How can I change the URL of a product page?

[Adam52]

I can't for the life of me locate where to change the URL of a product. I have checked out /admin/products/########## product editor page but there is no UI for changing the URL name. Thanks in advance.

[fb11112]

when is it expected to be able to change the URL for SEO as a whole?  Right now as I need specific formatting on my store page I am using a collection and need my SEO to point to this.  Do you know when the update on being able to cange URLs to totally custom or at least allow a collection to display will be coming in?  Thank you!

[Johannis]

lifesaver

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@Leon wrote:

Hi, Adam.

Leon here from Shopify Support.

To change the URL of any product in your store you just need to scroll to the very bottom of that product page in the admin (/admin/products/producttitle) and click on Edit SEO. These SEO functions will allow you to change the URL handle for any product, collection, or page. In this menu, you can also change the meta description and page title as it is shown by search engines. If you'd like to change the metadata for your storefront, just click on Online Store > Preferences. 

Does this help? Check out the Help Guide to SEO, or post more questions below. 

Cheers,

Leon 

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[hoguephoto]

Hello friendly Shopify person,

We have a client who made a mess of their URLs due to their long, keyword-stuffed page titles. I have a couple of questions.

1. I just requested a bulk .csv export of their product data because we will be manually writing new-and-improved page titles and meta descriptions for all of their products. Once this is done, we plan to import everything back into Shopify. I'm waiting for our client to send this to me.
2. I'm assuming we can modify the URLs in the .csv file too, then upload them back into Shopify. Is this correct? Please tell me we don't have to do these one-by-one for hundreds of products.
3. Are the 301 redirects handled automatically upon import or will we need to edit something on the backend like an .htaccess file?

If you could get back to me as soon as possible, I'd sure appreciate it. Also, if you could Email me a copy of the response to eric@missionwebmarketing.com, I would be most grateful.

Thanks for your help and have a great day.

Eric, on behalf of Latitudes Gallery

[Helen]

Hey, @hoguephoto. Thanks for your questions! 

Yes, you can update the product URL from within the CSV. The value entered in the Handle column is what will be used in the URL of the product. Take a look at the Help Doc for Product CSV file format for more information about this and the other column descriptors. 

Importing a CSV with an updated Handle should also automatically create a URL redirect for these products. However, FYI, it is possible to bulk edit your redirects and import them into the store via their own CSV. Checkout this Help Doc on Managing URL Redirects for more info and the steps on how to do that.

Good luck with updating your client's store! Let me know if you have any more questions.

[jorge10]

Hi Elen, I'm getting this url problem when I select a product from "you may also like" section under product page. when select a product from that list the url is the original one and no the one changed under Edit SEO option. how can we solve that issue?

Thank you

[Helen]

Hi, @jorge10. That sounds very unusual. Let’s take a look into this!

 In order to know where to begin with our troubleshooting, could you please provide the following information:

• Which theme are you using?
• Does it happen to all products in the “You may also like” section? Or just certain ones?
• Does it function this way on both your storefront, and from within your theme editor?
• Please provide a link to a product page on your store as an example for me to look at.

I’ll watch for your reply!

[jorge10]

Hello,

Thank you for answering! 

* Yes  it happens to all products in the section “You may also like” 

* This is the link from the product's page for a baby blanket    https://www.jc-boutique.com/collections/babys/products/baby-blanket

   and this is the link for the same product when I select it from the section “You may also like” 

   https://www.jc-boutique.com/products/baby-blanket?pr_prod_strat=collection_fallback&pr_rec_pid=60831...

* From my product's section in shopify everything look well

Please let me know if you have any idea what could be the issue.

thanks!

[Luuk01]

Hi @Helen is it correct that this issue is still not solved and we can't leave collections etc out of the fixed URL? Any idea when this will happen?

[Helen]

Hey, @jorge10. Thanks for following up, and for the example!

From what I can see, the URL resulting from the ‘You may also like” section is not different, but is instead a longer version of the product URL.  I checked in with our Theme department regarding this, they took a look at your storefront, and have advised that it is normal behaviour. Therefore, it doesn’t have any effect on the purchase flow or customer experience on your store.

Furthermore, if you are interested in discussing what all the parameters of the extended url means, then they encourage you to please start a new topic about it within the Technical Q&A board here in the Community. 

Thanks!

[Helen]

Hi, @Luuk01!  I’m afraid I don’t have a timeline for when, or if, this is a change our developers are working on. However, I’ve submitted another request for it on your behalf, so thanks for sharing your feedback.

In the meantime, the Shopify Changelog is a great place to keep up to date on all recent changes and upgrades to the platform. I recommend checking it out! 

[RCvD]

When changing this handle, it asks me to re-redirect. Should I tick this box? 

I am not completely sure, because it shows that I will be redirecting my original url to the new (but this new one does not exist, or is not created). 
What I basically would like to understand is, if by changing this A) this has any negative impact on SEO, because it's being redirected, and B) If you would need another page to be created that has this new handle. The main concerns I am having is that the URL handle has a number in there now, which I would like to replace with a generic keyword. 

