New (google) local SERPs has 40 character limit on title length

[adriandg]

Should i change my all the page titles for pages that show up in local SERPs to reflect this new limit?  Is there any benefit to leaving it at the old limit and having more keywords in there?  Or would there be benefit to conforming to google's new standard and having shorter titles?

[First]

I don't think you should change all the page titles on your site to 40 characters or less just to conform to Google's  new local SERPs.

The 40 character limit is what Google will show not what you are limited to use. The best advice I can give you is to be "true" to your page titles. If you need more then 40 characters to properly let search engines and people know what your pages are about then you should. Just don't add (stuff) an extra list of keywords to the end of your page titles.

[adriandg]

But then every title would look cropped in search results.  This seems quite silly.

Also, i completely disagree with you on "being true" to the page titles.  For example a local company that sells blue widgets that is named johns widget corp, would rank much better if their title was "blue widgets - johns widget corp" than if it was simply "johns widget corp".   If people followed your advice they would rank much poorer.

[First]

I think you misunderstood me on "staying true to the page title"

If your website is about selling blue widgets and you page title is "blue widgets - johns widget corp" then you are "staying true to the page title" You are letting people and search engines know that this page is about blue widgets. Also "blue widgets - johns widget corp" is under 40 characters so this would not be the best example.

Your question was if you should change all your page titles to under 40 characters so that your entire page title would show. My answer / advise to you is; if you need more then 40 characters to properly describe your page then you should not change just so that all characters in your page title show.