Find and Fix Broken Links in Your Website: 10 Steps

Why Broken Links Are a Bigger Problem Than You Think

Every website accumulates broken links over time. Pages get deleted, URLs change, external sites go offline, and internal restructuring leaves old links pointing nowhere. The result is a frustrating dead end for visitors and a signal to search engines that your site is poorly maintained. If you want to find and fix broken links in the website before they silently damage your rankings and conversions, this guide walks you through exactly how to do it, step by step.

The Real Cost of Ignoring Broken Links

Before diving into the steps, it helps to understand the stakes. According to a study by Semrush (2023), websites with significant crawl errors, including broken links, rank an average of 32% lower in competitive search results compared to technically clean sites. Research from HubSpot (2022) found that 88% of online visitors are less likely to return to a website after a bad experience, and hitting a dead link is a textbook bad experience. Additionally, Ahrefs (2023) reported that over 66% of pages have at least one broken external link, meaning the majority of websites are affected without their owners knowing.

Broken links waste crawl budget, orphan content from your internal linking structure, and send link equity into a void. For ecommerce stores in particular, a broken product or category link can directly kill revenue. If your site has been penalized or is struggling to recover rankings, broken links are often a contributing factor worth addressing through proper search engine optimization services.

10 Steps to Find and Fix Broken Links in The Website

1. Start With Google Search Console’s Coverage Report

Google Search Console (GSC) is the single most authoritative free tool for identifying pages Google cannot access on your site. Log in, navigate to the “Pages” report under “Indexing,” and look specifically for the “Not Found (404)” and “Server Error (5xx)” categories. These represent URLs Google tried to crawl and hit a wall. Export the full list as a CSV so you have a working document to reference throughout your audit process.

What makes GSC uniquely valuable is that it shows you exactly which URLs are causing Google to waste crawl budget. These are not hypothetical problems. They are pages Google actively attempted to reach and failed. Cross-reference this list with your sitemap to identify whether the broken URLs were once legitimate pages that have since been deleted or restructured. GSC also shows which pages link to these broken URLs, so you can trace the problem back to its source quickly. This first step alone can surface dozens of fixable issues on most websites without spending a penny.

2. Run a Full Site Crawl With a Dedicated Tool

While GSC gives you Google’s perspective, a dedicated crawler gives you a complete map of every link on your site regardless of whether Google has tried to follow it. Tools like Screaming Frog SEO Spider, Sitebulb, or Ahrefs Site Audit are the standard choices here. Configure your crawler to check all internal and external links, and let it run on your full domain. For large sites, schedule the crawl overnight.

Once the crawl completes, filter results by HTTP status code. Focus on 404 (Not Found), 410 (Gone), 500 (Server Error), and any URLs returning a redirect chain longer than two hops. Export the broken links report and include columns for the source page, the destination URL, and the anchor text. This structured data is what you will use to prioritize your fixes in the next steps. If you manage a WordPress site, this kind of regular crawl should be part of your ongoing maintenance routine. The WooCommerce store maintenance checklist is a helpful reference for building this habit into a repeatable process.

3. Audit Internal Links Separately From External Links

Not all broken links carry the same risk. Internal broken links, those pointing from one page on your site to another page on your site, are more damaging from an SEO standpoint because they directly interrupt the flow of link equity through your own domain. External broken links, those pointing to third-party sites that no longer exist, affect user experience but do not carry the same PageRank consequences.

Separate your crawl export into two tabs: one for internal broken links and one for external. Internal fixes are almost always within your control and should be prioritized. For internal broken links, you need to either update the link to point to the correct current URL, redirect the broken destination page to a relevant replacement, or remove the link entirely if no suitable replacement exists. Understanding how your internal links affect your broader backlink strategy is also worth studying. The article on using internal links to boost backlink impact explains the connection well. External broken links require a different approach covered in a later step.

4. Prioritize Broken Links by Page Authority and Traffic

If your site has hundreds of broken links, fixing them all at once is not realistic. You need a triage system. Open your crawl export alongside data from Google Analytics or your preferred analytics platform. Identify which source pages, the pages that contain the broken links, receive the most organic traffic and have the highest authority scores.

