Recently one of our readers emailed us asking the question how to get rid of numbers from WordPress post and page URLs. By default, WordPress uses post IDs (numbers) instead of pretty keyword text in the URLs. This is bad for SEO. In other cases, WordPress will add a -2 in front of your post, page, category, or tag URLs which simply looks bad in front of users. In this article, we will show you how to get rid of numbers from WordPress URLs.
Video Tutorial
If you don’t like the video or need more instructions, then continue reading.
Permalink URL Structure
WordPress has built in support for SEO friendly URL structure. All you need to do is to open Settings » Permalinks page in the admin area and choose a URL structure for your site. There are a number of options available. We recommend choosing a URL structure that shows your post title in the URL because it is SEO friendly and will help others discover your site in search engines. Once you have setup permalinks you need to save your changes.
WordPress will now automatically change URLs for all your previous posts as well. Don’t worry if you have posted the older URLs somewhere because WordPress will automatically redirect those users to new URLs.
Custom Slug
Even though you are using Pretty Permalinks now, you may still want to get rid of numbers in your post URL. The most common reason for this is when you are publishing a post that has no title.
Remember, WordPress chooses the text to display in URL from your post’s title, so if your post does not have a title, then WordPress will use the post’s ID in the URL. You can manually tell WordPress what to use in the URL instead of the post number.
Just below the post title, you will see your post’s URL with an Edit button next to it. Clicking on the edit button will make the URL editable. This editable part is called post-slug. You can enter the text you want to use as post slug in the URL.
Note: you can only add letters, numbers, and dashes in the URL slug.
Duplicate Posts and Pages
Sometimes even when you edit the custom slug, the -2 continues to be added in your URLs. For example you create a new about page, and your URL looks like this:
http://yoursite.com/about-2/
Now wouldn’t you want to get rid of that -2, and simply have it as /about/. This problem occurs when you have the same slug being used already.
Check all your posts and pages to see that there is none that has the same slug (i.e /about/). If you find one, then you need to delete it unless you’re using it. More often than not, you won’t find an active page with the same slug.
This is when you need to look in the Trash folder. When you trash a WordPress post or page, it is not entirely deleted. It sits in the trash for 30 days before it gets permanently deleted. This is done to give you an option to restore trashed item if you accidentally deleted them.
As long as the post or page stays in the trash, the slug cannot be re-used. So if you want to re-use the /about/ slug, then you must delete the About page sitting in the trash folder. Once you do that, you should be able to edit your slug like the method shown above and get rid of the -2.
This technique works for categories and tags as well.
We hope this article helped you get rid of numbers from WordPress URLs. For feedback and questions, you can leave your comments below or join us on Twitter and Google+
Today, when I working on Login page to place Password recover form short code, I Turn of Social media Login. After that I Logout Admin and checked that, two changes observed, one is Login form shwing very small size, second is all pages showing IDs when open in browser
Now what I do to set it, in settings, Permalinks seting are ok like previous, what thing changed, which showing IDs after url.
Any solution.
You would want to let the social media login plugin know what happened to the login form after disabling and they should be able to assist. If it is a ? followed by a number then you are likely using an ecommerce plugin that is tracking sessions so it can save the cart for the user.
I have a problem in my wordpress website. my old website has been linked to my new website though an URL which I can not find. I want to delet or disable that link especially in google search. because that is linked to my old shop and old prices and people keep calling about the differences in prices. please help!
My links are ok but on the top bar I see “All Posts | “my link name”. ‘All post’ is not part of the name of the page/blog posts or in the link? I can’t figure out how to remove it…any help out there?
Thank you, thats such a simple solution and works brilliantly thank you.
