Guides
How to get links out of the places they hide — and what each method cannot do. Every code example and formula here was run against the environment named alongside it.
- Code and automation
How to Extract and Copy Links in Chrome
What Chrome can do on its own, a bookmarklet you can read before you use it, and an honest look at when an extension is worth the permissions it asks for.
Read the guide - Code and automation
How to Extract URLs with Regex
Patterns that work, measured failures from the ones that do not, and a clear account of why no regular expression can fully validate a URL.
Read the guide - Code and automation
How to Extract Webpage Links with JavaScript
Two lines in the browser console give you every link on the page — including the ones built by JavaScript that a crawler cannot see. Plus how to get anchor text, rel values and a downloadable file.
Read the guide - Code and automation
How to Extract URLs from Text Using Python
A working extractor in about thirty lines — find candidates, trim punctuation without breaking balanced brackets, then validate with urlparse rather than trusting the pattern.
Read the guide - Spreadsheets
How to Extract URLs and Domains from Text in Google Sheets
Formulas that pull addresses out of a text column, get the hostname, and — importantly — why the popular "root domain" formula is wrong for half the internet.
Read the guide - Spreadsheets
How to Extract Hyperlink URLs in Google Sheets
Google Sheets has two kinds of hyperlink too. One yields to a formula; the other needs Apps Script, because no formula can see it. Here is how to tell which you have.
Read the guide - Spreadsheets
How to Extract URLs from Hyperlinks in Excel
A cell showing "Click here" stores its address somewhere you cannot reach with a formula. Three methods that work — VBA, FORMULATEXT and unzipping the file — and exactly when each one applies.
Read the guide - Extracting links
How to Extract Links from a PDF
Clickable link annotations, addresses printed in the text, and internal jumps are three different things inside a PDF. Here is how to get each one — and why a scanned PDF gives you nothing.
Read the guide - Extracting links
How to Extract a URL from an Image or Screenshot
OCR can read an address that is visibly written in a picture. It cannot recover a link hidden behind the words "click here" — here is the difference, and how to get the best result when OCR is the right tool.
Read the guide - Extracting links
How to Extract YouTube Description Links and Playlist URLs
Three different jobs that all get called "YouTube URL extraction" — finding links in text, pulling links out of a description, and exporting a playlist — and which ones need an API key.
Read the guide - Extracting links
How to Extract Links from a Website or a Single Page
When to fetch one page, when to crawl, how to set a scope that finishes, and what a crawler structurally cannot find — including the pages it will always miss.
Read the guide - Extracting links
How to Extract URLs from a Sitemap and Export Them
Paste, upload or fetch an XML sitemap and turn it into a URL list you can open in Excel — keeping page URLs separate from child sitemap files, and knowing when the list is incomplete.
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