💻 Text & Dev
🔗 🔗 URL Slug Generator: How to Create SEO-Friendly URLs
Learn how to create SEO-friendly URL slugs. Covers slug formatting rules, stop words, special character handling, SEO best practices, and common URL slug mistakes to avoid.
⏱️ 7 min read🦉 365tool.net🌍 For everyone worldwide
A URL slug is the human-readable identifier in a URL: in https://example.com/blog/how-to-bake-bread, the slug is how-to-bake-bread. Good slugs are readable, keyword-rich, and permanent — changing them after publication breaks inbound links and loses accumulated SEO value.
What Makes a Good URL Slug
- Lowercase only: URLs are case-sensitive; always lowercase
- Hyphens to separate words:
my-article not my_article — Google treats hyphens as word separators
- No special characters: Remove
!@#$%^&*(), accented chars, quotes — these require percent-encoding
- No stop words (usually): "a," "the," "and," "or" add length without SEO value
- Concise: Under 75 characters is best
- Keyword-rich: Include the primary keyword — it appears in the URL
The Slug Generation Process
"How to Bake the Perfect Sourdough Bread (With Tips!)" becomes:
- Lowercase:
how to bake the perfect sourdough bread with tips
- Remove special chars:
how to bake the perfect sourdough bread with tips
- Remove stop words:
bake perfect sourdough bread tips
- Replace spaces with hyphens:
bake-perfect-sourdough-bread-tips
Special Character Handling
| Character |
Action |
Example |
| Accented (é, ñ) | Transliterate | café → cafe |
| Ampersand (&) | Replace with "and" | bread & butter → bread-and-butter |
| Apostrophe (') | Remove | don't → dont |
| Spaces | Hyphens | my page → my-page |
SEO Best Practices
- Logical hierarchy:
/blog/category/slug creates breadcrumb context
- Avoid dates when possible:
/how-to-bake-bread ages better than /2024/01/how-to-bake-bread
- 301 redirect when changing slugs: Never change a URL without redirecting the old one
- Consistent trailing slash: Pick
/page/ or /page and redirect the other
Common Slug Mistakes
- Numeric auto-generated slugs: WordPress's
/?p=1234 misses all keyword opportunities
- Underscores:
my_article — hyphens are preferred over underscores
- Overly long slugs: Including every word from a long title; trim to 3–5 key terms
- Changing high-traffic slugs without a redirect: Causes immediate traffic loss and broken links
❓ Frequently Asked Questions
What is a URL slug?▼
A URL slug is the human-readable identifier in a URL. In https://example.com/blog/how-to-bake-bread, the slug is "how-to-bake-bread." Good slugs use lowercase, hyphens to separate words, no special characters, and include relevant keywords.
Should I use hyphens or underscores?▼
Hyphens. Google treats hyphens as word separators ("my-article" = two words). Underscores historically joined words. Hyphens are the universal convention for URL slugs, CSS class names, and web file names.
Should slugs include stop words?▼
Generally no. Stop words (a, an, the, and, or) add length without SEO value. "how-to-bake-bread" is cleaner than "how-to-bake-the-bread." However, don't remove stop words if doing so creates ambiguity.
What happens if I change a URL slug?▼
You lose inbound links to the old URL. Always set a 301 permanent redirect from the old URL to the new one — this preserves most link equity and prevents 404 errors. Never change a slug without a redirect.
How long should a URL slug be?▼
Under 75 characters, ideally under 60. Include the 3–5 most important keywords. Shorter slugs are cleaner, easier to share, and more readable in search results. Avoid slugs that copy the full page title verbatim.