Google SEO Snippets Video: URL Endings Or Extensions Don't Matter

Mar 30, 2018 - 7:44 am 0 by

Google Seo Url Extensions

In yet another SEO Snippets video John Mueller of Google addresses another basic SEO question, around how you end your URLs, what extension you use.

The question was "will removing that HTML from our URLs help my site?" The answer is no, it doesn't matter either way.

John said:

URLs are important for search engines like Google. Do they care which endings your URLs use though? The answer is no.

But if you change URLs, that can matter. John said:

Google uses URLs to identify pieces of content. Whether your URLs end with .html, .php, .asp or just have words in them, doesn't really matter to Google. All of these URLs can show up in search in the same way. That's it.

If you need to change your URLs, for example if you move to a new content management system that doesn't allow you to use .html URLs at all, keep in mind that this change would be a restructuring of your website. You would need to redirect the old URLs to the new ones. This kind of change can take quite a bit of time to be reprocessed. So picking a time when you're not dependent on search is a good idea. And because it can take time we don't recommend doing this kind of change on a wim. When making URL changes pick URLs that you're sure can last a longer period of time.

Here is the video:

Forum discussion at Twitter.

 

Popular Categories

The Pulse of the search community

Search Video Recaps

 
- YouTube
Video Details More Videos Subscribe to Videos

Most Recent Articles

Search Forum Recap

Daily Search Forum Recap: July 15, 2025

Jul 15, 2025 - 10:00 am
Google Maps

Google Local Ranking Documentation Updated

Jul 15, 2025 - 7:51 am
Google Maps

Google Business Profiles Automatically Adding Social Media Links To Businesses

Jul 15, 2025 - 7:41 am
Google Search Engine Optimization

Google Search Console Analytics API New Metadata Incomplete Data Points

Jul 15, 2025 - 7:31 am
Google AdSense

Google AdSense PIN Verification Issues

Jul 15, 2025 - 7:21 am
Google Maps

Google Business Profiles Now Requests Text/WhatsApp Number During Setup

Jul 15, 2025 - 7:11 am
Previous Story: Bing Ads Editor Adds Account Level Ad Extensions