Meta's New Advice May Change How You Share Links in post Forever

Has Facebook finally confirmed what many social media managers have long suspected—that adding links directly within your posts can hinder reach, and that it’s better to place them in the first comment instead?

Well, in a way.

Over the weekend, several Page administrators noticed an interesting advisory within the Professional Dashboard’s post-specific insights. The suggestion? Avoid placing external links in the body of your post—and instead, include them in the comments.

The observation was initially shared by @cmcalgary on Threads, though numerous other users echoed the same finding—pointing to it as a definitive signal from Facebook itself: to maximize reach, URLs should be placed in the first comment rather than embedded within the main body of the post.

Intrigued, I examined the Social Media Today (SMT) Page, where all posts typically include a link—our aim being to drive traffic to full articles rather than to generate engagement within Facebook itself. And, sure enough, the same advisory appears. But there’s a critical nuance worth noting:

As you can see, the advisory here points out that while this particular post does technically include a link, it doesn’t visibly display one in the caption.

That’s because I follow a specific posting method: after composing the post, I paste in the URL to allow Facebook to generate the link preview, then immediately delete the URL text from the body of the post. So, while the preview remains, the actual link text does not appear in the caption itself.

Does this approach influence reach in the same way as including a visible link? It’s unclear. After all, posts like this don’t include a native image—they rely solely on the link preview’s thumbnail. Perhaps that’s why many high-performing publishers now opt to place URLs in the first comment, while pairing the main post with a standalone image.

That method seems increasingly validated.

Consider this: Meta’s most recent “Widely Viewed Content Report” revealed that a staggering 97.3% of all post views on Facebook (in the U.S.) go to updates that don’t contain any external links. That statistic alone signals a clear preference by the algorithm—and likely, the users themselves—for content that keeps audiences within the platform’s ecosystem.

The visibility of link posts on Facebook has been trending downward for some time—despite a modest uptick in the most recent data—suggesting that Meta’s algorithm continues to deprioritize such content. Video, by contrast, has emerged as the key beneficiary of this shift, receiving increased emphasis across the platform.

Interestingly, Meta may be reassessing that stance, as part of a broader pivot toward championing “free expression.” Threads, in particular, has publicly acknowledged efforts to boost the visibility of external links in its feed, in a bid to attract more publishers and creators to post content natively on the app.

Still, the broader data indicates only a marginal shift. Meta’s own guidance reinforces the notion that link posts typically underperform—at least relative to other content types.

So, what’s a social media manager to do?

One potential workaround involves generating the link preview as usual, then deleting the URL from the body of the post before publishing. Another increasingly popular tactic is placing the link in the first comment instead—a method that, while more time-consuming (especially for scheduled posts), may yield improved reach.

I’ve reached out to Meta for clarification on these best practices, particularly regarding whether certain link placements yield better results. I’ll update this article if and when a response is received.

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