Clean My Links is available in Hookmark 7 currently in beta.
Many websites add unnecessary—and often privacy-invasive—cruft to their URLs. This cruft typically consists of parameters used for tracking, attribution, and marketing analytics. The result is links that are harder to read, harder to share, and harder to recognize as pointing to the same underlying resource.
Clean My Links is Hookmark’s built-in solution. It automatically removes tracking and unnecessary cruft from web links you copy or hook—protecting your privacy and ensuring Hookmark reliably recognizes the same resource every time.
An Example
Here is a typical link to a book page on Amazon:
https://www.amazon.ca/Enshittification-Everything-Suddenly-Worse-About/dp/0374619328/ref=sr_1_1?dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9._SjOlLplb7Z0Rvscl1ZihXsKv3j5PVjTYExbZMJmZuDtJLCIavbyJiKbtQJUy3Xn0bNemqglamuZWtNQzFB2_Q.x7nWZNgrA7o7I-w9roq4O53Ys4E1Wx9KWxrJHyQb-aY&dib_tag=se&gad_source=1&hvadid=788657704505&hvdev=c&hvexpln=0&hvlocphy=9001509&hvnetw=g&hvocijid=17902577840324087743--&hvqmt=b&hvrand=17902577840324087743&hvtargid=kwd-2078990547242&hydadcr=22430_13682881&keywords=enshittification&mcid=82e56b35149932d7aa07352f600aa68d&qid=1768014783&sr=8-1
This URL contains tracking and attribution information. When such links are shared, companies can use embedded parameters to infer marketing effectiveness, attribution paths, or user relationships.
Amazon is not alone in doing this. Google, Facebook, X, and many other platforms add similar tracking cruft to URLs. For background, see Cruft – Wikipedia. For a broader critique of large-scale platform behavior, see Cory Doctorow’s Enshittification (2025) (highly recommended reading).
When Clean My Links is enabled, any link you copy or hook with Hookmark is automatically cleaned and reduced to a canonical form such as:
https://www.amazon.ca/Enshittification-Everything-Suddenly-Worse-About/dp/0374619328
The destination is unchanged—only the cruft is removed.
Why URL Cruft Is a Problem
URL cruft causes several problems:
- Privacy: Tracking parameters leak information when links are shared or stored.
- Readability: Long, cluttered URLs are ugly and difficult to work with.
- Durability: The same resource can appear to be different links on different occasions.
- Hookmark accuracy: If two URLs differ superficially, Hookmark may treat them as different resources—even when they point to the same page.
Clean My Links solves these problems by treating cleaned URLs as canonical representations of the same resource.
What Are the Benefits of Clean My Links?
Hookmark’s Clean My Links feature:
- makes links shorter, cleaner, and more readable,
- removes known tracking parameters to reduce privacy leakage,
- ensures the same resource is recognized as the same link across time, and
- improves the reliability and usefulness of hooks by eliminating superficial URL differences.
This directly supports Hookmark’s goal of creating durable, meaningful links that remain useful across contexts, tools, and time.
Is This a “Link Shortening” Feature?
No. Clean My Links is not a traditional link shortener.
Unlike services such as TinyURL, Rebrandly, BL.INK, Ow.ly, Short.io, Sniply, Cuttly, ClickMeter, or ZipZy, Hookmark:
- does not change the domain name,
- does not introduce redirects, and
- does not rely on third-party services.
Clean My Links simply removes unnecessary or tracking-related components from the URL while preserving the original destination.
Who Can Use Clean My Links?
Clean My Links is available to all Hookmark users, including:
- Hookmark Trial tier
- Hookmark Lite (free) tier
- Hookmark Standard (paid) tier
- Hookmark Pro (paid) tier
How URL Cleaning Works
Hookmark uses a growing set of built-in rules to clean URLs. These rules:
- are conservative by design,
- remove only components known to be unnecessary or tracking-related, and
- never change the destination domain.
If a URL cannot be cleaned safely, Hookmark leaves it unchanged.
The built-in rules are not directly visible to users. Pro users, however, can view and manage the custom rules they’ve added.
Are Cleaning Rules Updated Automatically?
Yes. If one has a valid Updates license and if the feature is enabled in Hookmark’s Updates Settings, Hookmark periodically checks for updated cleaning rules—using the same secure mechanism it uses to update integrations and integration scripts.
Is a Browser Extension Required?
No.
Unlike many competitors, Hookmark does not require a browser extension or plugin to clean your links. Clean My Links works system-wide on macOS, wherever Hookmark copies or hooks a web link.
Can I Disable Clean My Links?
Yes.
Clean My Links is enabled by default, but all Hookmark users (Trial, Lite, Standard, and Pro) can enable or disable it—and configure custom rules—on the Clean My Links Settings tab.
Can I Add My Own Cleaning Rules?
Yes—for Pro users.
Hookmark Pro users can add custom URL-cleaning rules on the Clean My Links Settings tab, allowing you to tailor link cleaning to your own workflows and preferred sites.