160-character version that works as a meta description or a short directory blurb.
Keep the verb and the audience in all three. Only the detail changes. The Product Hunt launch checklist lists every other field the form asks for.
How do you test a tagline before launch day?
Run the stranger test: show the tagline for five seconds to someone outside your field, hide it, and ask what the product does and who it's for. If they can repeat both, it works. If they describe the category but not the job, or can't name who it's for, rewrite it and try someone else.
Three more checks take a minute each:
The swap test. Put a competitor's name in front of your tagline. If it still reads true, the tagline doesn't describe your product.
The search test. Does the tagline contain the words a buyer would type to find this kind of product? "Invoices" and "Stripe" are search words, "revolutionize" isn't.
The list test. Paste it into a mock list of ten real launches from the day. Read the list quickly and note whether yours is one you'd click.
The same line then feeds your meta description, your X bio and every directory form, so an hour here saves rewriting it ten times later.
What goes in the description under the tagline?
The description carries what the tagline had to leave out: how the product works, what makes it different and what it costs. On Product Hunt, the launch guide caps it at 500 characters and the help center's posting article at 260, so aim for 260. The guide suggests "a short, concise explanation of your value proposition and features." Treat it as a few plain sentences, not a second pitch.
A structure that runs about 260 characters with all four sentences, so drop the third if the form's counter says you're over:
Sentence one restates the job in more detail: "Acme reads your Stripe payouts and drafts an invoice for each one in Slack."
Sentence two says how it works or what's different: "Approve with one click, and the PDF goes to your client from your own address."
Sentence three names who it's for: "Built for freelancers and small agencies who bill in more than one currency."
Sentence four states the price or the free tier plainly: "Free for 10 invoices a month."
Write it after the tagline, not before. If the description needs to explain what the tagline meant, the tagline is too vague. Then carry the same sentences into your first comment, your directory listings and your homepage's meta description, trimmed to each limit, so every place a reader or an answer engine meets your product says the same thing.
Should your tagline match across every listing?
Yes. Keep the same facts in every listing and change only the length. When one site says "invoicing for freelancers" and another says "payment reminders for agencies," readers and AI answer engines both get two different products. One consistent description gives them one clear version of what yours does.
That consistency goes past the tagline: the category, the audience, the pricing and the main features should match everywhere. The guide on how to write a directory listing covers the longer fields, and the comparison of LaunchScaler and Product Hunt shows how each platform uses the tagline on its pages.
Have the listing written for you
If you'd rather not write the tagline and listing yourself, LaunchScaler's Premium launch does it. For $29 one-time it writes your listing for you, tagline included, from your own scan of your site, books any open day for the launch (today included), and puts nothing on your site because paying skips the badge. The listing stays in the permanent curated index after its standing decays, and the followed link still depends on your site passing the readiness scan. Get Premium and edit the draft if you want a different line.
Product Hunt's submission guide sets the tagline at a maximum of 60 characters and asks for no gimmicks or over-the-top language. The name field takes only the product's name. For the description, the launch guide says 500 characters and a help center article says 260, so 260 fits both.
03
What is the difference between a tagline and a slogan?
A brand slogan is written to be remembered and can be abstract. A launch-site tagline is a description: it has to tell someone scrolling a list what the product does, so it should be literal.
04
Should my tagline be the same on every launch site?
Keep the facts the same everywhere and adjust only the length to each form's limit. One consistent description helps readers and gives AI answer engines one version of what your product is.
05
How do I test a tagline?
Show it to someone outside your field for a few seconds, then ask them what the product does and who it is for. If they can't repeat it back, rewrite it.
Product Hunt is worth it for tools makers and early adopters try on the day: free, a day of attention, feedback and a lasting page. Featuring is not yours.
