• BBgmoro

        See all notifications

        Skip to content
        Moz logo Menu open Menu close
        • Products
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Pro Home
          • Moz Local
          • Moz Local Home
          • STAT
          • Moz API
          • Moz API Home
          • Compare SEO Products
          • Moz Data
        • Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Analysis
          • Keyword Explorer
          • Link Explorer
          • Competitive Research
          • MozBar
          • More Free SEO Tools
        • Learn SEO
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO
          • SEO Learning Center
          • Moz Academy
          • MozCon
          • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
        • Blog
        • Why Moz
          • Digital Marketers
          • Agency Solutions
          • Enterprise Solutions
          • Small Business Solutions
          • The Moz Story
          • New Releases
        • Log in
        • Log out
        • Products
          • Moz Pro

            Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

          • Moz Local

            Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

          • STAT

            SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

          • Moz API

            Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

          • Compare SEO Products

            See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

          • Moz Data

            Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

          Turn SEO data into actionable content briefs

          Turn SEO data into actionable content briefs

          Learn more
        • Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Analysis

            Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

          • Keyword Explorer

            Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

          • Link Explorer

            Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

          • Competitive Research

            Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

          • MozBar

            See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

          • More Free SEO Tools

            Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

          Let your business shine with Listings AI

          Let your business shine with Listings AI

          Get found
        • Learn SEO
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO

            The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

          • SEO Learning Center

            Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

          • On-Demand Webinars

            Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

          • How-To Guides

            Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

          • Moz Academy

            Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

          • MozCon

            Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

          Access 20 years of data with flexible pricing
          Moz API

          Access 20 years of data with flexible pricing

          Find your plan
        • Blog
        • Why Moz
          • Digital Marketers

            Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

          • Small Business Solutions

            Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

          • Agency Solutions

            Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

          • Enterprise Solutions

            Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

          • The Moz Story

            Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

          • New Releases

            Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

          Surface actionable competitive intel
          New Feature

          Surface actionable competitive intel

          Learn More
        • Log in
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Local
          • Moz Local Dashboard
          • Moz API
          • Moz API Dashboard
          • Moz Academy
        • Avatar
          • Moz Home
          • Notifications
          • Account & Billing
          • Manage Users
          • Community Profile
          • My Q&A
          • My Videos
          • Log Out

        The Moz Q&A Forum

        • Forum
        • Questions
        • My Q&A
        • Users
        • Ask the Community

        Welcome to the Q&A Forum

        Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

        1. Home
        2. Digital Marketing
        3. Web Design
        4. Does Google count the domain name in its 115-character "ideal" URL length?

        Moz Q&A is closed.

        After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

        Does Google count the domain name in its 115-character "ideal" URL length?

        Web Design
        3
        3
        3482
        Loading More Posts
        • Watching

          Notify me of new replies.
          Show question in unread.

        • Not Watching

          Do not notify me of new replies.
          Show question in unread if category is not ignored.

        • Ignoring

          Do not notify me of new replies.
          Do not show question in unread.

        • Oldest to Newest
        • Newest to Oldest
        • Most Votes
        Reply
        • Reply as question
        Locked
        This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
        • RScime25
          RScime25 last edited by

          I've been following various threads having to do with URL length and Google's happiness therewith and have yet to find an answer to the question posed in the title. Some answers and discussions have come close, but none I've found have addressed this with any specificity.

          Here are four hypothetical URLs of varying lengths and configurations:

          • EXAMPLE ONE:
            my-big-widgets-are-the-best-widgets-in-the-world-and-come-in-many-vibrant-and-unique-colors-and-configurations.html (115 characters)

          • EXAMPLE TWO:

          sample.com/my-big-widgets-are-the-best-widgets-in-the-world-and-come-in-many-vibrant-and-unique-colors-and-configurations.html (126 characters)

          • EXAMPLE THREE:

          www.sample.com/my-big-widgets-are-the-best-widgets-in-the-world-and-come-in-many-vibrant-and-unique-colors-and-configurations.html (130 characters)

          • EXAMPLE FOUR:

          http://www.sample.com/my-big-widgets-are-the-best-widgets-in-the-world-and-come-in-many-vibrant-and-unique-colors-and-configurations.html (137 characters)

          Assuming the examples contain appropriate keywords and are linked to appropriate anchor text (etc.,) how would Google look upon each? All I've been able to garner thus far is that URLs should be as short as possible while still containing and contextualizing keywords.

          I have 500+ URLs to review for the company I work for and could use some guidance; yes, I know I should test, but testing is problematical to the extreme; I look to the collective/accumulated wisdom of the MOZVerse for help.

          Thanks.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
          • MickEdwards
            MickEdwards last edited by

            I have understood the length of the URL to be calculated post http:// unless it's https://.

            Just the way it is displayed in the results.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
            • IOSC
              IOSC last edited by

              Here is Matt Cutts talking about this topic:

              http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRzMhlFZz9I

              The idea  is to avoid spammy looking urls (which all of those do) and focus on URLs that are easy for users to remember and link to while also keeping some sort organizational structure for the site.

              eg: example.com/widgets/blue

              example.com/widgets/green

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
              • 1 / 1
              • First post
                Last post

              Browse Questions

              Explore more categories

              • Moz Tools

                Chat with the community about the Moz tools.

              • SEO Tactics

                Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers

              • Community

                Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!

              • Digital Marketing

                Chat about tactics outside of SEO

              • Research & Trends

                Dive into research and trends in the search industry.

              • Support

                Connect on product support and feature requests.