Hello. I did what all the steps you did but the 2 continues to show up in the url. I dont know what to do . i deleted and add like 3 times the same page and that number still there … :s
Whats wrong ? can you help me pls
Appreciate the attention
Sarah. from Portugal
Hi Sarah,
When you delete a post or page in WordPress, it goes into the trash. You need to delete that page from Trash as well. Go to Pages » All Pages and you will see a row of links to sort pages according to their status (Published, Draft, Scheduled, Trash). Click on the trash to view the pages that you have deleted earlier. Once you are there you will see a link ‘Delete Permanently’ below each article clicking on it will delete the page permanently and you will be able to use that slug for your new page.
Hi there,
I’ve combed through our site and taken all the actions you’ve suggested (permanently delete everything in the trash and ensure there is no photo/media file with that slug) and it’s STILL naming my slug with a -2 at the end. Please help!!
Hi Kat,
Please check your pages and categories as well. Also try visiting the full url to see if there is a post, page, or attachment with the same slug.
How can I produce a list of permalinks that have “-2” at their end, so I can correct them? I have 291 posts, 48 pages, and around 50 product pages.
In addition, I have two ecommerce stores, one for Australia (/shop/bookname) and one USA (/books/bookname), and all products have permalinks. Doesn’t permalinks take notice of the rest of the URL?
Thanks,
Peter
I deleted a post and when I went to make a new one the -2 is STILL there. Any other help?
I didn’t have any pages still in trash. I didn’t have a category with the same name as my page. I didn’t have another page with the same name. So I did something crazy. WP was trying to name my page as page-2, so I went to mywebsite.com/page to see what happened.
A page with a single photo popped up. I had a PHOTO with the same name as the page, and WP media manager gives photos permalinks based on the file name! Fix was to rename the photo (still keeping SEO in mind), and using the permalink editor for the page. TAH DAH! Like magic, it worked
Ah, I was pulling my hair out with this and what you’ve found out has solved my issue. Thanks for posting your findings, very helpful…
is there any way to also hide the url link? for example, mysite/mypost/ instead of 192.168.0.1:8080/mypost/
I found your post because I do wonder about the following number behind all the pages and posts I have on my website which then looks like this: example.com/?v=b9610cde4c4c.
If I check the number only with google there comes my site with two pages and another very strange facebook website kind of….
I saw that someone commenting did find out about a plugin – so I deactivated all social plugins, I haven’t got hers on my site. The Permalinks are checked and correct and I didn’t find anything to change or this number, in my php. Do you have any Idea, what this could be or must I worry…?
If you are worried about security of your site, then you can try scanning your website with Sucuri. If the URLs are getting indexed in search, then it is not good for your website’s SEO.
Hello, thanks for your reply and yes, I will check it at sucuri – good idea! I don’t understand what you mean by “if the URL’s are getting indedexed in search…” what do you mean by that?
Thank You!
I Once Had The Problem Of Seeing the -2 slug being shown for duplicate pages left in trash. However with a New Site I was Editing I was Still Having the -2 show up in title but there was not anything in my Trash For Pages. I Finally Searched My domain with the correct title I wanted and Up Popped one Of the images in my IMAGE Library that had the same name of the page I kept trying to correct. So Images with Names the same as your titles will cause this Behavior too. Just My Experience with the problem.
Images are also stored as attachment which is a built in WordPress post type. Like all other post types attachments also have slugs. So yes if you have an attachment with slug my-first-bike and then you try to add an article with the same slug, then WordPress will add a number to the slug.
Had the same problem on a page. Deactivated all plugins, quick edit of page url. and bingo it now works, tried everything to no avail before!
Unfortunately, this article is a bit simplistic as that is not always what causes the -2 to be added. While it will do it if there is already an “about” and you are adding another page or post called “about”, but it also has problems with numbers as the titles of pages.
I am creating a gallery and some of the layout is a bit manual for organization, partly as I am wrapping text around the intro and conclusion. So I called one of the pages 2015, another 2010, another 2016. Doesn’t matter what I call it, there is nothing in my trash by that name, it is entirely “new”, but WP will NOT allow it. Why? Because it knows it looks like a year and it doesn’t like numbers only in the structure.
