LinkCleanhttps://www.google.com/search?q=hello&hl=ja
LinkClean preserves this parameter — no change.
hl
Region & language (preserved) · Google (Search, YouTube, Maps, Translate, …) · functional — preserved
What hl actually does
hl is short for “host language” (sometimes glossed “human language”). When you visit a Google service — Search, YouTube, Maps, Translate, Image Search — the hl= parameter on the URL tells Google which language to render the interface in. hl=ja gives you Japanese UI; hl=fr gives you French; hl=en gives you English; hl=zh-CN Simplified Chinese, etc. The values are IETF BCP 47 language tags (close cousins of HTML's lang attribute).
It's the URL-equivalent of clicking the language picker in the footer of a Google page. Google sets it when you change languages, and includes it in outbound share links so the recipient sees the same UI language you did. If you don't include hl, Google falls back to your browser's Accept-Language header (or guesses from your IP region).
Where you'll see it
Most commonly: Google Search share links (https://www.google.com/search?q=…&hl=…), YouTube video URLs (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=…&hl=…), and Google Maps shares. Google's apps add it on Share; manual URL bar typing usually doesn't.
Some non-Google services also use hl as a language indicator since the convention is well-known. Wikipedia uses uselang; Wikimedia projects use lang or setlang; YouTube ALSO accepts gl (geolocation, see below).
Why it's NOT tracking
hl doesn't identify you, doesn't follow your click anywhere, and isn't tied to a cookie. It's a preference (“render this page in Japanese”) that Google passes along via the URL because some users share links across language preferences. Forwarding it doesn't leak anything about who you are.
Compare to utm_source: utm_source is marketing attribution metadata that exists only to credit a campaign — stripping it changes nothing about what the page shows the user. hl is the opposite — it shapes what the page shows. Strip it and the recipient gets whatever language Google decides for their browser, which may not be what you intended when you shared the link.
How LinkClean handles it (and the rest of the language/region family)
LinkClean preserves hl on every host. It's in the catalog's explicit exemption set — even on hosts where similar single- or two-letter parameter names (t on x.com, s on x.com) ARE trackers, hl is recognized as functional and never stripped.
Same treatment for the small family of language/region parameters that frequently come up next: gl (Google country/geolocation — picks results relevant to that country); lang and language (generic language indicators used by many sites); setlang or uselang (Wikipedia / Wikimedia projects). LinkClean documents them in the glossary because users ask, but never removes them.
Frequently asked
What does hl stand for?
“Host language” — sometimes glossed “human language”. It's a Google convention dating back to the early Google Search interface: the language the host page should render in.
Is hl personal data?
No. It's a preference (which language to render) — the same value would be sent by anyone choosing that language. It doesn't identify you, doesn't connect to a cookie, doesn't follow your click.
Does LinkClean strip hl?
No. hl is in the explicit exemption list — even on hosts where similar single- or two-letter parameter names are trackers, hl is preserved.
What's the difference between hl and gl?
hl sets the interface language (“render the page in Japanese”); gl sets the geographic region (“return results relevant to Japan”). gl can change which results come back; hl just changes the UI text around them. Both are functional, not tracking — LinkClean preserves both.
Why do Google share links have hl on them?
Google's apps add it on Share so the recipient sees the same UI language. It's a convenience for cross-language sharing — if you're showing a Japanese friend a YouTube video and the URL preserves hl=ja, they get the same Japanese UI you had.
Can I add hl manually to a Google URL?
Yes. Append ?hl=<lang> (or &hl=<lang> if other params already exist). Common values: hl=en, hl=ja, hl=fr, hl=de, hl=es, hl=zh-CN, hl=zh-TW. The full list is the IETF BCP 47 language-tag registry, but Google only renders UI for languages it supports.
Clean tracking on iPhone, in one tap.
LinkClean strips ~80 vendor-specific tracking parameters from any link, from any app's share sheet — and preserves functional ones like hl, t (YouTube timestamp), and q (search). No account, on-device.
