What Is a 301 Redirect? + How They Affect SEO

What Is a 301 Redirect?

A 301 redirect is an HTTP presumption codification that sends users from the requested URL to a antithetic URL and signals to hunt engines that the determination is permanent.

If /old-page/ has a 301 redirect to /replacement-page/, past anyone who attempts to sojourn /old-page/ automatically ends up connected /replacement-page/.

The official name for the HTTP 301 presumption codification is 301 Moved Permanently.

Why Are 301 Redirects Important successful SEO?

301 redirects are important successful SEO due to the fact that they assistance your tract support its hunt visibility by transferring hunt motor rankings and ranking signals from aged pages to replacement pages.

Importantly, 301s transportation PageRank.

PageRank is simply a strategy Google uses to measurement a webpage’s value based chiefly connected its backlinks (links it gets from different websites). 

These backlinks supply varying levels of value, known arsenic nexus equity.

When a 301 redirect is successful place, Google tin reassign nexus equity to the replacement page. Which tin assistance the replacement leafage execute amended successful hunt results.

301 redirects besides guarantee users scope the close pages alternatively of breached oregon suboptimal pages.

This means users are much apt to prosecute positively with your site—which is bully for SEO and selling successful general.

Use Cases for 301 Redirects

These are the astir communal usage cases for 301 redirects:

Deleting a Page That Has a Replacement

When you delete a page, you tin adhd a 301 redirect from the deleted leafage to a replacement leafage to perchance walk connected rankings and traffic.

But you should lone redirect to an equivalent oregon near-equivalent leafage that’s apt to fulfill the aforesaid needs arsenic the unwanted page. 

For example, you tin sphere rankings and postulation by adding 301 redirects from:

• Discontinued merchandise pages to replacement merchandise pages
• Old blog posts to caller blog posts connected akin topics
• Niche work accusation pages to broader work accusation pages

Don’t adhd a 301 redirect to an irrelevant leafage (e.g., from an aged blog station to your homepage). Because these kinds of redirects tin confuse users and hunt engines.

If you privation to delete a leafage that has nary bully replacement, you should mostly usage the 404 Page Not Found error. To amusement users and hunt engines that the leafage is nary longer available.

Semrush’s 404 mistake leafage looks similar this:

Migrating Your Site to a New Domain

Implementing 301 redirects is an important portion of immoderate website migration task (e.g., if you’re switching to a caller domain sanction arsenic portion of a rebrand).

• If you’re keeping the aforesaid website structure connected your caller domain, you tin instrumentality a wide redirect to nonstop visitors from the aged domain to the corresponding way connected the caller domain
• If you’re changing your website structure, you’ll request to make a redirect representation that matches up each aged URL with its replacement URL

Changing URL Slugs

If you alteration a URL slug (unique leafage identifier), adhd a 301 redirect from the aged URL to the caller URL. 

For example, you mightiness privation to hole a typo successful the URL slug. Like this:

• Redirect from: https://www.semrush.com/blog/031-redirect/
• Redirect to: https://www.semrush.com/blog/301-redirect/

Or marque your URL slugs shorter and much descriptive. Like this:

• Redirect from: https://www.semrush.com/blog/h25j-kb3t2b2t-po9/
• Redirect to: https://www.semrush.com/blog/301-redirects/

Moving a Page to Different URL Path

If you determination a leafage to a antithetic URL path, adhd a 301 redirect from the aged URL to the caller URL.

For example, if you present a caller merchandise class and determination existing products to this category, you mightiness acceptable up redirects similar this:

• Old URL: https://www.example.com/old-category-name/product-name
• New URL: https://www.example.com/new-category-name/product-name

Consolidating Duplicate oregon Similar Pages

You tin usage 301 redirects to consolidate duplicate oregon akin pages connected your website.

This allows you to forestall disorder for users and hunt engines, harvester the ranking powerfulness of aggregate pages, and streamline website maintenance.

Duplicate pages are mostly caused by:

• WWW and non-WWW URLs (e.g., www.example.com and example.com)
• HTTP and HTTPS URLs (e.g., http://www.example.com and https://www.example.com)
• Trailing slash and non-trailing slash URLs (e.g., example.com/ and example.com)
• Case sensitivity (e.g., example.com/blog/ and example.com/Blog/)
• Session IDs oregon parameters (e.g., example.com/page?sid=123 and example.com/page)
• Index files (e.g., example.com/page and example.com/page/index.html)
• Multiple paths to the aforesaid leafage (e.g., example.com/page and example.com/category/page)

It’s besides astute to consolidate pages that service precise akin purposes for users.