I need to communicate the URL of a drafted page to another company for back linking, what URL best to provide them with?

Thanks in advance

[Helen]

Hi, @RCvD. Thanks for contributing to this thread!

Just so that I’m on the same page as you, you’re referring to the Create a URL redirect box within the Search engine listing preview of your Product page as seen below, correct?

The handle used in the URL can be anything you’d like it to be, and does not have to be the same as the Product title. In general, you would want to check the redirect box. It’s useful for when you’ve used the old URL in marketing campaigns, for example. Having it redirect to the updated URL will ensure anyone coming across and clicking on the old one, will be taken to that product page and not a 404 page instead. Does that make sense?

Now, in regards to if redirecting your URL’s are going to affect your SEO and/or if it would be better to create a new page instead, I don’t know the answer to that for sure. An SEO Expert will be a better resource to consult about your particular situation.

However, I did come across this Community post which has some insight into it. Feel free to create a new comment within that thread, or start a new topic with any additional questions you may have. (Pro tip: Tagging the Experts who have already contributed in the post can increase the likelihood of them seeing and replying to your comment).

Hope this helps! Let me know if I can assist with anything else.

[PeterW]

So we just improved upon the URL structure with one of our sites - using the following method.

Product URL's were outputting the category structure within the URL structure - which leads to duplicate content and stops authority flow through the site appropriately. 

For example https://bathzoom.co.uk/collections/bath-taps/products/modern-bath-shower-mixer-tap-with-shower-kit

Note the /collections/bath-taps/ bit. 

However, when you check the canonical link it points to https://bathzoom.co.uk/products/modern-bath-shower-mixer-tap-with-shower-kit

Naturally with all the categories are pointing to the category based variants of the products URL - this meant that actual main /products/etc location were being orphaned from the rest of the site. 

To fix this: we went in the theme liquid files -product-grid and replaced all instances of: 

{{ product.url | within: collection }}

with

{{ product.url }}

This means that if you go into a category like https://bathzoom.co.uk/collections/bath-taps now and click a product, you now end up at the correct location:

https://bathzoom.co.uk/products/modern-bath-shower-mixer-tap-with-shower-kit

Which is much better for SEO. 

[JPV]

May I know if we are able to remove the word pages/ or products/ or collections/ from the URL? 

[Helen]

Hey, @JPV. Welcome to the Community, and thanks for inquiring about this!

The structure of Shopify URL’s are not customizable, I’m afraid. I go into a little bit more detail about this in a previous reply within this thread on 10-10-2019. I recommend taking a look at it.

However, the handles of the URL are able to be customized. This is done within the Edit SEO section of your page, products, or collection pages in your admin. Take a look at the Help Doc for Edit a search engine listing preview for more specific steps on how to do this.

Hope this helps! Please let me know if you have any further questions.

[JasonSong]

I see that all products link are prefix with 'http://domain/product/{product-name}' .  May I change it to 'http://domain/{country code}/product/{product-name}'

[Helen]

Hi, @JasonSong. Welcome to the Communtiy! Thanks for your question.

The structure of the Shopify URL is not customizable at this time. You can find more detail about it in my reply within this thread on 10-10-2019.  

However, I understand how being able to customize the Shopify URL would be beneficial, therefore I have submitted a feature request to our developers on your behalf. I don’t know when or if this is a feature that will be made available, but I recommend checking the Shopify Changelog regularly, as this is where you’ll find all recent updates to the platform announced, as they are released. 

All the best!

[madeinearth]

Hi there,

When I change the URL of a product, an unchecked box pops up where it's asking to do a URL redirect. How do I simply change the URL of the product? I don't see why a redirect is needed. I'm changing the keywords in the URL as well so I would prefer not to do url redirects

[Helen]

Hey, @madeinearth! Welcome to the Community, and thanks for your question.

The purpose of a URL redirect is best summed up in the introduction within the Help Doc on URL redirects as seen below:

URL redirects can be manually created by going to ‘Online Store > Navigation > URL redirects’. Or they are automatically created for you within the Edit website SEO section of your Product page in your admin, when editing a URL for an existing product. This is where you are referring to, correct?

Therefore, you can change the URL of a product there, and if you do not wish to have the previous URL of your product redirect to your new product, then do not check the Create a URL redirect for box. Generally merchants choose to do this if their updated product is completely unrelated to their new product and/or they have not shared the previous URL anywhere that they want to lead back to their store (ie. in ads, blogs or other websites etc.).

Let me know if this helps!

[chris214]

@Helen this is a 2 year old request.

Any update when we can get rid of /collections and /products in the URL?

SEO experts tell me shorter is better.

Would you mind adding a "URL-related" filter to the product updates? Right now it is tedious to run through months of shopify updates in the search of this issue.

thanks in advance