A broken link on your homepage or a top-ranking blog post is exponentially more damaging than one buried on a low-traffic archive page. Create a priority matrix with three tiers: high-traffic pages with broken links at the top, medium-traffic pages in the middle, and low-traffic or orphaned pages at the bottom. Fix the top tier first. This approach ensures that your effort delivers the maximum SEO and user experience improvement per hour spent. It also helps you make a business case for allocating developer or editor time to the task. Connecting broken link fixes to page-level SEO improvements is also covered in the guide on boosting SEO efforts with page content analysis.

5. Implement 301 Redirects for Moved or Renamed Pages

When a page that once existed has been permanently moved to a new URL, a 301 redirect is the correct technical solution. This tells both users and search engines that the content has a new permanent home, preserving the majority of the original page’s link equity. Without a redirect, every link pointing to the old URL becomes a dead end, and any SEO value those links carried is effectively lost.

Set up 301 redirects at the server level or through your CMS. WordPress users can use plugins like Redirection or Yoast SEO Premium for straightforward redirect management. For larger or custom-built sites, redirect rules should be implemented in the .htaccess file (Apache servers) or the nginx configuration file. Always test your redirects after implementing them to confirm they resolve to the correct destination and do not create redirect chains or loops. A redirect chain occurs when URL A redirects to URL B which redirects to URL C. This wastes crawl budget and dilutes link equity. Flatten all chains so every old URL redirects directly to its final destination in a single hop. If your site has suffered a manual penalty related to link issues, structured redirect cleanup is often part of the recovery process for Google penalties.

6. Fix or Remove Broken External Links

External broken links are those where you link out to a third-party website and that destination no longer exists or has moved. These do not affect your internal PageRank flow, but they do affect user experience and signal to search engines that your content is outdated or poorly maintained. Leaving dozens of broken outbound links on an otherwise authoritative article undermines its credibility.

For each broken external link, you have three options. First, find if the destination page has moved to a new URL and update your link accordingly. Use the Wayback Machine at archive.org to check whether the original content still exists in cached form and whether the site owner has migrated to a new domain. Second, find an alternative authoritative source covering the same topic and replace the broken link with a working one. Third, if no suitable replacement exists, remove the link and restructure the sentence so it reads naturally without it. Never leave a broken external link in place simply because fixing it takes time. The maintenance cost of a poor user experience compounds over time.

7. Check Broken Links in Images, Files, and Embeds

Most people focus on text hyperlinks when auditing for broken links, but broken links in images, downloadable files, videos, and embedded iframes are equally problematic. A missing product image on an ecommerce page affects conversions directly. A broken PDF download link frustrates users who expected a resource. A failed video embed leaves an ugly blank space where engaging content should be.

Your site crawler should flag broken image sources (returning 404 status) alongside broken text links. Review the report specifically for broken media URLs. For images, re-upload missing files or update the src attribute to point to the correct file path. For downloadable assets, verify the file still exists in your media library or server storage and update the link path accordingly. For third-party embeds such as YouTube videos or external iframes, check whether the source content has been removed by the original publisher and replace it with a current equivalent. This step is particularly important for WordPress website management where media files are frequently reorganized or overwritten during theme updates and migrations.

8. Update Your XML Sitemap After Fixing Broken Links

Your XML sitemap should only contain URLs that are live, indexable, and returning a 200 OK status. After you have fixed broken links and implemented redirects, audit your sitemap to ensure it reflects the current state of your site. Many CMS platforms auto-generate sitemaps, but they do not always exclude redirected or deleted pages immediately. A sitemap that includes 301 or 404 URLs sends confusing signals to Google and wastes a portion of your crawl budget on pages that no longer exist at their listed addresses.

Generate a fresh sitemap after your cleanup effort. Submit the updated sitemap through Google Search Console under the “Sitemaps” section. Monitor the “Submitted” versus “Indexed” count in GSC in the days following submission. If Google is indexing significantly fewer pages than you submitted, investigate what is blocking those pages, which may include noindex tags, canonical issues, or lingering redirect problems. A clean sitemap is also important if you are actively building links to your site, since it helps Google discover and index the destination pages efficiently. The guide on building links safely without triggering penalties touches on why technical site health and link building need to work in parallel.

9. Set Up Ongoing Broken Link Monitoring

A one-time broken link audit is valuable, but it is not a permanent solution. New broken links will appear every time you publish content, restructure your site, or link to external resources that may eventually go offline. Building an ongoing monitoring process is the only way to stay ahead of the problem without repeating a full manual audit every few months.