              • See all categories

              Related Questions

              • Bold

                Subdomain or Country Code Top Level Domain

                Hello Friends, I am planning to develop my website for other languages. which one is best for SEO? (The main English website is well ranked in google) 1. de.example.com (subdomain may obtain rank faster as it is part of the main website?)
                2. example.de (this is a completely new one; so not easy to get rank?) thank you
                Barsbold

                Web Design | | Bold
                0
              • ahtisham2018

                I am Using <noscript>in All Webpage and google not Crawl my site automatically any solution</noscript>

                | |
                |   | <noscript></span></td> </tr> <tr> <td class="line-number"> </td> <td class="line-content"><meta http-equiv="refresh" content="0;url=errorPages/content-blocked.jsp?reason=js"></td> </tr> <tr> <td class="line-number"> </td> <td class="line-content"><span class="html-tag"></noscript> | and Please tell me effect on seo or not

                Web Design | | ahtisham2018
                1
              • Kingalan1

                Wordpress Plugin To Capture Form Completion Data, Before Visitor Hits "Submit"?

                Greetings MOZ Community: Visitors frequently start to enter contact information in the forms on our website, but then chicken out and don't hit the submit button. I noticed this watching the recordings of visitor web site visits using Mouse Flow. Is there a Wordpress Plugin that would allow us to capture data entered in forms, where the visitor does not finally hit the "submit" button? Obviously this would be very, very valuable as this scenario occurs in one out of three or four instances. Thanks!!!
                Alan

                Web Design | | Kingalan1
                0
              • netviper

                Question Mark In URL??

                So I am looking at a site for a client, and I think I already have my answer, but wanted to check with you guys. First off the site is in FLASH and HTML.  I told the client to dump the flash site, but she isn't willing right now. So the URLS are generated like this. Flash: http://www.mysite.com/#/page/7ca2/wedding-pricing/ HTML: http://www.mysite.com/?/page/7ca2/wedding-pricing/ checking the site in Google with a site:mysite, none of the interior pages are indexed at all. So that is telling me that Google is pretty much ignoring everything past the # or ?. Is that correct? My recommendation is to dump the flash site and redo the URLS in a SEo friendly format.

                Web Design | | netviper
                0
              • OOMDODigital

                Accordion Fold Ups Bad For Google

                http://fandicoach.com/products Right now I have these accordion things on the website. Are they bad for google in terms of being an SEO best practice? I want to avoid doing anything black hat. Thanks!

                Web Design | | OOMDODigital
                0
              • adamkirk

                URL structure for multiple cities?

                Hi, i am in the process of setting up a business directory site that will be used in a number of cities, though i am initially launching with only one city. My question is, what is the best URL structure to use for the site and should i start using this URL structure from day one? At the moment i am using www.mysite.com.au as my primary website where it contains all listings for the the one initial launch city. Though to plan for the future i was considering this URL structure: www.mysite.com.au/cityname so for example, if i launch in the city Sydney initially then all website traffic that goes to www.mysite.com.au would simply be redirected (302 temp redirect?) to www.mysite.com.au/sydney. When i expand to other cities www.mysite.com.au would simply be a "select your city" screen that then redirects to the city of choice (similar to www.groupon.com page). How would doing a 302 redirect from www.mysite.com.au to www.mysite.com.au/city impact on SEO for the initial launch? Or should i just place this on the root domain since no other cities exist at the moment?

                Web Design | | adamkirk
                0
              • jhamlin

                Google penalty for links opening in new tab?

                Our web services provided suggested that Google doesn't like in-text links that open the link in a new tab. Can anyone verify this? We often link to outside credible resources for our audience, though it seems smarter to open in a new tab rather than risk that the person will not navigate back to our site after finding us. Thank you in advance!

                Web Design | | jhamlin
                0
              • iAnalyst.com

                Custom URL's with Bigcommerce Issue (Is it worth it?)

                We're building out a store in Bigcommerce, who for all intensive purposes is perfect for SEO besides the fact that you can not change the URL's to be custom. My question is, does this kill the SEO value of bigcommerce, despite everything else being great? So for example the URL's for a category page would be something like this www.mysite.com/categories/keyword and the product URL's are pulled in by product name, so product URL's could be something like www.mysite.com/products/Product-Description-Long-223.html (notice the words will be capitalized and their is no way to remove the trailing .html) I could go with Interspire (the liscenced version of Bigcommerce) or Magento so I can custom edit this stuff. But then its a lot more work for my employee's on the buildout.

                Web Design | | iAnalyst.com
                0

              Get started with Moz Pro!

              Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

              Start my free trial
              Products
              • Moz Pro
              • Moz Local
              • Moz API
              • Moz Data
              • STAT
              • Product Updates
              Moz Solutions
              • SMB Solutions
              • Agency Solutions
              • Enterprise Solutions
              • Digital Marketers
              Free SEO Tools
              • Domain Authority Checker
              • Link Explorer
              • Keyword Explorer
              • Competitive Research
              • Brand Authority Checker
              • Local Citation Checker
              • MozBar Extension
              • MozCast
              Resources
              • Blog
              • SEO Learning Center
              • Help Hub
              • Beginner's Guide to SEO
              • How-to Guides
              • Moz Academy
              • API Docs
              About Moz
              • About
              • Team
              • Careers
              • Contact
              Why Moz
              • Case Studies
              • Testimonials
              Get Involved
              • Become an Affiliate
              • MozCon
              • Webinars
              • Practical Marketer Series
              • MozPod
              Connect with us

              Contact the Help team

              Join our newsletter
              Moz logo
              © 2021 - 2026 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
              • Accessibility
              • Terms of Use
              • Privacy

              Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.