Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
URL Rewriting Best Practices
-
Hey Moz!
I’m getting ready to implement URL rewrites on my website to improve site structure/URL readability. More specifically I want to:
- Improve our website structure by removing redundant directories.
- Replace underscores with dashes and remove file extensions for our URLs.
Please see my example below:
Old structure: http://www.widgets.com/widgets/commercial-widgets/small_blue_widget.htm
New structure: https://www.widgets.com/commercial-widgets/small-blue-widget
I've read several URL rewriting guides online, all of which seem to provide similar but overall different methods to do this. I'm looking for what's considered best practices to implement these rewrites. From what I understand, the most common method is to implement rewrites in our .htaccess file using mod_rewrite (which will find the old URLs and rewrite them according to the rewrites I implement).
One question I can't seem to find a definitive answer to is when I implement the rewrite to remove file extensions/replace underscores with dashes in our URLs, do the webpage file names need to be edited to the new format? From what I understand the webpage file names must remain the same for the rewrites in the .htaccess to work. However, our internal links (including canonical links) must be changed to the new URL format. Can anyone shed light on this?
Also, I'm aware that implementing URL rewriting improperly could negatively affect our SERP rankings. If I redirect our old website directory structure to our new structure using this rewrite, are my bases covered in regards to having the proper 301 redirects in place to not affect our rankings negatively?
Please offer any advice/reliable guides to handle this properly.
Thanks in advance!
-
Thanks for clearing that up and all of the help!
-
I'm saying rename files first and do rewrite for removing extensions.
You will have to do rewrite for replacing underscores with hyphens anyway, just for redirect purposes.
So, rename files from underscores to hyphens; do rewrite rule for underscore to hyphens to insure old pages are being redirected; do another rewrite for removing file extensions. In som time (2-3-4 months) when old file names (with underscores) are out of google index, delete first rewrite.
-
Hey Dmitrii,
I was planning on using two rewrites.
One rewrite for replacing the underscores with hyphens.
And another rewrite for removing the file extensions.
Just so I fully understand, you recommend implementing the rewrite for replacing the underscores with hyphens in our .htaccess file. Then once the new URLs are indexed, change the webpage file names themselves by replacing the underscores with hyphens, make the newly named files live and remove this rewrite from our .htaccess. Is my understanding correct?
Again...thanks for all of your help!
-
Well, I thought that's what you were going to do and use rewrite just for deleting file extensions. Honestly, I'd leave file extensions and rename files to hyphens. This way there is no server processing involved.
-
Another question just popped into my head...
Once our new website directory structure and URL format has been rewritten, redirected and indexed by search engines, would it make sense to edit the actual webpage file names (replacing the underscores w/ hyphens) and then remove the URL rewrite that replaces the underscores with the hyphens? Or is this not recommended?
-
Thanks for the help Dmitrii!
Both the rewrite I posted above and yours for removing file extensions failed to work. However, it seems this one does the trick (taken from the Apache help forums).
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^[A-Z]{3,}\s([^.]+).htm [NC,OR]
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^[A-Z]{3,}\s([^.]+).php [NC]
RewriteRule ^ %1 [R,L] -
Yes, I believe so, that's the only rewrite you'd need not to mess up rankings.
I don't know if one of codes is better than another. All I know that my piece of code is working and i haven't used the one you wrote. It seems ok to me, but just test it. If it works, I don't think there is any difference.
-
Hey Dmitrii,
This rewrite that I posted above...
RewriteRule ^old/(.*)$ /new/$1 [L,R=301]
...isn't intended to remove the file extensions. I'm using it to redirect the old directory structure to our new directory structure.
I was asking if using this rewrite when changing my directory structure will be all I need in regards to having all the necessary redirects in place to not negatively affect our SEO/SERP rankings. Any idea?
Also, would you recommend the rewrite you provided above over the one below when removing file extensions?
RewriteBase /
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME}.html -f
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ $1.htmlLet me know if I'm being clear enough
Thanks!
-
the rule you wrote wont work.
What it will do is redirect this: _domain.com/old/small_blue_widget.htm _to this: domain.com/new/small_blue_widget.htm
To remove the extension would be:
<code>RewriteRule ^([^\.]+)$ $1.htm [NC,L]</code>
-
Thanks for the response Dmitrii!
Thanks for for confirming that I don't need to update the webpage file names.
Do you know if redirecting the old directories to the new ones (using the the rewrite below) is all I need to do regarding redirects? In other words, when redirecting directories using the rewrite below is there any need to redirect the old URL format (small_blue_widget.htm) to the new (small-blue-widget)? My understanding is no, all I need to do is redirect the directories; but please share your knowledge.Thanks in advance!
<code>RewriteRule ^old/(.*)$ /new/$1 [L,R=301]</code>
-
Hi there.
Well, as for best practices - you got it covered - remove/substitute underscores, remove redundant directories, make urls readable and understandable by users, implement redirects for pages, which are being renamed.
As for removing extensions from files - i'm not sure it has any effect on SEO or user experience at all. But no, you don't have to create new format pages. Basically what mod_rewrite does is when somebody requests a page, server says "I gonna server you this file with this name, because you sent me this specific request". Just be aware that there is no way to access both original url and rewritten url at the same time, since it would create duplicate issues.