Let’s accidental Semrush has 3 blog posts astir imperishable 301 redirects. We could harvester these posts into a single, broad usher and adhd 301 redirects pointing from the aged URLs to the caller URL accordingly.

To find pages that mightiness beryllium worthy consolidating, usage Semrush’s Position Tracking tool.

The “Cannibalization” study shows which pages connected your tract person overlapping keyword rankings. This suggests that the pages are akin and could beryllium competing with each different for hunt visibility. (An contented known arsenic keyword cannibalization.)

If you find pages with precise akin purposes, see combining them.

How to Do a 301 Redirect

To bash a 301 redirect, you request to usage the redirect settings successful your website editor, usage a suitable website plugin, oregon get a web developer’s help.

For example, WordPress admins tin usage the redirects manager successful the Yoast SEO plugin. Simply take the “301 Moved Permanently” option, adhd your aged URL and replacement URL, past click “Add Redirect.”

Here are basal 301 URL redirect instructions for immoderate different contented absorption systems: 

• Adobe Commerce: Go to “Marketing” > “SEO & Search” > “URL Rewrites” to usage the custom URL rewrites feature. You tin besides set up automatic redirects to grip merchandise oregon class URL changes.
• Drupal: Install and usage the Redirect module
• HubSpot: Go to “Settings” > “Content” > “Domains & URLs” > “URL Redirects” to usage the URL redirects tool
• Joomla: Install and usage 1 of these URL redirection plugins
• Shopify: Go to “Content” > “Menus” > “View URL Redirects” > “Create URL redirect” to usage the built-in URL redirect feature
• Squarespace: Open the developer tools sheet and click “URL mappings” to usage the URL mappings feature
• Webflow: Go to “Site settings” > “Publishing” > “301 redirects” to usage the built-in redirect feature
• Wix: Go to your SEO Dashboard > “Tools and settings” > “URL Redirect Manager” to usage the URL Redirect Manager
• WordPress: Install and usage a redirects plugin from the WordPress directory

If you request to acceptable up 301 redirects successful bulk, it’s usually champion to get a web developer’s help.

Best Practices for 301 Redirects

Follow these champion practices to guarantee your 301 redirects enactment decently and enactment your SEO goals:

Update Links that Point to Redirected URLs

Wherever possible, update links that constituent to a redirected URL truthful they constituent straight to the replacement URL instead.

For example, if /old-page/ redirects to /replacement-page/, find links that spell to /old-page/ and alteration those links to /replacement-page/. 

Avoiding unnecessary nexus redirects can:

• Reduce load times
• Improve crawl ratio (i.e., assistance hunt engines research your site)
• Prevent redirect chains (i.e., redirects upon redirects, which tin confuse crawlers)
• Avoid imaginable disorder for users

Update each your internal links (links connected your ain website). And immoderate different links you control, specified arsenic those successful your societal media profiles and directory listings.

Also, cheque that the links inactive marque consciousness aft they’re updated.

Remove Redirecting URLs from Your XML Sitemap

Remove redirecting URLs from your XML sitemap to guarantee you’re sending wide signals to hunt engines.

The XML sitemap should lone see URLs you privation to amusement successful hunt results. Because hunt engines usage the record to assistance determine which pages to crawl and index.

You mightiness besides request to adhd your replacement URLs to your XML sitemap.

Only Redirect to Canonical URLs

You should lone redirect to a canonical URL—i.e., the superior code for a webpage.

Search engines take a canonical URL and disregard immoderate alternate URLs to prevention processing clip and debar duplication successful hunt results.

For example, if your blog is disposable via https://example.com/blog/ and https://blog.example.com/, Google volition effort to prime 1 URL arsenic the canonical mentation that volition amusement successful hunt results. And you should absorption your SEO efforts connected this version.

In practice, this means you should not redirect to a URL that:

• Has a canonical tag pointing to different URL
• Has a 301 redirect to different URL

If you redirect to a leafage that has a 301 redirect successful place, you hazard creating a redirect concatenation that slows users and hunt engines down. Or creating an infinite redirect loop.

• Redirect concatenation example: Page A > Page B > Page C
• Redirect loop example: Page A > Page B > Page A > […]

Semrush’s Site Audit instrumentality makes it casual to find 301-related issues connected your website.

Use the instrumentality to:

• Monitor the 301 redirects, canonical tags, and impermanent redirects connected your website
• Find interior links that constituent to redirected oregon breached URLs
• Identify duplicate contented issues
• Check for overly agelong URLs that whitethorn request updating
• Ensure your website prioritizes HTTPS implicit HTTP
• Look for redirect chains and loops

The Site Audit instrumentality besides checks for dozens of different SEO issues and provides proposal connected however and wherefore to hole each one. To assistance you amended your hunt motor rankings.