URL Shortener

Yes. Leave it blank and you get a short random code; enter a name and that becomes the suffix — handy for a campaign, an event or something you put in print. The name may contain letters, digits and dashes and must still be available. Pick something that stays legible when someone types it from a poster: do not mix a capital i with a lowercase L, and avoid digits that look like letters.

There is no expiry date and no subscription that can lapse. That said, a shortened link is by definition dependent on the service that forwards it. If you are putting it on something meant to last for years — a printed annual report, a sign in a building — weigh up whether the direct, long link is not the safer choice. For social media, a newsletter or a QR code on a flyer, a short link is perfectly fine.

Not yourself, no. Clicks are counted — that is needed to spot abuse — but there is no view where you can inspect it, simply because no account is attached to your link and we therefore cannot establish that it is yours. No visitor information is recorded per click: no IP address, no referring page, no device data. If you genuinely want to measure what a campaign delivers, attach UTM parameters to the destination URL before shortening it. You then see the traffic in your own analytics, with the context you already have there.

When a link is created we store the destination URL, the chosen name, the timestamp and the creator’s IP address. The last of these serves one purpose: being able to act if someone uses the shortener for phishing or malware. If a link is removed for that reason, the row is kept along with a reason and a timestamp, so there is a trail when an abuse report comes in. Beyond that you leave nothing behind to use the tool: no account, no email address, no registration.

There is a check on the destination URL. An address must start with http or https and have a valid host; a reference to a javascript or data address is refused. A link to one of our own short domains is also blocked, to prevent a redirect loop. And there is a length limit on the destination URL. If you get a message on a seemingly normal link, check whether a space or line break was pasted into it.