Use hyphens for new, descriptive URL paths. Google recommends hyphens (-) between words because they help people and search systems identify separate concepts. Underscores (_) are valid URI characters, so an established underscore URL can continue to work. Do not rebuild a stable site merely to replace underscores; change URLs only when a broader information-architecture or migration plan justifies the risk, and preserve the old addresses with redirects or canonical signals.
The short decision
For a new page, write a lowercase, readable slug with hyphens: /summer-clothing/ or /color-profile/dark-grey/. Avoid joining words (/summerclothing/) simply to avoid punctuation, and remove parameters that do not change the page’s content.
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- Launching a new URL: choose hyphens.
- Keeping a working legacy URL: an underscore is technically acceptable; leave it alone unless there is a wider reason to migrate.
- Changing an established URL: map every old address to one preferred new address with a permanent redirect and update internal links, sitemaps and canonical tags.
- Operating case-insensitive servers: select one case convention, normally lowercase, because Google Search treats differently cased paths as distinct URLs.
This is a clarity and URL-design recommendation, not a promise of a ranking increase. Google has published no qualifying statistic showing that replacing underscores alone produces a guaranteed lift.
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What Google recommends—and what that means
Google Search Central’s URL Structure Best Practices for Google Search states: “Specifically, we recommend using hyphens (-) instead of underscores (_) to separate words in your URLs, as it helps users and search engines better identify concepts in the URL.”
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The recommendation concerns word recognition and readability. It does not say that an underscore violates URL syntax or makes a page ineligible for indexing. Google explains that underscores are discouraged for historical reasons: programming-language names often use underscores to keep a multiword concept together. In a page path, however, readers and search systems generally benefit when separate words are visibly separated.
Google’s SEO Starter Guide also emphasizes descriptive, understandable URLs. A slug should tell a person what the destination contains before they open it. The separator is one part of that larger design: useful words, sensible hierarchy, consistent case and minimal noise matter more than punctuation in isolation.
Are both characters valid in a URL?
Yes. The URI generic syntax in RFC 3986 lists both the hyphen and underscore in the unreserved character set. A server, browser and crawler can therefore receive paths such as /product-guide/ and /product_guide/.
Syntax permission and search clarity are separate questions. RFC 3986 defines how a URI is formed; it does not tell a search engine which visual separator best expresses word boundaries. Google’s hyphen preference is an interpretation and usability recommendation layered on top of valid URI syntax.
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Hyphens and underscores compared
| Decision factor | Hyphen (-) |
Underscore (_) |
|---|---|---|
| Google’s stated preference | Recommended between words because concepts are easier to identify. | Discouraged for word separation; still technically accepted. |
| URI syntax | Unreserved and valid under RFC 3986. | Unreserved and valid under RFC 3986. |
| Human readability | Usually remains visibly distinct when a link is underlined, copied or read aloud. | Can visually blend into an underline or be mistaken for part of one compound identifier. |
| Search word recognition | Best default for separating independent words. | May be interpreted less clearly because of its historical use inside programming names. |
| New-site choice | Use for descriptive slugs. | Use only when a deliberate routing convention requires it. |
| Migration risk | Changing to it requires redirects, canonical handling and link updates. | Leaving a stable path avoids URL-change risk. |
| Effect of punctuation alone on rankings | No guaranteed ranking lift has been established. | No evidence that an existing underscore automatically causes a ranking penalty. |
How search interpretation differs from URL syntax
Hyphens make boundaries explicit
In /winter-running-shoes/, the three words are visually separated. A user can infer the subject from a copied link, browser history or printed document. The same path also gives a search system clear candidate terms without relying on capitalization or context.
Underscores are not a ban
An underscore path such as /winter_running_shoes/ can be crawled and indexed. Its weakness is communicative: an underscore is frequently used within identifiers in software, where the entire string denotes one name. That history is why Google advises against using it as a word separator; it is not a claim that every underscore path is treated as one unbreakable token.
Meaning still comes from the whole URL
Separators cannot rescue a vague slug. /p-18472/ gives little context even though it contains no underscores, while /winter-running-shoes/ is informative because the words, hierarchy and page topic align. Relevance, page content, internal links and accessibility remain essential.
