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How to Create a Short Link in WordPress

Creating a Short Link in WordPress

Are you posting links on your WordPress website or linking your resources on other sites but wish they could all be short? You’re far from alone in your desire. Long links are hard to type out and remember and easy to copy incorrectly while inviting distrust about the web page behind the link. The situation gets even worse when the resource is within one or several folders and has a long name. In short, it’s not something you should suffer if you plan to make web resource sharing a pivotal part. Luckily, you don’t have to, since we’ll show you how to create a short link in WordPress.

1. Using wp.me to shorten links on WordPress.com websites

We realize not everyone is a user of a self-hosted WordPress website. Therefore, we’ll first cover our readers who are hosting a site using WordPress.com, a service that offers a built-in URL shortening component titled “wp.me”. All sites can avail of the feature, it’ll be around as long as the service itself is, and links neither expire nor are susceptible to spam as it constantly monitors them. We also want to clarify that this ability comes from the Jetpack plugin, and may be disabled. If the options below don’t appear:

  1. Open your WordPress Admin dashboard and click on Jetpack on the left-hand side.
  2. Go to Settings.
  3. Select Traffic.
  4. Toggle the switch in front of “Create short and simple links for all posts and pages.” to on.

With that said, there are three methods to generate a short link:

1. Using Block Editor for making short links

Visit the Posts → All Posts or Pages → All Pages section of the WordPress Admin section. Then:

  1. Open any published post or page. This is mandatory—it won’t work on drafts or pending pages or posts.
  2. Select the green Jetpack icon in the upper right corner.
  3. After it expands, locate a section titled “Shortlink” and either manually copy the link or click on Copy.

2. Employ Classic Editor to generate a short link

Though we generally propose you transition to Block Editor, users who still utilize Classic Editor aren’t left out. They can also visit the Pages or Post section of the WordPress Admin dashboard before they:

  1. Begin editing a post or page.
  2. Find the “Permalink” section directly under the title and click on Get Shortlink next to “Edit.”
  3. A new window, titled “URL:” will pop up. Copy the link and click OK.

3. Create a short link via WordPress Action Bar

It has been quite a while, precisely 2015, since WordPress.com introduced an Action Bar feature to their websites. This method is unique because it uses frontend, meaning that your visitors can also get a generated short link and share pages further. After visiting a public post or page, anyone can:

  1. Click the three dots (usually next to a “+” sign option) to expand a list.
  2. Select Copy shortlink among the offered options.
  3. The link will become visible when pasted anywhere.

2. Apply a hook to restore Shortlink functionality to Classic Editor

This is a quick workaround to achieve the thing described under method 1, sub-method 2, without being a WordPress.com user. The truth is, the function exists outside of Jetpack, and only needs to be enabled via code. We propose making a site-specific plugin or using a code snippet plugin to add the following code:

add_filter( 'get_shortlink', function( $shortlink ) {return $shortlink;} );

3. Utilize third-party URL management, shortening, and sharing service

While undoubtedly more labor-intensive, third-party services don’t use up your resources and may come with additional tools for branding, tracking, and sharing. There are plenty of these, and we have no preference or affiliation. However, we’ll demonstrate the procedure with a well-known option, TinyURL.

  1. Visit the Tinyurl app’s web page.
  2. Paste the long, regular link under “Enter a long URL to make a TinyURL”
  3. Decide which domain and alias (at least 5 random words that will be added to the link afterward. These must not be taken by a different user).
  4. Click on Make TinyURL, and you’ll get a link that looks like this: tinyurl.com/alias

Note. We recommend creating a free account if you plan to generate many links at once or over time. You’ll get a full history and other convenient features.

4. Install a WordPress plugin to create a short link across your site

Though you may realize this already, if you already have a Jetpack installer or plan to employ it as your primary analytics plugin, you can use method 1, sub-method 1, despite using a WordPress.org installation. However, if you solely need this functionality, we propose a specific solution that permits making short links using your domain name.

Installing a WordPress plugin that will utilize a variation of your domain name as a shortened link is an ideal solution for many. It’s not as labor-intensive, everything happens within the Admin section, and you’re essentially creating nice links through 301, 302, or 307 redirects. Though we’re unaffiliated, a great example of this is a well-known solution Pretty Links for WordPress. Here’s how it works:

  1. After installation and activation, head to the Pretty Links option in the left sidebar of WordPress Admin.
  2. Select Add New or, if you open the section itself, the Add Pretty Link button.
  3. You can now select:
    1. Redirection — We suggest 307 (Temporary)
    2. Target URL — Enter your long link here
    3. Pretty Link — configure a short link with your domain name
    4. Title — Configure a title for when the link is added or embedded
    5. Notes — For backend use only, has no functionality but to help keep you organized
    6. Advanced Options — Unless you need to disable an option like “nofollow” or tracking clicks, leave it untouched
  4. Click on Create in the bottom left corner.
  5. You can now see it as an entry in the “Pretty Links” section from step 1 and access all related settings.

5. Create a custom branded short link in WordPress

What would happen if you could combine the best part of methods 3 and 4? You would get the ability to create custom-branded URLs, on a separate domain name, while retaining the ability to track click-through rate, improve branding, shorten affiliate or campaign links to invoke trust, and much more. Many services offer this option. Though we have no ties, a renowned provider of this service is Bitly, and for free. Since this also has a manual alternative and is advanced, we’ll cover this in a separate guide.