Passing route control with optional parameter after root in express?

That would work depending on what client.get does when passed undefined as its first parameter.

Something like this would be safer:

app.get('/:key?', function(req, res, next) {
    var key = req.params.key;
    if (!key) {
        next();
        return;
    }
    client.get(key, function(err, reply) {
        if(client.get(reply)) {
            res.redirect(reply);
        }
        else {
            res.render('index', {
                link: null
            });
        }
    });
});

There’s no problem in calling next() inside the callback.

According to this, handlers are invoked in the order that they are added, so as long as your next route is app.get(“https://stackoverflow.com/”, …) it will be called if there is no key.