SEO Redirects: The Complete Guide to 301, 302, 307 and 308

Every site changes URLs: a product is renamed, a blog is restructured, the whole domain moves to HTTPS or to a new brand. Without SEO redirects, each change leaves behind a dead page, lost backlinks and visitors who land on an error. With the right redirect, Google moves the old URL's signals to the new one and users never notice. Google's documentation on redirects and Google Search sets the rules; this guide turns them into decisions you can apply page by page.

What is a redirect in SEO?

A redirect is an instruction that a URL now lives somewhere else. When a browser or a crawler requests the old address, the server answers with a 3xx status code and a Location header that points to the new address, and the client follows it. For search engines, the redirect also says something about indexing: whether the new URL should replace the old one in the results, or whether the move is temporary.

Redirects are the standard tool for moving a domain, merging duplicate pages, switching from HTTP to HTTPS, changing a URL structure or replacing a removed page with a close equivalent. They work hand in hand with the canonical tag, which names a preferred URL without sending visitors anywhere.

Which types of redirects exist?

Google sorts redirects into two families. Permanent redirects tell its indexing pipeline that the target should become canonical; temporary redirects do not, so the old URL may stay in the results.

Google recommends a permanent server-side redirect whenever possible and says to use JavaScript redirects only when neither a server-side nor a meta refresh redirect is possible, because Google may never see a redirect that depends on rendering. Our guide to JavaScript SEO explains why rendering is not guaranteed.

Should you use a 301 or a 302 redirect?

Ask one question: will the old URL come back? If not, use a 301 redirect. A 302 used for a permanent move is the most common redirect mistake: Google may keep the old URL indexed and show it in results, while the new page waits for signals that never fully arrive. Google does correct some long-standing 302s over time, but you should not count on it.

The 307 and 308 codes exist for a technical reason. According to MDN's guide to HTTP redirections, a 301 or 302 may let browsers change a POST request into a GET, while 307 and 308 keep the method and body unchanged. For ordinary pages this makes no SEO difference; it matters for forms, checkouts and APIs.

Do redirects lose PageRank?

Not in a way you need to plan around. Google's Gary Illyes stated in 2016 that 30x redirects no longer lose PageRank. The real losses come from elsewhere: redirecting to an unrelated page, breaking a redirect after a few months, or leaving long chains that slow down crawling.

What are redirect chains and loops?

A chain happens when URL A redirects to B, which redirects to C. Chains build up over years of migrations: HTTP to HTTPS, then www to non-www, then a new URL structure. Google's crawlers follow up to 10 redirect hops, according to its documentation on HTTP status codes, but Google advises redirecting straight to the final destination and, if that is impossible, keeping chains to three hops or fewer. Each hop adds latency for users and wastes crawl budget on large sites.

A loop happens when A redirects to B and B redirects back to A. Browsers show an error, crawlers give up and the page drops out of the index. Loops usually come from conflicting rules, for example a CMS rule and a server rule that disagree on the trailing slash.

Should you redirect, return a 404 or a 410?

Not every removed page needs a redirect. Redirect only when a close equivalent exists. Google's guide to site moves with URL changes warns against redirecting many old URLs to one irrelevant destination such as the home page, which can confuse users and may be treated as a soft 404.

Google says that all 4xx errors except 429 are treated the same way, so the choice between 404 and 410 has little practical effect: in both cases a previously indexed URL is removed from the index.

How do you handle redirects during a site migration?

A migration is where redirects make or break traffic. Our complete SEO migration guide covers the full project; for redirects, five rules apply:

1. Map every URL one to one. Export all indexed URLs, pages with backlinks and pages with traffic, then assign each one its closest new equivalent.
2. Use permanent server-side redirects. 301 or 308, configured on the server or the CDN, not in JavaScript.
3. Update everything you control. Internal links, canonical tags, hreflang, XML sitemaps and structured data must point to the new URLs directly, not through redirects.
4. Keep redirects for at least a year. Google recommends keeping them as long as possible, generally at least one year, so that it can transfer signals, including links from other sites.
5. Monitor indexing. Watch the Page indexing report in Search Console; our guide to Google indexing explains how to read it.

How do you set up a redirect?

The method depends on your stack, but the result must be the same: a single 3xx response from the server.

• Apache: in the .htaccess file, a rule such as Redirect 301 /old-page https://example.com/new-page, or RewriteRule rules for patterns.
• Nginx: in the server block, location = /old-page { return 301 https://example.com/new-page; }.
• WordPress: WordPress automatically redirects some changed slugs, and a redirect plugin manages the rest from the dashboard.
• Shopify, Wix, Webflow: each has a built-in URL redirect manager in its settings, which creates permanent redirects.
• CDN or edge: Cloudflare and similar services can apply redirect rules before the request reaches your server, which is fast and useful for domain moves.

After each change, test the old URL with a redirect checker: it shows the status code of every hop and the final destination.

Why do redirects matter for AI visibility?

Old URLs live on long after you change them. Other sites, newsletters, social posts and AI answers keep pointing to the address that existed when they were written. When ChatGPT, Perplexity or Gemini cite a page and the link leads to an error, you lose the visit and the citation loses its value. A permanent redirect keeps those references working and helps search engines and AI crawlers attach the history of the old page to the new one. Our study of the pages ChatGPT cites shows how much these answers rely on stable, well-established sources.

How do you audit your redirects?

1. Crawl the site and list every internal link that points to a redirect; replace it with the final URL.
2. Find chains and loops in the crawl report and point each source straight to its final destination.
3. Check broken links with a broken link checker, especially after deleting pages.
4. Verify indexability of the destination pages with an indexability checker: a redirect to a noindex page wastes the move.
5. Review Search Console for pages reported as "Page with redirect" or soft 404, and for drops in indexing.
6. Spot-check pages as you browse with the free Sorank Chrome extension, which flags SEO issues on the page you are viewing.

Redirects are one part of technical SEO that rarely gets attention until traffic drops. A permanent, direct, relevant redirect for every moved URL keeps your rankings and your backlinks working for you. To follow the effect of a migration on clicks, positions and AI citations in one place, use Sorank's GEO and SEO dashboard.