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I want to have a bookmark shortcut on my Home screen to launch a web app I use regularly. The only way I found to achieve this is using the Add to Home screen from the Chrome browser menu when I'm on the site. However, this does not let me edit the actual URL the bookmark will point to.

This is a problem because said web app automatically appends the current date to the end of the URL when it's loaded. When I add the shortcut to the Home screen, the link will then actually open the app to display data from the day on which I created the shortcut. I'll always have to open the date picker and navigate to the current date to start using the app.

I'd like to edit the Home screen bookmark shortcut's URL to remove the date added to its end, so it always opens to the current day. Can I achieve this without third-party software?

I'm using an unrooted Sony Xperia Z5 Compact running Android 6.0.1.

  • Some sources say to create a standard bookmark in Chrome, where the URL can be edited, then long-press it in the bookmarks manager and choose to add it to the home screen from the context menu. This context menu entry does not appear to exist anymore in current versions of Chrome.
  • Some sources say to look for a Bookmarks widget that allows to choose a Chrome bookmark to display. This widget doesn't appear to exist anymore in Android 6. The only bookmarks widget I have displays the entire bookmarks folder.
  • The website in question loads too quickly for me to be able to cancel before the URL is modified. I tried many times.
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  • 2
    Why don't you try this? Install Tasker, setup a 1x1 widget on a home screen and in the task choose Net -> Browse URL -> your URL. Done! MacroDroid can be used as an alternative to Tasker.
    – Firelord ♦
    Commented Oct 14, 2016 at 12:35

4 Answers 4

Reset to default
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I havent been able to find an intuitive way to modify a desktop shortcut's URL, but I have found a workaround for the problem.

  • Put your phone in airplane mode and disable WiFi to turn off all internet access
  • Open the Chrome browser
  • Type in the URL you are trying to set a shortcut for
  • Press enter and the browser will alert you that you are currently in an offline status
  • On Chrome, click the settings (hamburger) button
  • select add to desktop
You will now have a shortcut on your desktop that refelcts the URL that you have just entered into Chrome
Turn off airplane mode and you're golden.

This applies to Android Marshmallow 6.x as well as Nougat 7.x. It may also apply to older versions as well

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  • Best part? Not even working for me. It changes in airplane mode too.
    – Andrew
    Commented May 23, 2019 at 14:41
  • Nice hack - I added a maps URL query this way.
    – user3486184
    Commented Jul 30, 2019 at 6:15
  • Works but PWA display rules are not respected to me. It opens the correct URL but in classic Chrome (with the address bar and stuff). When doing "classic way" I have the wrong URL, but it's displayed full page.
    – Mtxz
    Commented Feb 28, 2022 at 16:40
  • Still works on Android 14 :-D
    – Sunday
    Commented Mar 15 at 16:25
  • Doesn't work for gmail. Can't get the desktop version to show up reliably. It seems to redirect to the mobile version. :v(
    – kgingeri
    Commented May 4 at 5:19
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Inspired by the airplane mode by @axelderhund, the following is my way.

Add any URL you like to home screen

Turn on airplane mode, type in your desired URL in your browser, and add to home screen.

In this way no redirection happens and the url is intact.

Check (original) URL of a home screen bookmark

Turn on airplane mode, which prevents redirection. Then connect your phone with your computer via a USB cable. Run browser on the computer and turn on USB debugging. The USB debugging page shows the URL of opened pages on your phone.

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Okay, this was my solution for Firefox haha:

Search online for a link shortener. (Edit: The one I linked previously is no longer active.)

Use it to create a link, then press and hold on the link to open a drop down and create a bookmark from that. Then, you can press and hold that bookmark and click "Add Page Shortcut".

Now that I did this, I think another solution would be to bookmark the wrong URL and then just edit the bookmark and repeat the "Add Page Shortcut" action above.

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    easyhyperlinks.com seems to be down. But it should work with any link shortener. Just make sure to access and add the link to the home screen before saving the shortened URL.
    – Ralf
    Commented Oct 21, 2019 at 12:36
  • This answer was the only method that allowed me to create an Android desktop icon that opened up Google Chrome on outlook.office365.com/mail link. I used the tiny URL shortener in order to do this as otherwise Outlook .com blocks the Google Chrome browser from showing the Add to Home screen menu entry. Placing the phone in airplane mode is a requirement. My current phone is a Samsung Galaxy Note 10 lite, unrooted.
    – bgoodr
    Commented Jan 14, 2023 at 19:03
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Unfortunately I know of no way to edit an Android Homepage/Desktop Web shortcut. And neither do any of the people who provided answers.

The easiest and fastest way to achieve what you want is to delete the original shortcut, and create a new one the way you did before.

If you need more specific instrunctions:

  • Long-Press the current shortcut
  • Tap Delete
  • Open Chrome
  • Go to the webpage you want a shortcut to
  • Tap the three-dot menu
  • Tap "Add to Homescreen"

Then you can drag it to wherever you want it. No need to for Airplane Mode, or anything else.

Pretty simple. Very straightforward.

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  • This doesn't help the case when the final URL is a result of redirection, while the user wants to link to the source URL, which is what this question asks.
    – Andrew T. ♦
    Commented Oct 2 at 14:58

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