Summaries and Reading Time

On list pages and the homepage, Ananke shows a short summary of each post rather than its full content. This page explains where that summary comes from and how to control it.

Automatic summaries #

If you do nothing, Hugo generates the summary automatically from the start of the content (by default the first 70 words). This needs no configuration and works for every page.

The manual summary divider #

To choose exactly where the summary ends, add a divider in your content. Hugo uses everything before it as the summary:

This paragraph is the summary shown on list pages.




This and everything after it is only shown on the full page.

A custom summary in front matter #

To write a summary that is independent of the body text, set summary in front matter:

+++
title = "Summary example"
summary = "This is a custom summary shown on list pages."
+++

This is the full article body, shown only on the page itself.

This is useful when the first paragraph does not make a good preview.

List summaries are followed by a “read more” link. Customise its text with read_more_copy, site-wide or per page:

# config/_default/params.toml

[params]
read_more_copy = "Read more about this entry"

See General content features → Read more link for per-language and per-page examples.

Reading time and word count #

Enable the reading time and word count display with show_reading_time:

# config/_default/params.toml

[params]
show_reading_time = true

You can also tune the words-per-minute used for the estimate with reading_speed. Both are covered in detail, including multilingual setup, on the Reading Time page.

How list pages use summaries #

On list pages and the homepage:

  • each entry shows its summary (manual divider, front matter summary, or the automatic excerpt — in that order of preference);
  • a “read more” link points to the full page;
  • if reading time is enabled, it appears with the entry.

Posts that have a featured image show it alongside the summary as a card.