As for rankings affect - as long as all redirects are done properly and urls are targeting the keywords on the page - you should be fine.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Changing Url Removes Backlink
Hello MOZ Community, I have question regarding Bad Backlink Removal. My Site's Post's Image got 4 to 5k backlinks from unknown sites and also their is no contact details on their site so that i can contact them to remove. So, I have an idea for which i want suggestion " If I change the url that receieves backlinks" does this will remove backlinks? For Example: https://example.com/test/ got 5k backlinks if I change this url to https://examplee.com/test-failed/ does this will remove those 5k backlinks? If not then How Can I remove those Backlinks? I Know about disavow but this takes time.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Jackson210 -
Is single H1 tag still best practice?
Hi Guys, Is having a single h1 tag still best practice for SEO? Guessing multiple h1 tags dilute the value of the tag and keywords within the tag. Thoughts? Cheers.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | kayl870 -
Help with facet URLs in Magento
Hi Guys, Wondering if I can get some technical help here... We have our site britishbraces.co.uk , built in Magento. As per eCommerce sites, we have paginated pages throughout. These have rel=next/prev implemented but not correctly ( as it is not in is it in ) - this fix is in process. Our canonicals are currently incorrect as far as I believe, as even when content is filtered, the canonical takes you back to the first page URL. For example, http://www.britishbraces.co.uk/braces/x-style.html?ajaxcatalog=true&brand=380&max=51.19&min=31.19 Canonical to... http://www.britishbraces.co.uk/braces/x-style.html Which I understand to be incorrect. As I want the coloured filtered pages to be indexed ( due to search volume for colour related queries ), but I don't want the price filtered pages to be indexed - I am unsure how to implement the solution? As I understand, because rel=next/prev implemented ( with no View All page ), the rel=canonical is not necessary as Google understands page 1 is the first page in the series. Therefore, once a user has filtered by colour, there should then be a canonical pointing to the coloured filter URL? ( e.g. /product/black ) But when a user filters by price, there should be noindex on those URLs ? Or can this be blocked in robots.txt prior? My head is a little confused here and I know we have an issue because our amount of indexed pages is increasing day by day but to no solution of the facet urls. Can anybody help - apologies in advance if I have confused the matter. Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | HappyJackJr0 -
Should I include URLs that are 301'd or only include 200 status URLs in my sitemap.xml?
I'm not sure if I should be including old URLs (content) that are being redirected (301) to new URLs (content) in my sitemap.xml. Does anyone know if it is best to include or leave out 301ed URLs in a xml sitemap?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Jonathan.Smith0 -
Mega Menu Navigation Best Practice
First off, I'm a landscape/nature/travel photographer. I mainly sell prints of my work. I'm in the process of redesigning my website, and I'm trying to decide whether to keep the navigation extremely simple or leave the drop-down menu for galleries. Currently, my navigation is something like this: Galleries
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | shannmg1
> Gallery for State or Country (example: California)
> Sub-region in State or Country (example: San Francisco)
Blog
Prints
About
Contact Selling prints is the top priority of the website, as that's what runs the business. I have lots of blog content, and I'm starting to build some good travel advice, etc. but in reality, the galleries, which then filter down to individual pages for each photo with a cart system, are the most important. What I'm struggling to decide is whether to leave the sort of "mega menu" for the galleries, or to do away with them, and have the user go to the overall galleries page to navigate further into the site. Leaving the mega menu intact, the galleries page becomes a lot less important, and takes out a step to get to the shopping cart. However, I'm wondering if the amount of galleries in the drop down menu is giving TOO many choices up front as well. I also wonder how changing this will affect search. Any thoughts on which is better or is it really just a matter of preference?0 -
If I own a .com url and also have the same url with .net, .info, .org, will I want to point them to the .com IP address?
I have a domain, for example, mydomain.com and I purchased mydomain.net, mydomain.info, and mydomain.org. Should I point the host @ to the IP where the .com is hosted in wpengine? I am not doing anything with the .org, .info, .net domains. I simply purchased them to prevent competitors from buying the domains.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | djlittman0 -
Strange URLs, how do I fix this?
I've just check Majestic and have seen around 50 links coming from one of my other sites. The links all look like this: http://www.dwww.mysite.com
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | JohnPeters
http://www.eee.mysite.com
http://www.w.mysite.com The site these links are coming from is a html site. Any ideas whats going on or a way to get rid of these urls? When I visit the strange URLs such as http://www.dwww.mysite.com, it shows the home page of http://www.mysite.com. Is there a way to redirect anything like this back to the home page?0 -
How To Best Close An eCommerce Site?
We're closing down one of our eCommerce sites. What is the best approach to do this? The site has a modest link profile (a young site). It does have a run of site link to the parent site. It also has a couple hundred email subscribers and established accounts. Is there a gradual way to do this? How do I treat the subscribers and account holders? The impact won't be great, but I want to minimize collateral damage as much as possible. Thanks.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AWCthreads0