To shorten a link, paste the long URL into the field on the blinkhop.com home page. You get a short zou.sh link right away, already copied to your clipboard, with no account, ads or captcha in the way.
Shorten a link on the website
- Open blinkhop.com and click the field that says “Paste a long link…”.
- Paste your URL. When the field is empty, pasting shortens the link immediately. If you typed the URL instead, click Shorten.
- Your short link appears, for example
https://zou.sh/7Kp2x, and is copied to your clipboard. - Click QR to open its QR code, or New to shorten another link.
Want a readable link such as https://zou.sh/launch instead of a random code? See How do I choose a custom ending?
What you get
- A short code. Codes have 5 characters by default and skip look-alike characters (no 0/O, 1/l/I). Letter case doesn’t matter when someone types the link.
- One link per URL. Shorten the same URL again without a custom ending and you get the existing link back, not a duplicate.
- A link that lasts. Short links never expire unless an owner sets an expiry, which requires an account (early access).
- A preview page. Add
+to the end (https://zou.sh/7Kp2x+) to see the destination, the creation date and the total clicks.
Shorten a link from the command line
The REST API does the same thing, and you don’t need a key to try it:
curl --data-urlencode "url=https://example.com/a/very/long/link?utm_source=newsletter" \
"https://api.blinkhop.com/v1/links?format=text"?format=text returns only the short URL. Leave it out to get the full JSON response. The API quickstart walks you through your first request.
Still stuck? Contact us and include the URL you tried to shorten.
