Redirects are essential for maintaining SEO equity when URLs change — during a site migration, a page rename, or the consolidation of duplicate content.
Key redirect types:
- 301 (Moved Permanently) — permanent move; Google transfers the majority of link equity to the destination. Use for migrations and permanent renames.
- 302 (Found / Moved Temporarily) — temporary redirect; link equity is generally not transferred. Use only for genuinely temporary moves.
- 308 (Permanent Redirect) — like 301 but preserves the HTTP method. Rarely needed for SEO purposes.
Common issues:
- Redirect chains (A → B → C): Each hop dilutes link equity and slows crawling. Collapse to single-hop redirects.
- Redirect loops (A → B → A): Cause crawlers and browsers to give up. Always fatal.
- 302 used instead of 301: Prevents equity transfer during a permanent move.
What SearchVitals checks: The Technical SEO audit logs the HTTP status of every crawled URL, detects redirect chains longer than one hop, and flags pages linking to redirect targets rather than final destination URLs.