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Tuesday 19th March 2024

How to Post a Link on Facebook Without the URL 2020

Fri 23rd Jan 2015
By Todd
Facebook

Have you noticed that you can now post a link on your Facebook status and then delete the link and leave just the nice image and text box that it auto-generates?

It’s all down to some clever code that Facebook pulls from the website but you don’t need to understand all that shiz… you can have pretty links on Facebook in two easy steps!

It certainly makes your social media posts look neater and more like the Facebook Ads format.

How to Post a Link on Facebook Without the URL

How to Post a Link on Facebook Without the URL in 2020

[Updated March 2020]

 

How to post a link on Facebook without showing the URL:

  • Just paste the link into your status and wait for the link to load.
  • Wait…
  • When the image and text appear just delete the link and write your update. Simples.

 

how to post a link on facebook without url

 

The end result is a post that looks like this:

how to post a link on facebook without url - explained

 

2020 UPDATE: Facebook seems to do this automatically now. Try this:

  1. Paste in the link.
  2. Wait for the image to load.
  3. And post

The link won’t show on your post most of the time. Failing that, just do it the old way as above!

We really like this feature as it makes your posts look cleaner and more professional. Give it a go and let us know how it goes.

 

Pasting a link to your website or someone else’s and seeing a terrible ‘snippet’?

Another thing that might be bothering you is that the snippet itself looks wrong, doesn’t have an image, has the wrong text or something else.

This might well be down to what’s called Opengraph Data. This is the system used by social media platforms to ‘pull’ the image and title and text into their platform when you share. Not seeing what you want? This post about how to make your Facebook posts share the right image from a link will help.


Tags associated with this article

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44 comments on this article

  • Geraldine at 8:43am on January 30th 2015

    Are you sure this is NEW as I’ve been doing exactly that for ages?! Often wondered why other people kept the URLs in…

    1. Todd at 8:45am on January 30th 2015

      You’d think it was by the reaction from people! 😉

      Me too… been deleting the link for a while but lots of people didn’t know what I meant by ugly URL. So thought I’d share it.

      1. Dan Beaupre at 18:13pm on November 12th 2020

        Does not work anymore. Why? Is there a workaround?

      2. Yannina at 22:25pm on January 14th 2020

        When I delete the url…post deleted too!!!

        1. Todd at 16:37pm on January 15th 2020

          Mmm… that’s certainly not what we experience. Wait for the content box to loads and then see?

      3. Geraldine at 11:36am on January 31st 2015

        Nice to know I was ahead of the curve – for once! TBH I think I discovered it by accident 🙂

  • Misha at 9:48am on February 27th 2015

    Just tried this tip and thanks guy, it worked a treat and my posts do look better. I didn’t know you could do this. Any similar tips for twitter please?

  • Dave at 17:29pm on February 23rd 2016

    Todd,

    I am trying to replace the url with an image from my website. Where would I put this?

    1. Todd at 17:54pm on March 3rd 2016

      You would need to either edit the box that comes up on Facebook (sometimes you can change the image) or simply create a post with an image from your website and put the link in the copy.

  • C at 2:34am on March 19th 2016

    Is there a way to post the link without having to delete the URL after?

    1. Todd at 11:05am on March 21st 2016

      Of course… just post it and then leave it in 🙂

      If you use a tool like Buffer to post the link it actually does all the magic for you too.

  • Mar at 13:43pm on April 19th 2016

    I know this is an old thread, but… I’m looking for a way to do the same thing, but while *replying* to a comment on Facebook. Haven’t been able to find a way to do that.

    1. Todd at 13:59pm on April 19th 2016

      Howdy, Mar.

      You’re right that’s not possible. Even when you go back and edit to take out the link it doesn’t work. Annoying… maybe Facebook will fix in the future.

  • JohnL at 12:43pm on October 6th 2017

    T hank you a lot for the great article

    1. Todd at 9:52am on October 11th 2017

      Pleasure!

  • rizmi at 9:54am on August 28th 2018

    Nice. I didnt expect it to be this simple!

  • Hashem at 12:38pm on November 7th 2018

    What should I do when there are is more than one link in the post?

    1. Todd at 20:31pm on November 19th 2018

      In that case, leave them both in to save confusion.

  • John at 5:17am on December 17th 2019

    Thanks Todd, your blog was so helpful. Thumbs up!!

  • Pokojonomofogo at 14:00pm on February 12th 2020

    Is there a way in 2020 on fb mobile to comment on a friend’s post with an url to a video (e.g. YouTube), then remove the link but leave the video in there? Thanks!

    1. Todd at 16:08pm on February 12th 2020

      Howdy! I’m not sure there is, no. It would be cool if you could though, I agree.

  • farshmartlink at 10:30am on April 16th 2020

    very intersting

  • farshmartlink at 10:31am on April 16th 2020

    T hank you a lot for the great article

    1. Todd at 10:38am on April 16th 2020

      Thanks, glad it helped…

  • farshmartlink at 17:59pm on May 7th 2020

    very good article

    1. Todd at 20:56pm on November 12th 2020

      Thanks 🙂

  • farshmartlink at 18:00pm on May 7th 2020

    very good

  • King Royal at 6:06am on May 8th 2020

    Very Nice

  • Zia Habib at 6:07am on May 8th 2020

    Good

  • Dan Beaupre at 18:10pm on November 12th 2020

    I used to do this all the time. NOW it does not work! Any clues as to why or a work around?

    1. Todd at 18:03pm on March 2nd 2021

      Did you spot the new way this work? It loads and updates automatically now.

  • Dan Beaupre at 18:20pm on November 12th 2020

    Nevermind. The difference now is you can not backspace to erase link. Need to highlight entire link then delete. Weird.

    1. Todd at 20:55pm on November 12th 2020

      Cool. I’ll edit the post. Thanks

  • meirina at 15:24pm on November 27th 2020

    problem now, the url had been deleted but the preview is still there. any tips to take out the preview as well?

    1. Todd at 18:03pm on March 2nd 2021

      Yup. Click top right and you can remove it.

  • meirina at 15:25pm on November 27th 2020

    i have problem now, the url had been deleted but the preview is still there. any tips to take out the preview as well?

    1. Todd at 12:06pm on December 18th 2020

      Just click the preview top right and you should be able to delete or right click.

  • James at 18:37pm on December 5th 2020

    Does anyone know how do you undo this? I edited a post to add a url, and it put the embed at the end of the post. I changed my mind about what I wanted to put on the post and deleted the url, but it still puts the embed at the bottom. How do I get rid of the embed?

    Help! I can’t find how to do this anywhere.

  • Anne Pounds at 17:51pm on February 27th 2021

    Thanks for the tips. I am very untechie, but now have an author page and author website and need to know how to post the first few lines of a blog in my FB page and then link it to the specific landing page at my website. I will try your suggestions. Thanks for being so helpful and actually answering people!

    1. Todd at 18:02pm on March 2nd 2021

      Awesome. Thanks for the feedback too 🙂

  • bekharim at 12:40pm on August 9th 2021

    thank you

  • Tom at 13:54pm on November 30th 2023

    This does not work if replying in a post.

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