• majorAlexa

        See all notifications

        Skip to content
        Moz logo Menu open Menu close
        • Products
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Pro Home
          • Moz Local
          • Moz Local Home
          • STAT
          • Moz API
          • Moz API Home
          • Compare SEO Products
          • Moz Data
        • Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Analysis
          • Keyword Explorer
          • Link Explorer
          • Competitive Research
          • MozBar
          • More Free SEO Tools
        • Learn SEO
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO
          • SEO Learning Center
          • Moz Academy
          • MozCon
          • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
        • Blog
        • Why Moz
          • Digital Marketers
          • Agency Solutions
          • Enterprise Solutions
          • Small Business Solutions
          • The Moz Story
          • New Releases
        • Log in
        • Log out
        • Products
          • Moz Pro

            Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

          • Moz Local

            Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

          • STAT

            SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

          • Moz API

            Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

          • Compare SEO Products

            See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

          • Moz Data

            Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

          Let your business shine with Listings AI
          Moz Local

          Let your business shine with Listings AI

          Learn more
        • Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Analysis

            Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

          • Keyword Explorer

            Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

          • Link Explorer

            Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

          • Competitive Research

            Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

          • MozBar

            See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

          • More Free SEO Tools

            Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

          NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
          Moz Pro

          NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

          Learn more
        • Learn SEO
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO

            The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

          • SEO Learning Center

            Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

          • On-Demand Webinars

            Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

          • How-To Guides

            Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

          • Moz Academy

            Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

          • MozCon

            Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

          Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
          Moz API

          Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

          Find your plan
        • Blog
        • Why Moz
          • Digital Marketers

            Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

          • Small Business Solutions

            Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

          • Agency Solutions

            Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

          • Enterprise Solutions

            Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

          • The Moz Story

            Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

          • New Releases

            Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

          Surface actionable competitive intel
          New Feature

          Surface actionable competitive intel

          Learn More
        • Log in
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Local
          • Moz Local Dashboard
          • Moz API
          • Moz API Dashboard
          • Moz Academy
        • Avatar
          • Moz Home
          • Notifications
          • Account & Billing
          • Manage Users
          • Community Profile
          • My Q&A
          • My Videos
          • Log Out

        The Moz Q&A Forum

        • Forum
        • Questions
        • My Q&A
        • Users
        • Ask the Community

        Welcome to the Q&A Forum

        Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

        1. Home
        2. SEO Tactics
        3. On-Page Optimization
        4. Will changing a URL negatively affect ranking?

        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.

        Will changing a URL negatively affect ranking?

        On-Page Optimization
        6
        6
        22347
        Loading More Posts
        • Watching

          Notify me of new replies.
          Show question in unread.

        • Not Watching

          Do not notify me of new replies.
          Show question in unread if category is not ignored.

        • Ignoring

          Do not notify me of new replies.
          Do not show question in unread.

        • Oldest to Newest
        • Newest to Oldest
        • Most Votes
        Reply
        • Reply as question
        Locked
        This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
        • Substance-create
          Substance-create last edited by

          Hello Mozzers,

          We would like to change the URL for a page on our website which ranks well for some our keyphrases/words. We are hoping the change of URL, through the addition of an additional keyword would help boost the rank of that URL further. At the moment out page gets 2 x A and 2 x B 1xF on the MOZ page rank tool using 5 keyphrase/word variations . One phrase ranks 4, one ranks 3 and the other 3 are 'not in the top 50'

          Our plan was to change the URL, using SHF404, and use 'Fetch' in the Google search console to re-submit the page to Google.

          Appreciate you can't give any guarantees how Google will behave, just wondered what your thoughts were on the wisdom of changing the URL in the first place?

          Thanks

          Ian

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • kiingugo
            kiingugo last edited by

            i did this without a proper 301 redirect... it affected me badly..  pages where i rank the posts really dropped..  you'll need to do a proper 301 redirect... rankings would drop a little bit . but it would  boost up late on  . .

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • KDeaver
              KDeaver Subscriber @LoganRay last edited by

              Where did you get the 15% number? Just hoping to cite it. Thanks!

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
              • OlegKorneitchouk
                OlegKorneitchouk @EGOL last edited by

                Agreed with one note... its a really bad idea if you are already ranking for the terms you like to. There will definitely be a period of time where you will lose your rankings and although they should return to their previous rankings, Google is fickle.

                So if you aren't ranking in the top 50 for several terms, simply changing the URL won't get you to the first page (it may get you into the top 50 though). You would need to update the content and backlinks (internal + external) to see worthwhile movement. Otherwise you just risk losing ranking for the terms you currently do well for.

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                • EGOL
                  EGOL @LoganRay last edited by

                  It's a bad idea to monkey with your URLs, a really bad idea... but if you can't help yourself, do it immediately, because the longer you wait the more you will probably lose as that page accumulates authority.

                  OlegKorneitchouk 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                  • LoganRay
                    LoganRay last edited by

                    Hi,

                    According to this article, John Mueller says Google doesn't weigh URLs that heavily when determining rank. I always advise against changing URLs unless it's absolutely necessary, as you'll lose about 15% of the page's current PR when you redirect it.

