How To Use Bitly Url Shortener In Laravel?

Sometimes, you need to shorten URL. Especially when you want to send URLs in SMS or Social Media. We will learn about laravel bitly URL shortener composer package.

# Requirements

• Laravel installed in your system. How to install laravel?
• Laravel bitly URL shortener package. Documentation.

# Getting Bitly URL Shortener Access Token

First of all, you need to get a bitly access token. Create a new free account into a bitly. Your dashboard will look like below.

Click on profile settings and after a click on generic access token.

Enter your account password and click on generic access token to get your bitly access token.

# Installing Bitly Package

Install laravel bitly package using following command

composer require shivella/laravel-bitly

Register the service into the app.php‘s providers array.

/* config > app.php */

'providers' => [    
    Shivella\Bitly\BitlyServiceProvider::class,
]

Similarly, register the facade into aliases array.

/* config > app.php */

'aliases' => [    
     'Bitly' => Shivella\Bitly\Facade\Bitly::class,
]

That’s It! You successfully configured laravel bitly.

# Usage

There are two methods you can use it.

$bitlyUrl = app('bitly')->getUrl('https://www.your-url.com/');
echo $bitlyUrl;

Likewise, you can use it with laravel facade.

/* declare bitly namespace */
use Bitly;

$bitlyUrl = Bitly::getUrl('https://www.google.com/');
echo $bitlyUrl;

Check the shortened URL to your browser. It will automatically redirect to your original URL.