7 Best URL Shortener Software in 2024 (Ranked)

Are you looking for the best URL Shortener Software to shrink and track your site’s links?

With hundreds of free and premium URL Shortener services available, it’s hard for beginners to choose the right URL shortener for their site’s links.

A good URL Shortener gives you the ability to track link performance so that you can easily measure the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns, channels and activities. 

In this post, we’ve collected the five best URL Shortener Software for beginners based on the features that beginners care about, such as how easy it is to create short, user-friendly URLs and how they benefit your business. 

 

What Are URL Shortener Software?

A URL shortener is an online software tool that converts long URLs into short, user-friendly URLs. It also allows you to customize URLs to fit your individual preferences.

Overall, URL shortener software is becoming more and more capable of completing tasks usually done by sophisticated software solutions.

Some URL shorteners come with built-in click analytics, UTM parameter support, retargeting and more. These features let you track, manage and see which of your custom links are performing well.

 

What Are The Best URL Shortener Software?

Now that you understand what URL shorteners are, let’s take a look at the best URL Shortener Software that you can use to shrink and track links.

 

1. Bitly

Bitly is the best URL shortener software on the market. It helps you convert long links into short, trustworthy links so you can get more leads from your marketing efforts. 

Bitly comes with a powerful analytics tool, which allows you to track individual links and get related analytics on your dashboard. This way, you can make smarter decisions about which content and platforms to focus your efforts and money on.

The platform also integrates with your favorite online tools like Salesforce, Zapier, TweetDeck, and more.

Bitly is an excellent URL Shortener platform for both individuals and teams that need to produce high-quality, more aesthetic URLs regularly.

Key Features:

• Free version—which allows you to shorten links without signing up.
• Analytics dashboard — for rich tracking, reporting, and analytics.
• Custom URL—get Branded links with your custom domain.
• URL retargeting.
• QR Code solutions to fit any need.

Pricing:

Bitly offers these pricing plans:

• Free: $0
• Basic: $35/month or $29/month (billed annually)
• Premium: $300/month or $199/month (billed annually)
• Enterprise: Custom pricing plans are available.

 

2. Sniply

Sniply provides more than a URL shortener tool.

It helps marketers, bloggers and businesses of all sizes shorten long links and allows them to overlay their own custom message onto any piece of content.

The platform enables users to create friendly URLs with a variety of call-to-actions they can seamlessly embed on their blog posts or web pages.

Additionally, Sniply’s tools empower you to track individual links and get related analytics metrics such as conversion rates, link clicks, and more. This way, you can effectively optimize your link marketing campaigns.

Key Features:

• Custom URL shortener.
• Designed the perfect call-to-action on each shortened URL.
• A/B testing.
• Embeddable on blogs post and webpages you share.
• Dashboard monitors to track user interaction.
• Integrates with different marketing platforms and other analytic tools.
• Connect custom domain.

Pricing:

There are four pricing plans available on Sniply:

• Basic: $29/mo
• Pro: $79/mo
• Business: $149/mo
• Agency: $299/mo

All plans come with a 14-day free trial.

 

3. TinyURL

TinyURL is a powerful and easy-to-use URL shortener.

The software provides users with powerful tools to help them effectively shorten and customize URLs. It allows users to create branded, trustworthy links that customers will easily recognize.

The dashboard is super clean and straightforward, making content analysis accessible even for beginners. It provides detailed click metrics for individual links as well as link groups.

Key Features:

• Link management tool
• Anonymous usage for free
• Easy-to-use
• Branded and customized links to match your brand
• It Provides Real-time click data.

Pricing:

TinyURL pricing plans are based on the number of active URLs

• The Free Plan offers free basic ad-supported shortening for individual users.
• The Pro Plan is $12.99/month and includes 10,000 API requests, and 500 TinyURLs with unlimited tracked clicks.
• The Bulk 100K plan is $129.00/month and gives you 100,000 API requests, 300,000 TinyURLs and more.
• You can also contact TinyURL for custom plan options.

 

4. Rebrandly

Rebrandly is one of the leading tools that shorten URLs for online marketing or social networking. The platform is an all-in-one solution with link management, URL retargeting, custom URL, analytics dashboard, and collaboration tool.

Rebrandly is most suitable for small businesses and teams since it lets you create separate workspaces. Plus, It allows teammates to create and share branded links using the same domain name(s).

Key Features:

• Domain name management
• Analytics tool—allows you to keep track of all traffic generated by your branded Links
• Link management
• UTM parameters
• Traffic routing and deep linking.
• A powerful collaboration tool for teammates.
• Integrates seamlessly with 100+ third-party tools.

