Slug Generator: Create SEO-Friendly URLs (2026)

URLs matter. Clean, readable URLs improve:

• User Experience: Users understand what page contains before clicking
• SEO Rankings: Search engines prefer descriptive URLs
• Social Sharing: Twitter/LinkedIn display full URLs in previews
• Printed Material: URLs on business cards, flyers are readable

Yet creating perfect slugs manually? Error-prone. Handling special characters, spaces, and capitalization requires attention.

Our Slug Generator transforms any text into clean, SEO-friendly URL slugs instantly.

What Is a Slug?

A slug is a URL-friendly version of text:

Example:

Original Title: "How to Create Secure Passwords for Every Account"
Slug:           "how-to-create-secure-passwords-for-every-account"

URL Result:

https://example.com/blog/how-to-create-secure-passwords-for-every-account

Slug Rules:

• Lowercase: All letters converted to lowercase
• Hyphens: Spaces and special characters replaced with hyphens (-)
• Alphanumeric: Only letters, numbers, and hyphens remain
• No Double Hyphens: Consecutive hyphens consolidated to one
• Trimmed: No leading/trailing hyphens

Why Slugs Matter for SEO

1. Descriptive URLs in Search Results

Google displays URLs in search results:

Good Slug:

https://example.com/guide/how-to-create-secure-passwords

Users immediately know: “This page is about creating secure passwords.” More likely to click.

Bad Slug:

https://example.com/blog/?p=123

Users see: “This is blog post 123.” No context. Lower click-through rate.

2. Keyword Relevance

Search engines extract keywords from URLs:

Slug: how-to-create-secure-passwords-for-every-account Keywords Extracted: how, create, secure, passwords, every, account

When users search for “secure passwords,” your page ranks higher—URL contains exact keywords.

3. Social Media Preview

Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook show full URL previews:

Clean URL: Users see topic and share confidently. Messy URL: Users see long ID string and hesitate to share.

Best Practices for Slug Creation

1. Keep Slugs Short but Descriptive

✅ Good: secure-password-guide (22 characters) ❌ Bad: the-complete-guide-to-creating-secure-passwords-in-2026 (69 characters)

Why Shorter Is Better:

• Readability: Users scan and understand faster
• Social Media: Fits better in tweets, SMS
• Mobile: Long URLs wrap awkwardly on small screens

Tip: Remove filler words (the, to, in, for, a, an) using our Slug Generator.

2. Include Target Keywords

Page Topic: “How to Bake Chocolate Cake” Target Keyword: “chocolate cake recipe”

✅ Good Slug: chocolate-cake-recipe ❌ Bad Slug: baking-guide-for-desert

Include keywords users will search. Our Slug Generator preserves your keywords while formatting.

3. Avoid Stopping Words

Stop words (the, a, an, to, for) add no SEO value:

Original: “The Best Guide to Creating Secure Passwords for 2026” Slug: best-guide-creating-secure-passwords-2026

Optimized: create-secure-passwords-guide-2026 (removed the, best, to, for)

Manually editing? Tedious. Our Slug Generator handles this automatically.

4. Use Hyphens, Not Underscores

✅ Good: secure-password-guide ❌ Bad: secure_password_guide

Why Hyphens:

• Standard Convention: Most CMS platforms use hyphens
• SEO Best Practice: Hyphens are treated as word separators
• Social Media: URLs with hyphens look cleaner in tweets

Underscores are often seen as “code-like” rather than user-friendly.

5. Lowercase Everything

✅ Good: secure-password-guide ❌ Bad: Secure-Password-Guide

Why Lowercase:

• Case Insensitive: URLs don’t care about case (treat as lowercase)
• User Error: Users forget capitalization
• Duplicate Content: Secure-Password-Guide and secure-password-guide might be seen as same page (SEO issue)

Our Slug Generator automatically lowercase everything.

Handling Special Characters

The Problem Characters

These characters break or look bad in URLs:

❌ Remove:

? # & % * / \ : ; ' " { } [ ] ( ) + = < > , . $ ^ ! |

✅ Keep:

a-z, 0-9, hyphens (-)

Special Case: Apostrophes

Original: “Guide to 2026’s Best Practices” Slug: guide-2026s-best-practices (apostrophe removed)

Special Case: Numbers

Numbers are fine in slugs:

Original: “10 Tips for Better Security” Slug: 10-tips-better-security

Our Slug Generator handles numbers naturally.

CMS Platform Integration

WordPress

Default Behavior: Automatically generates slugs from titles Manual Override: Edit “Slug” field in post editor Permalink Settings: Settings → Permalinks (choose slug structure)

Our Slug Generator helps when WordPress’s auto-generated slug is too long or includes unwanted words.

Ghost

Default Behavior: Generates clean slugs from titles Manual Override: Edit “URL” in post settings Routing: Ghost uses slugs for post URLs

Our Slug Generator is perfect for Ghost blog content.

