A free redirect manager, with a 404 monitor built in.

Why redirects matter

Every URL on your site is an address that other things depend on. Search engines have it in their index. Other sites link to it. Visitors have it bookmarked, shared in messages or saved in old emails. When the URL changes or the page is removed, all of those references break, unless a redirect tells browsers and search engines where the content went.

Without redirects, a redesign, a new category structure or a single renamed post can quietly turn valuable links into dead ends. With them, visitors land on the right page and search engines transfer what they know about the old URL to the new one. That’s why a redirect manager is one of the most useful tools in any SEO plugin, and why Rilea SEO includes a full one for free.

Choosing the right status code

A redirect is a response that tells the browser to go somewhere else, with a status code that says why. Rilea SEO supports six:

• 301 Moved Permanently. The page has moved for good. This is the right choice almost every time you change a URL. Search engines replace the old URL with the new one in their index.
• 302 Found. The page has moved temporarily, such as during maintenance or a short campaign. Search engines keep the original URL indexed.
• 307 Temporary Redirect. Like 302, but the browser must repeat the request in the same way, which matters for forms and other non-GET requests.
• 308 Permanent Redirect. Like 301, with the same strictness as 307.
• 410 Gone. The page has been removed deliberately and isn’t coming back. Search engines drop it from the index more quickly than a 404.
• 451 Unavailable For Legal Reasons. The page has been removed because of a legal demand.

If in doubt, use 301 for moved content and 410 for content you’ve removed on purpose with no replacement.

Matching URLs

Most redirects match one old URL to one new URL. Sometimes you need to move a whole group at once, such as every post in a renamed category or every page under an old folder. Rilea SEO offers five ways to match:

• Exact. The request must match the source URL exactly. Use this for single pages.
• Contains. Any URL that includes the text you enter.
• Starts with. Any URL that begins with the text, such as everything under /old-blog/.
• Ends with. Any URL that ends with the text, such as a file extension.
• Regex. A regular expression, for patterns the other options can’t express. Capture groups such as $1 let you carry part of the old URL into the new one, so /2019/05/my-post/ can become /blog/my-post/ with a single rule.

Start with exact matches, and only use patterns or regex when you need to move many URLs that follow a clear structure. Test a few URLs after adding a pattern rule, because a pattern that’s too broad can redirect pages you meant to keep.

Automatic redirects when URLs change

The most common cause of broken links is a simple edit: someone improves a post’s slug, or moves a page under a different parent. Rilea SEO watches for this. When the URL of a published post or page changes, it creates a 301 from the old address to the new one automatically. You don’t need to remember, and the redirect appears in your list like any other, so you can see it and remove it if you ever need to.

Rilea SEO can also redirect attachment pages, the thin pages WordPress creates for each uploaded image, to the post or file they belong to. That keeps search engines focused on your real content.

The 404 monitor

Redirects fix the problems you know about. The 404 monitor finds the ones you don’t. When it’s turned on, Rilea SEO logs requests for URLs that don’t exist, with how many times each was requested and when.

Not every 404 needs fixing. Bots probe for common file names, people mistype URLs, and some old pages genuinely have no replacement. Focus on the 404s that get repeated hits, especially from real visitors, and on URLs that look like content you’ve moved. For each one, the monitor offers a one-click option to create a redirect. You can limit how many 404 entries are kept, so the log doesn’t grow forever.

There’s also an option to send every 404 to the homepage. It’s off by default and it’s not recommended. Redirecting unrelated missing pages to the homepage confuses visitors, and search engines usually treat it as a soft 404 anyway, so it hides problems rather than fixing them.

Managing redirects at scale

On a growing site, the redirect list can reach hundreds or thousands of rules. Rilea SEO keeps it manageable:

• Hit counter. Every rule shows how often it’s been used, so you can see which redirects still matter and which are no longer needed.
• CSV import and export. Move redirects between sites, back them up, or prepare a large set in a spreadsheet during a migration and import it in one go.
• Bulk actions. Work on several rules at once instead of one by one.
• Import from other plugins. When you switch from Yoast SEO or Rank Math, the importer brings the redirects those plugins created into Rilea SEO.
• Per-post redirects. For a single page, you can set a redirect directly in its Rilea SEO panel without opening the redirect manager.

Redirects during a site migration

Redesigns, platform moves and domain changes are when redirects matter most. A careful process:

1. List every URL before you start. Export your current sitemap and, if you can, a list of pages that receive traffic or links.
2. Map old URLs to new ones. Each important old URL should point to the closest equivalent new page, not to the homepage.
3. Prepare the redirects in a spreadsheet, then import them as CSV once the new site is ready.
4. Test a sample of old URLs in a browser after launch, including some with query strings and trailing slashes.
5. Watch the 404 monitor closely for the first few weeks, and add redirects for anything you missed.
6. Update internal links to point straight to the new URLs, so visitors and crawlers don’t go through redirects unnecessarily.

Common mistakes

• Redirect chains. A redirects to B, which redirects to C. Each hop slows the page and weakens the signal. When you move a page again, update older redirects to point to the final destination.
• Redirect loops. A redirects to B and B redirects back to A. The page never loads. Test new rules, especially patterns.
• Redirecting everything to the homepage. Visitors looking for a specific page don’t want the homepage, and search engines often ignore these redirects.
• Using 302 for permanent moves. Search engines may keep the old URL indexed. Use 301 or 308 when the move is permanent.
• Leaving internal links on old URLs. Redirects work, but linking directly to the current URL is faster and cleaner.

Redirects on Shopify

On Shopify, changing a product or collection handle in Rilea SEO’s editor makes Shopify create a native 301 from the old URL automatically. Shopify also has its own URL redirect tool in the admin for other changes. A full redirect manager and 404 monitor inside Rilea SEO for Shopify are the next features being built, and they’ll be free like the rest of the app.

Setting it up

1. Go to Rilea SEO, then Settings, then Redirects & 404.
2. Make sure the redirect manager is turned on, along with automatic 301s when a published URL changes.
3. Turn on 404 logging and set a sensible limit for how many entries to keep.
4. Leave “redirect all 404s to the homepage” off.
5. Open Rilea SEO, then Redirects, to add your first rules, and Rilea SEO, then 404 Monitor, to see missing URLs as they’re logged.

If you’re moving from Yoast SEO or Rank Math, run the importer first, so your existing redirects are already in the list when you open it. After that, the redirect manager mostly runs itself: automatic 301s cover routine URL changes, and a monthly look at the 404 monitor catches the rest.

What a redirect passes on

When a page moves with a 301, search engines treat the new URL as the replacement for the old one. Over time they update their index, and the links pointing at the old URL count toward the new one. That’s why redirecting to the closest equivalent page matters: a redirect from an old guide to a newer guide on the same topic keeps that value where it’s relevant, while a redirect to an unrelated page or the homepage usually doesn’t.

It can take search engines a while to process a large number of redirects, so don’t be surprised if old URLs keep appearing in search results for a few weeks after a migration. Keep the redirects in place for the long term. Removing them after a few months brings the broken links back.

When not to redirect

Not every missing page needs a redirect. If a page has been removed and there’s no equivalent, a 404 or 410 is the honest answer, and search engines will drop it from the index. Use 410 when you want that to happen sooner. Redirecting a deleted product to a loosely related one, or to a category page, can frustrate visitors who were looking for something specific. Redirect when there’s a real replacement; otherwise let the page go. If the old page had valuable links pointing to it, it’s worth asking whether you should publish a genuine replacement rather than leave the topic uncovered.