Pricing:

Here’s a list of the yearly pricing plans for Rebrandly:

• Starter: $24
• Pro: $75
• Premium: $417
• Enterprise: Custom price

They also offer a Free plan with up to 500 links.

 

5. Ow.ly

ow.ly is another simple yet powerful URL shortener software offered by Hootsuite to help business owners drive more traffic to their website, blog, or landing page.

It’s most suitable for small businesses and freelancers looking for solutions that come with a great social media management tool.

Key Features:

• Custom URLs
• Link retargeting
• Publish and schedule posts
• Link Management
• Track & improve link performance
• Rank monitoring

Pricing:

The paid plans start from $49 per month. You can get started with their 30-day free trial.

 

6. Short.io

Short.io gives you everything you need to get all the benefits of link shortening.

In fact, Short.io offers a friendly support team available Monday to Friday, 24-hour via live chat and email.

With 20,000,000 redirects per day for 200,000 happy customers, Short.io is becoming one of the most popular tools for businesses and individuals alike.

With a wide variety of features such as UTM builder, tracked clicks, password protection, QR code, mobile targeting and more, Short.io is one of the URL Shortener Software that offers the most features to its customers. 

They also have an intuitive centralized dashboard that allows you to manage, categorize, and track all your shortened links.

If you are an individual blogger, affiliate marketer or business owner who prioritizes personalized short URLs for enhanced brand recognition and trust, get started with the platform’s 7-day free trial.

Key Features:

• Short.io allows you to create branded links that enhance brand recognition.
• Their powerful analytics tool gives you access to detailed reports about your links, such as click-through rates, traffic source, campaign performance and more.
• The Link Permissions feature allows team members to give users with “Link-level permissions” access to individual short links.
• Short.io lets you generate QR Codes with a logo for every shortened link.
• Limit access to your website With Password protection. Users will need a password to reach the content.

Pricing

• Free Plan ($0/month) – Includes basic features.
• Personal ($18/month) – Unlimited branded links, Unlimited branded links and redirects, 10 custom domains, and 100k link automation per year.
• Team ($48/month) – Unlimited users, Unlimited branded links and redirects, plus the ability to create 50 custom domains, and have 100k link automation per year.
• Entreprise ($148/month) – Unlimited everything.

 

7. BL.INK

BL.INK is another well-known URL shortener tool for shortening URLs.

They provide an excellent analytics tool, easy integrations with other tools and robust security to meet the compliance needs of the most stringent, and they have an expert support team that’s been super helpful.

On top of that, BL.INK helps you create stunning landing pages in minutes using their intuitive drag-and-drop builder, with no coding required.

If you’re a professional looking for flexible, reliable URL shortener software that can grow with you, this platform is a great choice.

Key Features

• BL.INK offers an easy-to-use drag-and-drop interface allowing anyone to create landing pages.
• With built-in analytics, BL.INK provides you with real-time data about your users, landing page performance, links, and campaigns.
• Safe and secure, so your links are protected as they deliver content to your audience.
• You can add retargeting pixels to your short links, allowing you to reach and engage with your target audience more effectively.
• Their Enterprise clients are allowed to create QR codes that live forever.

Pricing

There are four pricing plans for those who want to create short links and QR codes on this platform:

• Expert+ Plan: $48/month
• SMB Plan: $99/month
• Team Plan: $299/month
• Entreprise Plan: Request a demo to learn more about this.

 

Does Short URL Expire?

The expiration of short URLs depends on the service you use. Some services offer permanent short links, while others may set expiration dates or require you to renew them periodically. Here’s a closer look at:

Permanent Short Links: Some services like TinyURL, Ow.ly or Bitly links do not expire and remain active as long as the original webpage remains active.

Expiring Short Links:  Most popular URL shortener tools offer permanent links. However, a few services might set expiration dates on shortened URLs. We highly recommend that you familiarize yourself with the terms and conditions of the service you are utilizing. This is because the availability of links can be influenced by the user’s subscription plan.

Custom URL Expiration: Some advanced URL shortening services like Rebrandly allow you to set a custom expiry date on links at a workspace level.

 

Conclusion:

Using URL shortener software is one of the most effective ways of creating more user-friendly URLs, tracking and analyzing URLs, and boosting your ability to capture new leads and drive sales.

However, It’s essential to make the correct choice based on your requirements.

My top recommendations are Bitly and Sniply. They are affordable, reliable, and easy to use.

TinyURL is most suitable for freelancers who are looking for Free URL shortener services.

Need something that’s more suited to support your teams’ efforts? Look at Rebrandly for a URL shortener platform that includes a collaboration tool.

Ow.ly is excellent if you want high-quality URLs and an integrated social media management tool.

We hope this post helped you find the best URL shortener tool for your website.