Goo.gl Shortener No More
Google is shutting down its goo.gl link shortening service due to a ‘proliferation of alternative URL minification platforms, like ow.ly and Bitly, as well as the fact that the ways people find content on the Internet have also changed dramatically, from primarily desktop webpages to apps, mobile devices, home assistants, and more.
The discontinuation of goo.gl will be in three stages, the post said. Starting on April 13th, anonymous users and users who have not used the service before will no longer be able to make new short links.
For developers, the URL Shortener API will be restricted to projects that had already accessed it before May 30th.
The goo.gl management console will continue to work until March 30th, 2019. Even after this date, all existing short links made through goo.gl will continue to be directed to the intended web page.
Problematic Service to Operate
While it is fortunate that Google will continue to maintain existing goo.gl links to direct users clicking on shortened links, URL shorteners are often a problematic service to operate. Many are inundated with spam links or have troublesome reputations due to users hiding URLs to malware, spyware, and shock websites behind shortened links. Use of shortened URLs has also been banned on various websites for similar reasons.
Most URL shorteners do not have as long of a lifespan as goo.gl has had. Unlike this situation, the linked URLs tend to disappear when URL shorteners cease operations. In 2009, the Internet Archive started the “301 Works” project to archive the short link and intended destination for a variety of URL shortening services.
The End of an Era
In 2018, we announced the deprecation and transition of Google URL Shortener because of the changes we’ve seen in how people find content on the internet, and the number of new popular URL shortening services that emerged in that time. This meant that we no longer accepted new URLs to shorten but that we would continue serving existing URLs.
Over time, these existing URLs saw less and less traffic as the years went on – in fact more than 99% of them had no activity in the last month.
As such, we will be turning off Google URL Shortener. Please read on below to understand more about how this may impact you.
Who is Impacted?
Any developers using links built with the Google URL Shortener in the form https://goo.gl/* will be impacted, and these URLs will no longer return a response after August 25th, 2025. We recommend transitioning these links to another URL shortener provider.
Note that goo.gl links generated via Google apps (such as Maps sharing) will continue to function.
What to Expect — August 25, 2025
Starting August 23, 2024, goo.gl links will start displaying an interstitial page for a percentage of existing links notifying your users that the link will no longer be supported after August 25th, 2025 prior to navigating to the original target page.
