Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • MozCon
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      Let your business shine with Listings AI
      Moz Local

      Let your business shine with Listings AI

      Learn more
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
      Moz API

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers

        Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. SEO Tactics
    3. On-Page Optimization
    4. Are the prepositions and separate letters in URL bad for website optimization?

    Moz Q&A is closed.

    After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

    Are the prepositions and separate letters in URL bad for website optimization?

    On-Page Optimization
    4
    5
    1881
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • adrecom
      adrecom Subscriber last edited by

      Is it ok for website optimization to use prepositions and separate letters in URL ?

      Examples: -i-series ; -salad-with-avocado etc.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • HiveDigitalInc
        HiveDigitalInc @Luis-Pereira last edited by

        Thanks Ipegiro...  My point exactly on saying "unless they are creating value within the url"...  as obviously "bunny-on-stool" has a completely different meaning than "bunny-stool"..

        Cheers

        -Jake

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • Luis-Pereira
          Luis-Pereira last edited by

          Reducing the url lenght will be a best pratice, however my adivice is to alwways put yourself as a user, the dumbest user you could be.

          Which one is the best for your users    e.g.  bunny-on-stool  or bunny-stool

          Google will ignore hyfens and stopwords (the, a, on, ....)

          HiveDigitalInc 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • HiveDigitalInc
            HiveDigitalInc last edited by

            Typically you want to minimize url length by removing stop words, prepositions, etc. unless they are creating value within the URL.      e.g.  bunny-on-stool  vs. bunny-stool

            I wouldn't go as far as to say it is bad for SEO, but there are some schools of thought that minimizing the number of words in a URL "concentrates" relevance around those terms remaining.   That being said, I'm confident Google already ignores common stop words and phrases, and this isn't something I would go about changing in an existing URL structure.

            You'll notice some sites, such as wordpress, by default remove the prepositions, etc. from the URLs.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
            • GlobeRunner
              GlobeRunner last edited by

              Yes, it's perfectly fine. It used to be that you actually needed to use hyphens to separate words in the URL (so search engines could understand) but now you don't need to do that.

              So, it is OK to use hyphens in URLs.

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • 1 / 1
              • First post
                Last post

              Got a burning SEO question?

              Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


              Start my free trial


              Browse Questions

              Explore more categories

              • Moz Tools

                Chat with the community about the Moz tools.

              • SEO Tactics

                Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers

              • Community

                Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!

              • Digital Marketing

                Chat about tactics outside of SEO

              • Research & Trends

                Dive into research and trends in the search industry.

              • Support

                Connect on product support and feature requests.

              • See all categories

              Related Questions

              • Safxmed

                Filter By Category bad for seo?

                on page optimization filter by category

                Hello Everyone! I know that a single product should not have filter by color option since it will create duplicate content, and you have to use canonical tags to solve it. BUT how about sorting through products via category/brands?
                Filter by category changes the URL of the General shop page (ex: hello.com/Shop/Category1022039 ). This page only displays the products within, no content/ descriptions etc unlike the original category page (ORIGINAL CATEGORY PAGE) Each of these category/brand already have their own individual pages (ex: hello.com/Shop/A). This is the page that will be optimized for content, FAQ, and ranking etc. Unlike in the url created when filtering through the categories. So technically I would have 2 URL for each Brand/Category. Would they compete with each other? What would you guys suggest. Please advise me on this. Thank You

                On-Page Optimization | | Safxmed
                0
              • TeodorMarin

                What to do to index all my links of my website?

                Ok, i have a new website, with only 14.000 page indexed by google, but the potential is big, 1-2 million pages. What i have to do, to force somehow google to index my website faster? This is my website: https://vmag.ro/

                On-Page Optimization | | TeodorMarin
                0
              • edwardlewis

                How does the suggested website functionality work in Safari?

