How to shorten a link — step by step, for free

The first time I seriously needed to shorten a link on a flyer for a local event. I pasted the raw address into a Canva project and it turned into a monster: about 140 characters with two utm_, one ?fbclid= added by Facebook, and a tail of parameters that no one ever reads. On paper, it looked like an accident. No one would type that from a poster into their phone. And then it hit me that shortening links isn't some marketer trick, but basic hygiene.

Good news: the entire operation takes less time than making a coffee.

Three clicks and that's it

You open cutty.dev. You paste your monster into the field at the very top. Click Shorten.

You get something like cutty.dev/aB3k9, and right underneath, a ready-made QR code.

No email. No "free plan for 5 links per month". No ads attached to your address. Copy and move on.

And what exactly do you get besides a shorter address

Because it's not just a matter of fewer characters. Along with the package, a few more things come in that I used to do with separate tools:

• QR code that generates itself. Download with one click and drop it onto a poster, business card, or flyer (yes, exactly that use case I started with).
• OG Preview. When someone pastes your short link on Discord or iMessage, a nice tile with a thumbnail appears, rather than just a naked line of text.
• Adding https:// for you. Paste an address without this prefix? No worries, the link will work anyway.

To log in or not

Shortening works without logging in, so in 90% of situations an account is unnecessary. But there is another side to the coin.

An account is useful when you want to manage links, rather than just launching them once and forgetting them. Then click statistics come into play (how many people, from which country, from which source, day by day on a chart). Destination editing is also included, meaning you can change where the link leads without touching the short address itself. This particular feature is a lifesaver: you printed a QR code on 500 flyers, but the landing page has changed? You swap the destination in the panel, and the code remains the same. No reprinting required.

To this, a password for the link (PIN before showing the offer or document) and an expiration date or an opening limit, after which the link closes itself.

Creating an account is email plus PIN. Or logging in via Google or Facebook, if you don't want to remember anything.

Your own suffix instead of gibberish

By default, the suffix is random. But honestly, you won't be able to read cutty.dev/aB3k9 to anyone over the phone. You can enter your own and make it cutty.dev/wiosna or cutty.dev/cennik. More readable in print, easier to dictate, looks better in a campaign.

One thing worth knowing: once a suffix is taken, it never returns to the pool. Even if you delete the link. This means cutty.dev/yourbrand remains yours forever, and in a month, someone else won't take it over and redirect your old audience into deep space. When it comes to your own brand, this can be more important than it seems.

A few questions that are always asked

Does such a link expire on its own? No. It works indefinitely, unless you manually set a date or a click limit.

Does it cost anything? No. Shortening, QR, custom endings, and statistics are free, with no limit on the number of links.

And is visitor data leaking somewhere? The servers are located in the EU, IP addresses are only stored as an encrypted hash, we do not sell statistics to anyone, and we do not add third-party trackers. If this is a concern for you, there is more about privacy here.

Will it work in a year? Yes. The tips are not recycled, so the link from last year's flyer leads where it was supposed to lead.

Let's go back for a moment to my flyer. That 140-character monster shrank to ten characters with a legible tail, and the QR next to it worked on the first scan. The best test is simply to take one of your ugly links and see what happens. It will take you less time than reading this paragraph. And if something doesn't work out, write to [email protected], we reply the same day.