https://www.google.com/search
After LinkCleanhttps://www.google.com/search?q=link+cleaner&ie=UTF-8
gs_lcrp
What is gs_lcrp?
Where gs_lcrp comes from
Most of the tail on a Google search URL is added by Google's page. This one is added by the browser. Chromium's source describes it directly: when you pick or type a search in the address bar, Chrome fills in a message it calls SearchboxStats, serialises it, Base64-encodes it, and reports it as the gs_lcrp parameter of the search URL. The source says it is reported for logging purposes, and only to a search provider reached over HTTPS.
It sits beside an older parameter with the same job, aqs, and usually next to sourceid=chrome and oq= — what you had typed before choosing a suggestion.
What it says about you
The message is about the interaction, not the query: it records how the search box was used on the way to this search. The exact fields are not listed in any user-facing document, and the encoded value can run past a hundred characters.
In 2025 the Brave browser project filed it as a privacy problem inherited from Chromium, on the grounds that every address-bar search to Google was carrying an encoded tracking value that Safari's searches do not.
Why it shows up in a link you copy
Because it is in the address bar. Search from Chrome's address bar, copy the results URL to send to someone, and gs_lcrp goes with it — along with rlz, which says how your copy of Chrome was installed. Searches started from google.com's own search box carry a sibling, gs_lp, instead.
How LinkClean removes it
Default-on, and scoped to Google's search domains (google.com and the main country domains). The same letters on any other site are left alone, and q=, tbm=, udm= and hl= — the parts that decide what the search shows — are never touched.
gs_lp, aqs, oq and sourceid are removed by the same scoped rule set.
Frequently asked
Is gs_lcrp added by Google or by my browser?
By the browser. Chrome and other Chromium-based browsers build it when you search from the address bar. A search typed into google.com's own box does not carry it.
What is the difference between gs_lcrp and aqs?
Both report address-bar search statistics from Chrome. aqs is the older text format; gs_lcrp carries the same kind of data as an encoded message. A URL can contain either or both.
Does removing gs_lcrp change the results?
No. It is a logging value. The search is q=.
Why is ie=UTF-8 left in the cleaned link?
Because it is not tracking. It declares the character encoding of the query, so LinkClean leaves it alone.
Clean tracking on iPhone, in one tap.
LinkClean strips 250+ 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.