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Describe the destination
Use words your audience actually uses and that accurately describe the page. A clothing guide might use /summer-clothing/; a product-support article might use /color-profile/dark-grey/. Do not stuff a slug with repeated synonyms or unrelated terms.
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Keep the path concise but meaningful
Remove filler words when they add no clarity, but do not shorten a phrase until it becomes ambiguous. A stable category hierarchy can help users understand where a page sits, provided it reflects the site’s information architecture and will not change every time navigation is reorganized.
Use lowercase consistently
Google Search treats /APPLE and /apple as distinct URLs. If your server treats case as equivalent, inconsistent capitalization can create duplicate addresses, split analytics and produce confusing links. Set a lowercase convention for new paths and redirect or canonicalize variants where your platform permits.
Separate words; do not concatenate them
Prefer /remote-work-policy/ to /remoteworkpolicy/. A concatenated string is harder to scan and gives the parser fewer obvious boundaries. Hyphens are the clearest default separator for independent words.
Use the audience’s language
For a regional site, decide whether paths should use the audience’s local language, transliteration or a shared language. Keep that choice consistent across the section. A locale directory or country-specific domain can make the intended audience clear, but do not create parallel versions without a plan for their relationships.
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Limit parameters to content-changing choices
Parameters are appropriate when they genuinely alter the returned content, such as a selected page or filter that has a useful, indexable result. Remove tracking, session and duplicate parameters from links where possible. If several parameter combinations produce the same content, establish one preferred URL with canonical signals or redirects rather than allowing every variant to compete.
A step-by-step process for creating a new URL
- Identify the page’s primary subject. Write the phrase a visitor would use to find the page, then remove words that do not distinguish it from neighboring pages.
- Check the site’s hierarchy. Decide whether a category segment improves orientation, for example
/color-profile/dark-grey/instead of a root-level slug. Use the hierarchy only if it is stable and meaningful. - Convert word boundaries to hyphens. Use one hyphen between separate words; do not substitute underscores or concatenate terms.
- Normalize the string. Set lowercase, choose a consistent treatment for accents and transliteration, and remove characters your routing system does not safely support.
- Remove nonessential parameters. Keep only parameters that change the page or are required by the application. Generate clean shareable links without campaign or session identifiers.
- Check for collisions. Confirm that the proposed path is not already assigned, reserved by the framework or equivalent to another path under the server’s case rules.
- Publish one canonical address. Make internal links, XML sitemaps and the page’s canonical element point to the same preferred form.
- Test before promotion. Request the exact lowercase URL, its trailing-slash convention and any expected redirects. Verify that the page returns the intended status and that alternate forms do not create duplicate content.
Should you change old underscore URLs?
Leave a stable URL when punctuation is the only issue
If /winter_running_shoes/ is indexed, linked by other sites, printed in documentation or embedded in applications, changing it solely to obtain hyphens creates work and failure modes without a documented guaranteed benefit. An underscore URL can remain functional and discoverable. Improve titles, content, internal links and information architecture first.
Change it when there is a broader migration reason
A redesign, domain move, category restructure, duplicate-path cleanup or platform change can justify adopting hyphens at the same time. The migration should solve that larger problem; the separator change is a component, not the business case.
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For every old path, define exactly one new destination. Use a permanent server-side redirect from the old URL to the corresponding new URL, not a chain through several intermediate addresses. Update navigation, contextual links, feeds, sitemaps, structured data and documentation so future crawlers and users encounter the preferred form directly.
Preserve content and monitor signals
Keep the page’s topic and useful content equivalent during the move so the redirect has a clear destination. Ensure the new page’s canonical URL points to itself, remove obsolete addresses from the sitemap and watch server logs and search reporting for redirect loops, spikes in not-found responses or unexpected duplicate URLs. Retain redirects for as long as external links and bookmarks need them; removing them immediately turns old references into errors.