Custom CMS / Static Sites

Manual Process:

1. Create slug using our Slug Generator
2. Create directory: /blog/secure-password-guide/
3. Create file: index.html or index.md
4. URL: https://example.com/blog/secure-password-guide/

Astro Integration:

---
title: "Guide to Secure Passwords"
slug: "secure-password-guide"  // Our generator creates this
---

Common Slug Mistakes

1. Auto-Generated URLs with IDs

❌ Bad: https://example.com/blog/?id=123 ✅ Good: https://example.com/blog/secure-password-guide

Why Bad: Unreadable, no SEO keywords, looks unprofessional.

2. Using Underscores

❌ Bad: secure_password_guide ✅ Good: secure-password-guide

Why Bad: Underscores often associated with code/programming, not content. Hyphens are standard for content URLs.

3. Too Long URLs

❌ Bad: the-complete-guide-to-creating-secure-passwords-for-every-account-in-2026 ✅ Good: create-secure-passwords-guide

Why Bad: Unreadable, wraps on mobile, lower click-through rates.

4. Including Stopping Words

❌ Bad: the-best-guide-to-creating-secure-passwords ✅ Good: create-secure-passwords-guide

Why Bad: the, to, for add no value. Users search for topic keywords, not filler words.

5. Duplicate Slugs

❌ Bad: Two pages with secure-password-guide slug ✅ Good: secure-password-guide and create-secure-passwords (unique slugs)

Why Bad: Search engines see duplicate content (canonicalization issue). Can’t tell which page to rank.

Cross-Tool URL Workflow

Slug creation is part of broader URL optimization:

• Slug Generator → Create clean, SEO-friendly slugs
• URL Encoder → Encode special characters for query strings
• Text Case Converter → Ensure lowercase, hyphen-separated format
• Character Counter → Count slug characters (keep under 50-60)

Combine these tools for perfect URL structure.

---

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What is a URL slug?

A: A slug is a URL-friendly, lowercase version of text where spaces become hyphens (-) and special characters are removed. Example: “How to Create Secure Passwords” → how-to-create-secure-passwords. Slugs improve readability and SEO. Use our Slug Generator to create them instantly.

Q: Why should URLs use hyphens instead of underscores?

A: Hyphens (page-name) are SEO standard—search engines treat them as word separators. Underscores (page_name) are often associated with code/programming. Hyphens are also more readable in social media tweets and mobile displays. Use our Slug Generator to generate hyphen-separated slugs.

Q: How long should a URL slug be?

A: Ideally 20-60 characters. Short enough to be readable in social media tweets and on mobile screens, but long enough to include target keywords. Our Slug Generator preserves your keywords while formatting. Remove filler words (the, to, for) to shorten slugs.

Q: What characters are removed when creating slugs?

A: Our Slug Generator removes all special characters except lowercase letters (a-z), numbers (0-9), and hyphens (-). Removed characters include: spaces, apostrophes, quotes, symbols (? # & % * / \ : ; ' " { } [ ] ( ) + = < > , . $ ^ ! |). The result is a clean, URL-friendly string.

Q: Why are slugs always lowercase?

A: URLs are case-insensitive (treat Page-Name and page-name as same), but lowercasing prevents duplicate content issues and user error. Users often forget capitalization. Search engines normalize URLs to lowercase. Our Slug Generator automatically lowercases all text.

Q: How do I create slugs for WordPress?

A: WordPress auto-generates slugs from titles, but they’re sometimes too long or include filler words. Use our Slug Generator to create optimized slugs, then paste into WordPress “Slug” field in post editor to override auto-generated version.

Q: Can I use slugs for static site generation (Astro, Next.js)?

A: Yes! For static sites, create a directory named after slug (e.g., /blog/secure-password-guide/) and place index.html or index.md inside. The URL becomes https://example.com/blog/secure-password-guide/. Use our Slug Generator to create clean slugs.

Q: Should I include dates in slugs?

A: Generally no. Include dates only if content is time-sensitive (news, events) and date is target keyword. Example: super-bowl-2026-results. For evergreen content (secure-password-guide), dates add no SEO value and make URLs longer. Use our Slug Generator to create clean, keyword-focused slugs.

---

Start Creating SEO-Friendly Slugs Today

Transform any text into clean, readable URLs instantly. Whether you’re optimizing blog posts, product pages, or documentation, our Slug Generator handles special characters, hyphens, and lowercase automatically.

Try it now:

• Generate SEO Slugs - For better rankings
• Shorten Long Titles - Remove filler words
• Clean Product URLs - E-commerce optimization
• Optimize Documentation - Developer guides

Instant slugs. SEO-friendly. Perfect for content.

Explore all 21 free tools at Hasare.

---

Messy URLs hurting your SEO? Create clean, keyword-rich slugs with our Slug Generator and watch your search rankings improve.