Introduction

VK, short for VKontakte, is one of the largest social networks in Russia and the CIS region. A link to a post or discussion on VK rarely looks compact — it's usually an address like https://vk.com/wall-123456789_98765, with the group and post numeric identifiers stretching on for a good dozen characters. That kind of link is awkward to paste into a conversation, read out loud, or print on a business card.

In this article, we'll cover why you'd want to shorten VK links — whether it's a post, a group, a page, or a user profile — how to do it in seconds with Lix.li, and how to set up a link so it opens the VK app directly on a user's phone.

Compactness and convenience

A short link like lix.li/my-group fits into any message, is easy to say out loud in a video or a meeting, and doesn't look suspicious the way a long string of digits in a standard VK link can.

Click analytics

VK doesn't give you detailed statistics on who clicks your post or group link and from where, outside the platform itself. When you shorten a link through Lix.li, you get separate analytics for every click: the number of clicks, the user's country, device, and traffic source. This is especially useful if you're promoting your group across different channels — Instagram, email, ads — and want to understand where most of your traffic is coming from.

Your own branding

If you regularly share links to your VK group or page, a short link on your own domain (for example, go.yourbrand.com/vk) looks far more polished than a standard VK link and builds more trust with your audience.

Convenient for printed materials and QR codes

A short link to a group or post is easy to turn into a QR code and place on packaging, a business card, a banner, or in printed ads — unlike a long link, which is impossible to remember or fit neatly onto a small format.

  1. Open the post, group, page, or profile on VK you want a link for, and copy its link (via the "···" menu → "Copy Link", or from the browser's address bar).
  2. Open the Lix.li link shortening service and paste the copied link into the input field.
  3. If you'd like, set a custom alias (for example, lix.li/my-page) — this makes the link easier to remember and say out loud.
  4. Click the shorten button — the service instantly creates a short link, ready to use.
  5. Copy the finished link and place it wherever you need it: in your bio, a post, an email newsletter, or on printed materials.

If you're already registered with Lix.li, the link is automatically saved to your dashboard, where click statistics are available, along with additional settings — such as a custom domain, a link expiration date, or a password for access.

Shortening a VK link through the Lix.li dashboard

One of the most common frustrations: a user clicks a VK link on their phone, and instead of the app they already have installed, the mobile version of the website opens in a browser — with limited functionality and a login prompt. The deep link technology solves exactly this problem.

A deep link is a short link that, when clicked, automatically opens the right app (VK, in this case) if it's installed on the user's device — and if it isn't, it simply opens the regular web version in a browser. The user doesn't have to choose anything manually: the link figures out on its own what's more convenient for them and takes them there instantly.

One nuance worth noting for VK links: on Android, the app always opens based on the address, while on iPhone, an exact deep link to a specific post or page isn't built yet — in that case, the web version opens instead. Still, simply skipping the extra intermediate screens already makes things noticeably more convenient for Android users.

  1. When creating or editing a short link in Lix.li, paste the VK post, group, page, or profile address into the URL field.
  2. The service automatically recognizes that the link points to VK and offers to enable opening in the app.
  3. Turn on that setting — from then on, the link will automatically open the VK app on Android devices where it's installed, and the regular web version on iPhone, a computer, or where the app isn't installed.

For more on how this technology works across different devices and which other apps are supported, check out our article What Is a Deep Link and How Does It Work.

Conclusion

Shortening a VK link is a simple way to make it more convenient for your audience and get useful click analytics that the platform itself doesn't provide. With Lix.li, you can shorten a link to a post, group, page, or profile in seconds, and set it up to automatically open the VK app on a user's phone — with no extra steps on their end and no loss of convenience.