In case your website is structured like a house, then your website’s URL is like that house’s address. It defines where your website lives online, just like how your property address determines where you reside in a neighborhood, helping your visitors easily find your site. URLs also help Google understand what your website’s pages are about.
There are several URL parts, and so they’re discreetly essential for optimizing your site’s user experience (UX) and web optimization. To assist you to develop a concrete understanding of each a part of a URL, let’s explore each of them intimately.
What are the parts of a URL?
A URL consists of ten parts: the scheme, subdomain, top-level domain, second-level domain, subdirectory, parameter, port, path, query, and fragment. While a URL doesn’t must contain all of those parts without delay, it’ll all the time have a minimum of three of them.
Below is an illustration of the essential parts of a URL. A URL will all the time have a scheme or protocol, a website name, and path.
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Nevertheless, URLs may contain more attributes than the essential components listed above. Let’s take a comprehensive take a look at URL structure below.
URL Structure
1. Scheme
The scheme (also called protocol) tells web servers which protocol to make use of when it accesses a page in your website.
Nowadays, HTTPS — which stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure — is probably the most common scheme. It tells your web browser to encrypt any information you enter onto the page, like your passwords or bank card information, so cybercriminals can’t access it. This security protocol protects your website visitors and implementing it’ll help your site rank higher on Google. That is why implementing SSL is a must-do on any technical web optimization guide.
Other schemes you would possibly see are mailto://, which might open your computer’s default email service provider to assist you to draft an email to the e-mail address you entered within the URL, and ftp://, which is an ordinary protocol for transferring computer files between a client and server on a pc network.
2. Subdomain
In case your website is sort of a house, your subdomains are like specific rooms in that house. A subdomain in a URL indicates which particular page of your website the net browser should serve up. As an illustration, subdomains like “blog” or “offers” will provide your website’s blog page or offers page.
Subdomains also bucket your website into its important content categories and shows Google and your visitors that there is more information in your site than simply a homepage.
3. Second-level Domain
Your second-level domain (SLD) is the name of your website. It helps people know they’re visiting a certain brand’s site. As an illustration, individuals who visit “mlb.com” know they’re on Major League Baseball’s website, with no need any more information.
4. Top-level Domain
The highest-level domain (TLD) specifies what variety of entity your organization registers as on the web.
For instance, “.com” is meant for industrial entities in america, so loads of American businesses register with a top-level domain of “.com”. Similarly “.edu” is meant for educational institutions in america, so loads of American colleges and universities register with a top-level domain of “.edu”.
5. Subdirectory
A subdirectory — also referred to as a subfolder — helps people in addition to web crawlers understand which particular section of a webpage they’re on.
As an illustration, in case you own a web-based store that sells t-shirts, hats, and mugs, one in every of your website’s URLs could appear to be “https://shop.yourstore.com/hats”. Notice that the subdomain is “shop” and the subdirectory is “hats.” Which means this URL would serve up the “Hats” page, which is a subfolder of the “Shop” page. T-shirts and mugs could be other subfolders of this page.
6. Port
The port is a number used to specify a connection endpoint and to direct data to a selected service. Different servers will use different port numbers. This number is all the time related to a bunch network address, like an IP address. For instance an HTTP server is identified using 80, while an HTTPS server uses 443 as its port number.
7. Path
The trail specifies the placement of the file or resource that the user desires to access. In the instance below, the desired path could be the article “parth-url.”
8. Query
Ever noticed a matter mark displayed in some URLs when Google displays your search results? That query mark says that a selected query is being performed and is used to precede a question string. A question string specifies the parameters of the information being asked from a web site’s database. We’ll dig into parameters next.
9. Parameters
Parameters are the values being queried during a search. The parameter could be a number, encrypted value, search term or other data that could be found on the web site. URL parameters contain a key and value, separated by an equal sign (=). A URL can contain multiple parameters, that are then each separated with an ampersand (&).
Written out, the structure would appear to be this:
https//www.hubspotexample.com/page?key1=value1&key2=value2
UTM parameters are used to trace your marketing or promotional efforts. Added to the ends of URLs these parameters can track how visitors are coming to your site and in the event that they’re interacting with an associated marketing campaign.
10. Fragments
Fragments are an optional component of URLs which might be typically placed at the top with a hash (#). They indicate a selected location on the webpage like an ID or name attribute, but may also direct to other resources like a footer, or sidebar.
URL Structure: Subtle Yet Essential
Regardless that URLs may appear easy and arbitrary, they’re actually essential on your website’s UX and web optimization. And now that you just understand each of the URL parts, take a look at the blog posts below to learn more about technical web optimization.
Editor’s note: This text was originally published in October 2021 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.
