Viraly provides powerful tools to help you write effective social media captions. From real-time character counting to AI-powered generation, you have everything you need to create engaging content for each platform.
Character Limits by Platform
Each social media platform has different character limits. Viraly automatically enforces these limits to ensure your posts will publish successfully:
| Platform | Field | Character Limit |
|---|---|---|
| Twitter/X | Caption | 280 (25,000 with Premium) |
| Caption | 2,200 | |
| Message | 5,000 | |
| Commentary | 3,000 | |
| Description | 800 | |
| Title | 100 | |
| TikTok Video | Title | 2,200 |
| TikTok Photo | Description | 4,000 |
| YouTube | Title | 100 |
| YouTube | Description | 5,000 |
| Threads | Message | 500 |
| Bluesky | Caption | 300 |
| Mastodon | Caption | 500 |
Using the Character Counter
Every text field in the post composer displays a real-time character counter at the bottom of the text area. This counter updates as you type, showing the format “X characters” to help you stay within platform limits.
Adding Emojis
Emojis can increase engagement on social media posts. Viraly includes a built-in emoji picker for easy insertion:
- Place your cursor where you want the emoji
- Click the smiley face icon in the text area footer
- Browse or search for emojis in the picker
- Click an emoji to insert it at your cursor position
The emoji picker supports dark mode and maintains your cursor position after insertion.
Adding Hashtags
Viraly integrates with your saved hashtag lists for quick insertion:
- Click the hashtag icon (#) in the text area footer
- The hashtag selection dialog opens
- Choose from your saved hashtag lists
- Selected hashtags are inserted at the end of your caption
Hashtags are automatically added with proper spacing (two newlines before the hashtag list).
To create and manage hashtag lists, see Managing Hashtag Lists.
AI Caption Generator
Viraly’s AI assistant can help generate or improve your captions. Look for the purple AI Generator button with a sparkles icon in the text area footer.
Generation Modes
The AI assistant offers four modes:
- Write New – Generate a caption from scratch based on your topic
- Shorten – Make your existing caption more concise
- Expand – Add more detail to your caption
- Rephrase – Reword your caption while keeping the meaning
Using the AI Generator
- Click the AI Generator button
- Select your desired mode
- Choose a tone from the dropdown (professional, casual, etc.)
- Optionally add keywords to guide the generation
- Click Generate
- Review the result and either:
- Click Insert to add it to your caption
- Click Copy to copy to clipboard
- Click Retry to generate a new version
First Comment Feature
Some platforms perform better when hashtags are placed in the first comment rather than the main caption. Viraly supports automatic first comment posting for select platforms including Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube.
To use this feature, click the speech bubble icon in the text area footer to enable first comment, then enter your hashtags or additional text in the separate field that appears.
Note: The first comment feature requires an Influencer plan or higher. For full details, see Adding First Comments to Posts.
Link Detection and Previews
When you include URLs in your captions, Viraly automatically:
- Detects links in your text
- Fetches preview metadata (title, description, image)
- Displays a link preview card
- Offers link shortening options
Link handling varies by platform based on their native support for link previews.