So I can’t have “2015 / January” as my structure, it will have to have some other letter in there for the year plus of course I can’t have the “January” page every year, leaving me with a URL that will look like Y2015 / 2015-January…not very elegant I’m afraid, but seems to be the only solution other than running a custom plugin that overwrites the slugs and risks breaking all of the WP install.
Paul
how can i remove category or tag from url…
example.com/category/mobile >>> example.com/mobile
See our guide how to change category base prefix in WordPress.
I seem to no longer be able to add a permalink with just four digits (ie “http://example.com/1223”)
You used to be allowed to do this for posts but not pages, now you can’t do it at all and it is really messing up one of my clients sites.
Thank You very much guyz ! You don’t know how disturb i was…..
How do you change it if you have wordpress beginner?
This is unusual behavior. Please deactivate all your WordPress plugins and switch to a default theme like twenty thirteen or twenty fourteen. See if your posts still have links like this. If they do then it is likely that your WordPress security is compromised.
I have permalinks set up on my site with “post name” as the default setting. And that does work. However, when you actually click on the live post, it initially comes up with the permalink, but after fully loading, it has a series of numbers/letters attached to the permalink, like this: #.VB2dTCtdVW0
How do I get rid of those numbers from the actual permalink?
Karon, I had the same problem. I found the culprit was the AddThis social bookmarking widget. To remove it, go to the Plugin settings under Settings > AddThis Share > Advanced Tab and turn off the Address Bar Shares Tracking.
I have been trying to figure out the number thing for a long time. Thank you for this!! I had no idea files in the trash were still using the page name!
I have the same problem (-2 at the end). I have cleared my trash, etc but I’m still having the same problem. I have an about-2 page, but no sign of an about page. Any ideas?
Really helpful – had problem with -2 being added to my posts page and emptied trash and hey presto gone! Thanks
sometimes the littlest things can feel like a stalemate. thanks for providing all these great tips
Splendid !!! You just said it all !!! Thanks a lot for this long-sought solution to the “urgly” url I have had to deal with for months. Now my posts url looks good. Thanks a lot My Balkhi and your team
This is all great information! I would like to know if I can use some of what I find here to post on my site, or include in email campaigns. Specifically, referring to the badge in this post for removing numbers from urls in WP, but also would like to know if there are others available, within the confines of best practices of course.
thanks,
jag
Hi Guys
I’ve got pretty permalinks set so I’ve had no problems with that but I have had the 2 appear in a couple of posts.
The first time I trashed a post and started again not realising that trashing is not enough: you have to delete it.
The second time I trashed and deleted the post but still got the dreaded 2 at the end.
No idea why that would happen.
Is the automatic redirection of permalink styles a new feature? I still use custom .htaccess code but have had issues with it eliminating my date-based archives, too.
WordPress automatically redirects to the new permalinks? I have wanted to change the permalink structure of my site for a long time but worried how it would affect links that are already out there.
Our site has over 4000 posts and I figured it would kill our page rank. What are you thoughts on that many redirects?
This is an interesting post, but it does not cover how to remove the site.com/category-2/sub-category/heres-a-post.php – I have this problem, and read it happens when you create a category called software, then delete it, and create it again further down the track – the original ‘software’ remains in the DB for ‘categories’ – therefore it is forced to name the category with a -2 so the Database doesn’t have a duplicate….
The only ways I’ve read to fix this in numerous posts is going into myPHPAdmin and deleting the original ‘software’ manually! Your post has shed some light on the situation, and may have another way to get rid of the -2 fro actual categories?
Thanks,
@jaycameron of ‘Crowd-Sourced Development Initiative’ -> @Code_Collective
How excellent! That hint about the trash is a gem. And go ahead and laugh – but – I knew what pretty permalinks were – but was confused if that was what acheived with clicking the Post Name option. I’d been confused because I used to do my Pretty Permalinks using the custom option – until this new button was added. So thanks for solving that tiny mystery for me!