Trim title lenth (characters number) Wordpress

I want to shorten my title lenth by characters. I will be glad if somebody will help me ^^ I'm noob so.. i have whits code on related posts

            <h3 class="additional"><?php _e('სხვა სტატიები','vergo');?></h3>
                        <ul class="related">      
                                
                        <?php
                        $backup = $post;
                        $tags = wp_get_post_tags($post->ID);
                        if ($tags) { $tag_ids = array();
                                foreach($tags as $individual_tag) $tag_ids[] = $individual_tag->term_id;

                        
                                $args = array(
    'category__in' => $category_ids,
    'post__not_in' => $showed_posts,
 'showposts'=>20, // Number of related posts that will be shown.
    'caller_get_posts' => 1,
    'orderby' => 'rand'
);
                                $my_query = new wp_query($args);
                                if( $my_query->have_posts() ) { echo ''; while ($my_query->have_posts()) { $my_query->the_post();
                        ?>
            <li><?php echo vrg_ribbon() ?>
                        
                                <?php if ( has_post_thumbnail()) : ?>
                
                     <a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="<?php the_title();?>" >
                     
                            <?php the_post_thumbnail( 'carousel',array('title' => "")); ?>
                            
                     </a>
                  
                <?php endif; ?>
                
                                        <p class="meta"><?php the_time('g:i  ;  j-m-Y') ?> &bull; <?php echo getPostViews(get_the_ID()); ?> <?php _e('ნახვა','vergo');?></p>
                    <p style="margin-top:-4px !important"><a class="title"  href="<?php the_permalink() ?>" title="<?php the_title(); ?>"><?php echo short_title('...', 4); ?></a></p>

                        </li>
                        <?php
                                        }
                                        echo '';
                                }
                        }
                        $post = $backup;
                        wp_reset_query(); 
                        ?>
                        </ul>
                        <div style="clear: both;"></div>

So i want to trim my title not by words number, i want to set characters lenth..maybe somebody knows how to do this..