Can I shorten a URL without creating an account?

Yes. Paste the address on the Linkonda home page and a short link is created immediately — no email, no password, no verification step. The link works the moment it appears.

How long does a link made without an account last?

30 days. After that the short link stops redirecting. Links created inside an account do not expire at all, including on the free plan.

How many links can I make without signing up?

Up to 10 active links at a time from one network. The limit counts links that are still live, so when older ones expire the capacity comes back.

Do I lose the links I made before signing up?

No. When you create an account, links you made anonymously from the same network can be claimed into it, and claiming removes their expiry date. You have to claim them before they expire — an expired link cannot be revived.

Why do most URL shorteners ask for an account first?

Because an account is what makes click data attributable to a person, which is the product most shorteners actually sell. Linkonda records only a total redirect count per link, so there is nothing to attach to an identity and no reason to demand one up front.

Guide

How to shorten a URL without making an account

Most shorteners put a signup form between you and a link you need in the next ten seconds. You do not have to accept that trade. Here is how anonymous shortening works, what it costs you, and when signing up is genuinely worth it.

The short version

Open the Linkonda home page.
Paste the long address into the field. A bare host like example.com/page is fine — the scheme is added for you.
Press Shorten. The short link appears immediately, along with a QR code you can download.
Copy it and use it anywhere.

There is no email field, no password, no confirmation link to click, and nothing to install. The link is live before you have decided whether you like the service.

What you get without an account, and what you don't

	Without an account	With a free account
Create short links	Yes	Yes
Link lifetime	30 days	Permanent
Active links at once	10 per network	100
QR code	Yes, generated in your browser	Yes
Total click count	Yes	Yes
Dashboard listing every link	No	Yes
Pause a link	No	Yes
Custom domain	No	1 included
Cost	Free	Free

The free account is genuinely free — no card, no trial clock. The difference it buys is permanence and a place to manage what you have made, not a paywall on the basic action.

The 30-day limit, and why it exists

A link created without an account belongs to nobody. There is no inbox to warn, no dashboard where it would show up, and no way for anyone to take it down if the destination later turns into something it should not be. Keeping those links forever would mean accumulating an ever-growing set of redirects with no accountable owner — which is precisely the shape of infrastructure that gets abused.

Thirty days is long enough for the cases anonymous links are actually for: a link pasted into a chat, a QR code on a slide for a talk next week, an address you need to text to someone now. If a link needs to outlive that, it needs an owner.

The same reasoning drives the cap of 10 active links per network. It is a quota, not a countdown — as older links expire, the capacity returns.

Keeping the links you already made

Signing up later does not orphan your earlier work. Links you created anonymously from the same network can be claimed into a new account, and once claimed their expiry date is removed — they become permanent, like anything else you make while signed in.

The one hard rule: claim them before they expire. An expired anonymous link cannot be claimed or brought back. Its short URL is retired for good: it tells visitors the link has expired and is never given to anyone else. If you have links you care about, the moment to create the account is while they are still live.

Shortening without even opening the site

Anonymous shortening is also what makes the other entry points usable straight away. The Chrome extension shortens the tab you are looking at from the toolbar, with no account and no API key. The MCP server does the same from Claude, Claude Code or Cursor — install it and ask for a short link in conversation.

Both produce ordinary anonymous links, with the same 30-day lifetime and the same claim path into an account later.

When you should sign up

Create a free account when a link needs to outlive the month, when you want to find it again without having saved it somewhere yourself, or when you need to pause it. Consider a paid plan only when you need to edit where an existing link points, want API access, or need more than one custom domain.

Anything short of that, anonymous shortening handles — and it keeps handling it, indefinitely, without ever asking who you are.

Frequently asked questions

Can I shorten a URL without creating an account?: Yes. Paste the address on the Linkonda home page and a short link is created immediately — no email, no password, no verification step. The link works the moment it appears.
How long does a link made without an account last?: 30 days. After that the short link stops redirecting. Links created inside an account do not expire at all, including on the free plan.
How many links can I make without signing up?: Up to 10 active links at a time from one network. The limit counts links that are still live, so when older ones expire the capacity comes back.
Do I lose the links I made before signing up?: No. When you create an account, links you made anonymously from the same network can be claimed into it, and claiming removes their expiry date. You have to claim them before they expire — an expired link cannot be revived.
Why do most URL shorteners ask for an account first?: Because an account is what makes click data attributable to a person, which is the product most shorteners actually sell. Linkonda records only a total redirect count per link, so there is nothing to attach to an identity and no reason to demand one up front.