Every affiliate site eventually runs into the same problem: you’ve got links scattered across posts, some cloaked, some not, and no real way to tell which ones are earning their keep. ThirstyAffiliates and Pretty Links are the two plugins that come up every time someone asks how to fix that in WordPress. Both cloak links, both track clicks, and both have free versions that look similar on a feature list. The differences that matter show up once you start using them on a real site with real traffic, not when you’re skimming a comparison chart.
This one scores both plugins on the five things that actually affect an affiliate’s day-to-day: how well they hide and redirect links, how much they tell you about who clicked what, whether they can split traffic for testing, where the free tier runs out of room, and how painful it is to move your links later if you change your mind.
What a link management plugin actually needs to do for an affiliate site
Before comparing features, it helps to be clear on the job. A link management plugin needs to turn long, ugly affiliate URLs into short branded ones, redirect visitors cleanly without leaking your affiliate ID in the browser bar, record enough data to tell you which links and which pages are converting, and let you update a destination URL in one place instead of hunting through every post that mentions a product.
Everything past that- geo-targeting, link rotation, advanced reporting- is a bonus that only matters once the basics are solid and your traffic has grown enough to need it. That’s the lens for the rest of this comparison.
Link cloaking and redirect options compared
Both plugins do the core job: you paste in an ugly affiliate URL, pick a short slug, and the plugin generates a clean link like yoursite.com/go/productname that redirects visitors to the real destination. Neither one makes you choose between cloaking and tracking; you get both by default.
Where they differ is redirect type flexibility. ThirstyAffiliates gives you a choice of redirect types (301, 302, 307, and a meta refresh option) right in the free version, which matters more than it sounds. A 301 tells search engines the redirect is permanent and passes link authority through; a 302 says it’s temporary. For affiliate links, you almost always want a 301, and having the option without upgrading is a genuine point in ThirstyAffiliates’ favor.
Pretty Links also supports multiple redirect types, but some of the more granular controls, like setting a default redirect type site-wide or overriding it per link, sit closer to the paid tiers depending on which version you’re running. If you’re the kind of affiliate who cares about SEO hygiene on your outbound links, check this before you commit.
Click tracking: what each plugin shows you (and what it doesn’t)
This is where the two plugins start to feel like different products wearing similar clothes.
Pretty Links’ free tracking is straightforward: total clicks, clicks over time, and basic referrer data. It’s enough to see that a link is getting traffic, but not enough to tell you much about who’s clicking or why. The paid version adds more detail, including click tracking by location and device.
ThirstyAffiliates’ free tracking is similarly basic out of the box: total clicks and a simple report, but its reporting dashboard tends to feel a bit more built for affiliates specifically, showing which links are performing across your whole site rather than just link by link. Neither plugin, in its free form, gives you conversion data, because neither one can see what happens after the click lands on the merchant’s site. That part of the picture comes from your affiliate network’s own dashboard or from a separate tracking setup.
This is worth sitting with for a second: click count alone doesn’t tell you whether a link makes money. A link with fifty clicks and three sales is outperforming a link with five hundred clicks and zero sales, and neither plugin will show you that side of the equation on its own. If you haven’t already connected your click data to actual conversion numbers, that’s a separate piece of work worth doing regardless of which plugin you pick.
Geo-targeting and link rotation for split testing
If you want to send US visitors to one affiliate link and UK visitors to another for the same product, that’s geo-targeting, and it’s a paid feature on both plugins. Neither offers it free, so this isn’t a deciding factor for a new site. It becomes relevant once you’re running campaigns across multiple regions with different affiliate programs or different commission rates by geography.
Link rotation, splitting traffic between two or more destination URLs to test which converts better, works similarly: both plugins offer it, and both gate it behind a paid tier. ThirstyAffiliates calls this feature set part of its “Pro” add-ons; Pretty Links folds it into its paid plans too. If split testing is a near-term priority rather than a someday feature, price out the specific tier that includes it on each plugin before assuming the free version will cover you.
Free versus paid: where each plugin starts charging you
The free version of ThirstyAffiliates covers link cloaking, basic categorization, redirect type selection, and simple click reports. It’s a genuinely usable free tool for a site with a modest number of links. Paid tiers add geo-targeting, link rotation, deeper reporting, and import/export tools for larger link libraries.
Pretty Links’ free version covers the same core ground, cloaking, basic tracking, and simple redirects, but some users find the free reporting thinner once you’re managing more than a handful of links. Its paid tiers unlock the location and device tracking mentioned earlier, along with automatic keyword linking (which auto-links specific words in your content to a chosen affiliate URL, a feature ThirstyAffiliates doesn’t really have an equivalent for).
Neither plugin’s free tier will embarrass you on a small site. The gap shows up as your link count grows: somewhere past fifty or so active affiliate links, both plugins start nudging you toward paid features just to keep reporting and organization manageable. Check current pricing directly on each plugin’s site before deciding, since tiers and what they include do shift over time.
Setup time and migrating links if you switch
Setting up either plugin from scratch takes under an hour for a small site: install, configure your link prefix (the “/go/” or “/recommends/” part of your cloaked URLs), and start adding links as you write new content.
Migrating existing links is the part people underestimate. If you’ve already got affiliate links scattered through old posts, uncloaked, switching to either plugin means going back through that content to replace raw URLs with cloaked ones, or using the plugin’s auto-linking feature if it has one. ThirstyAffiliates has historically had better import tools for pulling in data from other link plugins, which matters if you’re not starting fresh. Pretty Links can import too, but test it on a backup first. Migrating hundreds of links is exactly the kind of job where a plugin conflict or a missed redirect costs you commissions you’ll never notice you lost.
If you’re choosing between the two before you’ve published much, this friction doesn’t apply to you yet, and it’s one less thing to weigh.
Which one fits a new site versus an established one
For a new affiliate site with a handful of links and no existing cloaking setup, ThirstyAffiliates’ free tier is the stronger starting point. The redirect type options and more affiliate-oriented reporting give you more useful information without paying anything, and there’s nothing to migrate yet.
For an established site already using Pretty Links, especially one leaning on its keyword auto-linking, switching plugins purely to chase a feature on the other side usually isn’t worth the migration risk unless you’ve hit a real ceiling, like needing geo-targeting or deeper reporting that your current paid tier doesn’t offer.
For a site with real traffic and a real link library, the paid tiers of either plugin start to look similar in value, and the decision comes down to which reporting dashboard you find yourself actually using. A plugin you check is worth more than one with a longer feature list you ignore.
Whichever plugin you land on, cloaking and click counts are only half the picture. For the broader tracking picture, once your links are set up, see How To Track Affiliate Clicks And Conversions (And Actually Use The Data).