                    This article also directly says to not change URLs for SEO purposes: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-urls-seo-17889.html

                    EGOL KDeaver 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 3
                    • 1 / 1
                    • First post
                      Last post

                    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.

                    • See all categories

                    Related Questions

                    • DigitalProgress

                      Should I Change My Blog Permalinks to Remove The Date

                      page url

                      Hi All Thank you in advance for any help. Last year a website was moved to multisite and the permalinks for the blog posts were changed to include a category, the year, the month and day. As a result most of the page URL's are flagged as too long. A number of the pages are receiving good traffic, so my question is whether just to leave them as they are or to change the permalinks? My gut feeling is to take the short term hit and change the permalinks, but I thought I'd take the advice of the forum before doing so. Many Thanks

                      On-Page Optimization | | DigitalProgress
                      2
                    • williamhuynh

                      Query for paginated URLs - Shopify

                      Hi there, /collections/living-room-furniture?page=2
                      /collections/living-room-furniture?page=3
                      /collections/living-room-furniture?page=4 Is that ok to make all the above paginated URLs canonicalised with their main category /collections/living-room-furniture Also, does it needs to be noindex, follow as well? Please advice, thank you!

                      On-Page Optimization | | williamhuynh
                      1
                    • brianflannery

                      Stolen Content reposted on other sites. How does this affect ranking?

                      Visitors often copy and paste my content and post it elsewhere... on Facebook, on Tumblr, on forums and sometimes on competing websites... but they don't link to me. How does Google treat this duplicated content? What is the best way to handle it? File DCMA claims or ask them for a link?

                      On-Page Optimization | | brianflannery
                      0
                    • SamCUK

                      Should I redirect mobile traffic to a different url? Will it hurt SEO?

                      I'm working on a site that has lots of great content and ranks well but essentially the money is generated by affiliate links. I don't have a mobile version of the site but the company I'm affiliated with does offer a mobile redirect to their domain. Will redirecting mobile traffic to a different url hurt my SEO? I think the user will get a better experience by landing on a mobile page but I don't know if google will see it like that. Any thoughts?

                      On-Page Optimization | | SamCUK
                      0
                    • cmp101

                      Does css float affect SEO?

                      It is generally believed that the closer the content is to the top of the page, the better it is for SEO.  If that's incorrect, please let me know. I have a 2 column site where the left menu is navigation and right side is content.  Obviously, the left menu appears in the code before the content does, but I can flip them around via css float.  If I do that, the content will appear on the left visually, even though in the code it still comes after the left side navigation. Do either positions affect seo?

                      On-Page Optimization | | cmp101
                      0
                    • jampaper

                      How do I PERMANENTLY change an incorrect URL link with one of my keywords?

                      Hello, I received an “F” grade on my on-page report for one of my keywords. I noticed that the URL linked with that keyword was wrong. After changing it to the correct URL, I received an “A.” However, the change was not permanent. How do I permanently change the URL? I don’t see any “Save Changes” or “Apply Changes” button anywhere. Thank you!

                      On-Page Optimization | | jampaper
                      0
                    • OMGPyrmont

                      Disclaimer in footer - is it affecting my SEO?

                      For legal reasons I am required to include a 266 word disclaimer in the footer of every page of my credit card comparison site creditcards.com.au. My question is in 2 parts: is this indexable content likely to be hurting my SEO? if so, what is the best way to include the text in the footer but prevent search engines from indexing it? Thanks.

                      On-Page Optimization | | OMGPyrmont
                      0
                    • Aftermath_SEO

                      I have two pages ranking for the same keyword.

                      The index page and the targeted landing page for that keyword. They have different content, title, meta but I am competing with myself for the main keyword in the industry. What is the best way to fix this? 301 the keyword page to the index page?

                      On-Page Optimization | | Aftermath_SEO
                      0

                    Get started with Moz Pro!

                    Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                    Start my free trial
                    Products
                    • Moz Pro
                    • Moz Local
                    • Moz API
                    • Moz Data
                    • STAT
                    • Product Updates
                    Moz Solutions
                    • SMB Solutions
                    • Agency Solutions
                    • Enterprise Solutions
                    • Digital Marketers
                    Free SEO Tools
                    • Domain Authority Checker
                    • Link Explorer
                    • Keyword Explorer
                    • Competitive Research
                    • Brand Authority Checker
                    • Local Citation Checker
                    • MozBar Extension
                    • MozCast
                    Resources
                    • Blog
                    • SEO Learning Center
                    • Help Hub
                    • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                    • How-to Guides
                    • Moz Academy
                    • API Docs
                    About Moz
                    • About
                    • Team
                    • Careers
                    • Contact
                    Why Moz
                    • Case Studies
                    • Testimonials
                    Get Involved
                    • Become an Affiliate
                    • MozCon
                    • Webinars
                    • Practical Marketer Series
                    • MozPod
                    Connect with us

                    Contact the Help team

                    Join our newsletter
                    Moz logo
                    © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                    • Accessibility
                    • Terms of Use
                    • Privacy

                    Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.