                I don't seem to be able to find out much information on this one. Safari often shows a suggested website as you start typing a query into the browser. I've uploaded a screenshot to help show what I mean. safari-suggested-site.png

                On-Page Optimization | | edwardlewis
                0
              • Estherpuntu

                Ecommerce URLs with numbers

                Hi everybody! I have to optimize an ecommerce where somebody has previously done the SEO optimization, although the URLs have numbers before the product's name They have told me that these numbers are useful to find the products, so I think it shouldn't be really bad if I don't redirect them to "clear" ones. For example: /colesterol-sobrepeso/2217-hc-grass-capsulas-duras-15-capsulas.html > /colesterol-sobrepeso/hc-grass-capsulas-duras-15-capsulas.html Am I right? After all, they contain the keywords and the subfolders are also ok. Or it would be better if I redirect the whole site? Thanks!

                On-Page Optimization | | Estherpuntu
                0
              • IcanAgency

                XML Sitemaps for Property Website

                Hi all, I was hoping that someone might have a link to a good example of an XML Sitemap for a large property (real estate) website? Thanks in advance to anyone who does! 🙂 Gavin

                On-Page Optimization | | IcanAgency
                0
              • PorshaAndrea

                When writing content for a website what is the optimal copy length?

                My site is currently in the mist of a redesign and I’d like us to compile some recommendations on the length of copy for a page to rank well but can't seem to find any up to date articles on this.Does anyone have any suggestions, comments, or feedback?Thank you.

                On-Page Optimization | | PorshaAndrea
                0
              • Amped

                Question about url structure for large real estate website

                I've been running a large real estate rental website for the past few years and on May 8, 2013 my Google traffic dropped by about 50%. I'm concerned that my current url structure might be causing thin content pages for certain rental type + location searches. My current directory structure is:
                domain.com/home-rentals/california/
                domain.com/home-rentals/california/beverly-hills/
                domain.com/home-rentals/california/beverly-hills/90210/
                domain.com/apartment-rentals/california/
                domain.com/apartment-rentals/california/beverly-hills/
                domain.com/apartment-rentals/california/beverly-hills/90210/
                etc.. I was thinking of changing it to the following:
                domain.com/rentals/california/
                domain.com/rentals/california/beverly-hills/
                domain.com/rentals/california/beverly-hills/90210/ ** Note: I'd provide users the ability to filter their results by rental type - by default all types would be displayed. Another question - my listing pages are currently displayed as:
                domain.com/123456 And I've been thinking of changing it to:
                domain.com/123456-123-Street-City-State-Zip Should I proceed with both changes - one or the one - neither - or something else I'm not thinking of? Thank you in advance!!

                On-Page Optimization | | Amped
                0
              • SeoMartin1

                URLs and folder structure for an E-commerce

                Hi there !-) I´m helping a friend who has a e-commerce about nail polish in Brazil. I´m a little in doubt about the urls and folder structure. Two questions: 1. There are 10 products per category and 50 categories. Should I put them all in the root folder or creat 2 major categories ( 25 sub-categories each one)? 2. Whats the better product page url ( the store has around 500) nailpolish.com/IMPORT/BRAND/NAME-OF-THE-PRODUCT OR nailpolish.com/COMPLETE-NAME-OF-THE-PRODUCT Whats the best recomandation?

                On-Page Optimization | | SeoMartin1
                0

              Get started with Moz Pro!

              Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

              Start my free trial
              Products
              • Moz Pro
              • Moz Local
              • Moz API
              • Moz Data
              • STAT
              • Product Updates
              Moz Solutions
              • SMB Solutions
              • Agency Solutions
              • Enterprise Solutions
              • Digital Marketers
              Free SEO Tools
              • Domain Authority Checker
              • Link Explorer
              • Keyword Explorer
              • Competitive Research
              • Brand Authority Checker
              • Local Citation Checker
              • MozBar Extension
              • MozCast
              Resources
              • Blog
              • SEO Learning Center
              • Help Hub
              • Beginner's Guide to SEO
              • How-to Guides
              • Moz Academy
              • API Docs
              About Moz
              • About
              • Team
              • Careers
              • Contact
              Why Moz
              • Case Studies
              • Testimonials
              Get Involved
              • Become an Affiliate
              • MozCon
              • Webinars
              • Practical Marketer Series
              • MozPod
              Connect with us

              Contact the Help team

              Join our newsletter
              Moz logo
              © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
              • Accessibility
              • Terms of Use
              • Privacy

              Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.