Do not run a punctuation-only mass rewrite without a rollback plan
Large URL changes can expose assumptions in caches, APIs, image paths, analytics filters and third-party integrations. Stage the migration, test representative pages and keep the old-to-new map available for rollback. If the only expected gain is a cleaner separator, the safest decision is usually to keep functioning legacy URLs and apply the hyphen convention to future content.
Case, trailing slashes and duplicate forms
Case sensitivity
Google considers differently cased paths distinct. A platform that serves the same content for /Guide/ and /guide/ can therefore expose duplicates even though the application appears case-insensitive. Choose lowercase, redirect alternate case when possible and ensure generated links use the standard.
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Decide whether directory-like paths end in a slash and apply the rule consistently. The important point is not which convention you choose but that one form is preferred and the alternate form resolves predictably rather than returning two independently indexable copies.
Encoded characters and non-Latin text
Internationalized paths can be appropriate when they match the audience’s language, but verify how your CMS, web server, analytics and sharing tools encode and display them. A readable localized path is preferable to an opaque string, provided redirects, canonical tags and internal links all use the same normalized representation.
Common mistakes and how to fix them
- Changing every underscore in place: this breaks bookmarks and inbound links. Restore the old paths or add one-to-one permanent redirects, then update site-generated links.
- Mixing separators: having
/news_updates/,/news-updates/and/newsupdates/for similar pages creates needless conventions. Select one format for new work and consolidate duplicates. - Using a slug as a keyword list: a path such as
/cheap-best-running-shoes-sale/is less trustworthy than a concise description. Remove repetition and write for people. - Leaving session or tracking parameters in canonical links: generate clean URLs for navigation and set the preferred canonical form so measurement parameters do not become competing addresses.
- Ignoring case on a case-insensitive server: normalize to lowercase and redirect variants; otherwise links copied with different capitalization may split signals.
- Creating redirect chains: point the original URL directly to the final hyphenated URL. Chains add latency and make debugging harder.
- Assuming punctuation fixes weak content: a hyphen cannot compensate for an irrelevant page, poor navigation or missing internal links. Treat URL design as one technical and editorial signal among many.
Examples of sound and unsound patterns
| Use case | Preferred pattern | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Seasonal guide | /summer-clothing/ |
Lowercase, descriptive and clearly separated. |
| Nested design reference | /color-profile/dark-grey/ |
Shows stable hierarchy and readable terms. |
| Legacy page that already ranks | /summer_clothing/ retained |
Avoids a punctuation-only migration; redirect only if a wider change warrants it. |
| Opaque identifier | /p-18472/ |
Provides little information to users; replace during a justified redesign with a descriptive path and redirect. |
| Concatenated words | /summerclothing/ |
Word boundaries are harder to read and interpret. |
| Tracking variant | /summer-clothing/?session=... |
Remove from normal shareable and canonical links when it does not change content. |
A practical decision framework
Choose hyphens now when
- The page or site is new and no external links depend on a different format.
- You are establishing a documented slug convention for a content team.
- A redesign already requires redirects and duplicate-URL cleanup.
- Users need to read, copy or communicate links outside the site.
Keep underscores when
- The URL is stable, indexed and widely referenced.
- The application, API or integration contract treats the path as an identifier.
- No broader information-architecture problem is being solved.
- The cost and risk of redirects outweigh a cosmetic consistency gain.
Review the whole routing system when
- Both hyphen and underscore versions return content.
- Case variants, trailing-slash variants or parameters create duplicate pages.
- Internal links and canonical tags disagree about the preferred URL.
- A migration is producing redirect chains or rising not-found responses.
Bottom line for site owners and editors
Use lowercase hyphens for new descriptive URL slugs. They align with Google’s explicit recommendation, make word boundaries easier to read and avoid the ambiguity associated with underscores in programming identifiers. Underscores remain valid URI characters, so an existing underscore URL is not automatically a problem and does not have to be replaced for SEO. If you migrate, do it as a controlled URL project: choose one canonical form, redirect each old address directly to its exact new counterpart, update every first-party reference and monitor the results. The durable SEO benefit comes from clear, stable information architecture—not from punctuation alone.
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