App Deep Link Builder
The link that opens the app instead of the browser — and when each kind really works.
- 100% success
Tool input
Overview
About this tool
Turns an ordinary profile or post link into the universal link and, where the platform has a long-established one, the scheme URI — with the failure mode of each stated rather than implied.
Instructions
How to use it
Paste the ordinary web link to the profile, video, post or Pin. Both kinds of deep link come back, labelled, along with an HTML snippet for the one you should actually put on a page.
Universal links versus scheme URIs
A universal link is the ordinary https URL. Both iOS and Android let an app claim its own domain, so tapping https://instagram.com/nasa opens Instagram when it is installed and the website when it is not. It cannot fail, which is why it belongs in a bio, a newsletter and every button on a web page.
A scheme URI — instagram://user?username=nasa — addresses the app directly and does nothing at all when the app is missing. No error, no fallback, a tap that looks broken. It belongs inside your own app, not on a public page.
Where a scheme is not offered
Some platforms have no long-established scheme for a given object. Rather than invent a URI that silently opens nothing, the tool says so. A deep link you cannot test is worse than no deep link at all.
Questions
Frequently asked
Which link should I put in my bio?
The universal link, always. It opens the app for people who have it and the website for everyone else, which is exactly what a public link has to do.
Why does my instagram:// link do nothing on desktop?
Because there is no Instagram app to hand it to. A scheme URI is only meaningful on a device with the app installed, and it fails silently everywhere else.
Is the X scheme still twitter://?
Yes. The app kept its original scheme through the rename, which is one of the more common reasons a hand-written X deep link fails.
Does the tool strip tracking from the link?
Yes. A deep link carrying somebody’s share id is a deep link that identifies them, so the tracking comes off before anything is built.
Stay sharp
One email a month, when a tool worth your time ships.
No drip sequence, no launch countdowns. Unsubscribe in one click.