The short link is the smallest piece of software anyone rents. Five characters after a slash, a redirect, a click counter, and a company that counts how many of them you are allowed to make each month.
Shlink is what happens when someone decides the counting should stop.
The best open source Bitly alternative for most teams is Shlink: MIT licensed, free to self-host on your own domain with no link cap, with a REST API, a command line and a web client, and version 5.1.8 shipped on October 21, 2026. YOURLS is the pick for a plain PHP host that already runs WordPress, and Kutt is the pick if you want a modern interface and a public instance to try before you install.
What Shlink actually is
Shlink is a self-hosted URL shortener written in PHP that serves short links under domains you own and tracks every visit with anonymised, geolocated stats. The project calls itself “the definitive self-hosted URL shortener”, is distributed under the MIT licence, and has about 5,400 GitHub stars (repo). Version 5.1.8 was released on October 21, 2026.
You install it from a Docker image or a dist file and talk to it through a REST API, a CLI, or the separate Shlink web client. The documentation covers multiple domains on one install, QR codes, dynamic redirects by device or language, and sending visits to Matomo. There is no hosted plan and no pricing page. The price is the server.
Bitly's free plan allows 5 links a month and its cheapest paid plan costs $120 a year, paid up front (Nov 5, 2026). A Shlink install on a server you already pay for has no link count at all, and the domain in the link is yours.
What Bitly charges now
Bitly prices by the number of links and QR codes you create each month. On Nov 5, 2026 bitly.com/pages/pricing lists Free at $0 “With Ads” for 5 links a month, 2 QR codes a month and 3 custom back-halves, with unlimited clicks. Core is $10 a month, “Annual Only”, billed as $120 a year, for 100 links a month and 30 days of click data. Growth is $29 a month ($348 a year) for 500 links, a custom domain and 4 months of data. Premium is $199 a month ($2,388 a year) for 3,000 links a month and a year of data. Enterprise is a quote.
The comparison table under the cards adds that Free has no data history and no custom domain below Growth. Bitly is the generic word for a short link, and the free plan is now five links long.
The open source Bitly alternatives
Of the 135 URL shortening tools in the AppClap catalog (Nov 5, 2026), 9 are open source and 117 have a free tier. These five put the redirect on a server you control.
Shlink
Shlink is a PHP shortener with a REST API, a CLI and a separate web client. It costs nothing beyond hosting, and version 5.1.8 shipped on October 21, 2026. The licence is MIT and it runs from a Docker image, with about 5,400 stars. It is best for a team that wants an API-first shortener with several domains on one install. The honest drawback: there is no hosted version, so the first step is always a server.
YOURLS
YOURLS, short for Your Own URL Shortener, is a set of PHP scripts with an admin page, bookmarklets, a developer API and click stats with referrers and geolocation. It is free and MIT licensed, version 1.10.6 shipped on August 30, 2026, and the repo has about 12,300 stars (repo). It runs on any PHP host and extends through dozens of plugins. It is best for someone who already pays for shared hosting. The drawback: the interface shows its age, and most features live in plugins rather than the core.
Kutt
Kutt describes itself as a “Free Modern URL Shortener” and is written in JavaScript. It is MIT licensed, version 3.2.6 shipped on July 5, 2026, and the repo has about 11,200 stars and lists a public instance as its homepage (repo). It is best for a team that wants to try a hosted instance before self-hosting. The drawback: that public instance sat behind a security block when we tried it on Nov 5, 2026, a reminder that a shared shortener domain carries other people's reputation.
Chhoto URL
Chhoto URL is “a simple, blazingly fast, selfhosted URL shortener with no unnecessary features” written in Rust, by its own description. It is MIT licensed, had about 1,000 stars on Nov 5, 2026, and was pushed to the day before (repo). It is best for a homelab or a single site that wants one tiny container. The drawback: no plugin system and a small community.
Polr
Polr is a Laravel-based shortener with a clean admin panel and an API, licensed GPL-2.0, with about 5,100 stars (repo). It is free to self-host and best for someone whose Polr install already works. The drawback is the reason it is last: the repo's most recent commit is from May 28, 2024, so treat it as finished rather than maintained.
| Tool | Licence | Hosting | Last release or push | Stars (Nov 5, 2026) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shlink | MIT | Self-host, Docker | v5.1.8, Oct 21, 2026 | ~5,400 |
| YOURLS | MIT | Self-host, any PHP host | 1.10.6, Aug 30, 2026 | ~12,300 |
| Kutt | MIT | Self-host or public instance | v3.2.6, Jul 5, 2026 | ~11,200 |
| Chhoto URL | MIT | Self-host, one container | pushed Nov 4, 2026 | ~1,000 |
| Polr | GPL-2.0 | Self-host | last commit May 28, 2024 | ~5,100 |
| Bitly | Proprietary | Hosted only | Free 5 links/mo, Core $120/yr | n/a |
One name is missing on purpose. Dub, for years the best-known open source shortener, now describes its repo as “the modern link attribution platform”, and its pricing page on Nov 5, 2026 starts at $81 a month for a partner-program product with links included. It left the category it used to lead.
Shlink vs YOURLS
Shlink and YOURLS differ most on how you run them. Shlink is API-first and ships as a Docker image with a separate web client, so it suits a team that scripts link creation or wants several domains on one install. YOURLS is a folder of PHP scripts with its own admin page, so it suits a person with shared hosting and a browser. Both are MIT licensed, both store every click, both cost nothing beyond the server, and both shipped a release in the second half of 2026.
Is Bitly free forever?
Yes, Bitly's Free plan has no expiry date, but it allows 5 short links a month, 2 QR codes a month and no click history, and Bitly's pricing page labels it “With Ads” (checked Nov 5, 2026). The sixth link in a month, or any click data, needs Core at $120 a year. A self-hosted Shlink or YOURLS has no monthly count, and a free anonymous service such as URLVanish will shorten a link without an account, though you get no stats and no domain of your own.
What you actually take on
Bitly's price buys a domain people already trust to click, an uptime record you did not have to earn, and a support team when a redirect breaks. For a marketing team that prints QR codes on packaging, that trust is the product, and $29 a month is a fair rent for it.
A self-hosted shortener moves that trust to your own domain, which means you earn it. A short domain must stay registered for as long as any flyer carrying it exists, because the day it lapses every link on every poster dies at once. Spam filters judge your domain by every link it serves, so a public submit form is an invitation. And the analytics are yours to maintain: Shlink's geolocation needs a GeoLite2 licence key, and nobody else keeps the database fresh.
- 1Do you already own a short domain, or will you register one and keep it renewed for years?
- 2Does someone on the team run a Docker host or a PHP server they trust?
- 3Are you making more than 5 links a month, or do you need click data at all?
- 4If a printed QR code stops resolving on a Saturday, is that your problem or Bitly's?
This series keeps walking a hallway of paid-app doors, from dictation through the login, the mailbox, the CRM and the storefront, and today's door is the smallest one in the building: the link on the poster. We keep writing these at AppClap because a search for software should put the tool you can own next to the famous one, with the price on the page. Our Bitly alternatives page lists everything we track in this category, and if you would rather describe the job, start from a URL shortener I can self-host on my own domain. Thirty seconds on the question is worth it: do you want to rent five links a month, or own the domain?