Several tools support automated broken link monitoring. Ahrefs Site Audit and Semrush Site Audit both offer scheduled crawls with email alerts when new errors are detected. Google Search Console sends notifications when it encounters new crawl anomalies. For smaller sites, free tools like Dr. Link Check or Broken Link Checker (as a WordPress plugin) can provide lightweight ongoing monitoring without a paid subscription. Set your monitoring frequency based on how often you publish new content. A daily publisher needs weekly crawls at minimum. A site that publishes monthly can audit quarterly. The key is consistency, not frequency. Connect monitoring alerts to your workflow so broken links are addressed within days of discovery, not months. This habit is especially important for sites relying heavily on link equity, where maintaining link health directly supports the value of your link building investment.

10. Document Your Broken Link Fix Process for Future Audits

The final step is often skipped, but it saves enormous time in every future audit. After completing your broken link cleanup, document what you found, what you fixed, and what decisions you made. Create a simple spreadsheet or internal wiki page that records the original broken URL, the fix applied (redirect, link update, or removal), the date of the fix, and the team member responsible.

This documentation serves multiple purposes. It prevents the same broken links from being re-created accidentally, particularly in cases where pages are rebuilt or URLs are restructured again in the future. It gives new team members a reference for understanding past decisions. It also provides a baseline for future audits so you can quickly identify whether errors are new or recurring. Pair this documentation with a site change log that records every URL change, page deletion, and structural update. When broken links appear in the future, you can cross-reference the change log to identify the root cause quickly rather than re-investigating from scratch. For teams managing complex sites with ongoing content and technical work, this kind of structured process is what separates reactive damage control from proactive site health management. If you need support building this process at scale, working with an experienced SEO services provider can accelerate both the initial cleanup and the implementation of sustainable monitoring systems.

Broken Link Fix: Tool Comparison

Tool	Type	Internal Links	External Links	Cost	Best For
Google Search Console	Webmaster tool	Yes (crawl errors)	Limited	Free	All site sizes
Screaming Frog	Desktop crawler	Yes	Yes	Free up to 500 URLs, paid above	Technical SEO teams
Ahrefs Site Audit	Cloud crawler	Yes	Yes	Paid subscription	Agencies and larger sites
Semrush Site Audit	Cloud crawler	Yes	Yes	Paid subscription	All-in-one marketing teams
Broken Link Checker (WP)	WordPress plugin	Yes	Yes	Free	WordPress site owners
Dr. Link Check	Online tool	Yes	Yes	Free (limited), paid plans	Small sites and quick checks

Practical Action Plan: Prioritized by Urgency

• Do This Now: Open Google Search Console and export your 404 and crawl error report today. Identify broken links on your five highest-traffic pages and fix or redirect them within 48 hours. Every day these sit unfixed, you are losing potential ranking signals and user trust.
• Do This Now: Run a Screaming Frog crawl on your full domain and filter results by 404 status. Export the full broken links list and sort by source page authority. Begin working through the top-priority internal broken links immediately.
• Worth Doing: Audit your XML sitemap for any redirected or deleted pages and resubmit a clean version to Google Search Console. This is a moderate effort task that meaningfully improves crawl efficiency.
• Worth Doing: Set up automated monitoring through Ahrefs, Semrush, or a free plugin so you receive alerts when new broken links are detected. This prevents future accumulation without requiring repeat manual audits.
• Worth Doing: Review your top 20 blog posts for broken external links and either update or remove them. These pages likely carry the most authority and user traffic, so keeping their outbound links clean protects their credibility.
• Low Priority: Create a documentation template for recording broken link fixes and train your content team to update it after every site change. This is a process improvement that pays dividends over the long term but is not urgent for immediate SEO impact.
• Low Priority: Audit broken links in older, low-traffic archive content. These pages have limited SEO value individually, but a bulk cleanup can still improve overall site health scores in tools like Ahrefs and Semrush.

Connecting Broken Link Fixes to Your Broader SEO Strategy

Fixing broken links does not exist in isolation. It is one component of a healthy technical SEO foundation that supports all of your other ranking efforts. If you are investing in content, backlinks, or any other growth channel, a site riddled with broken links partially cancels out that investment. Link equity from external backlinks cannot flow properly through a site with broken internal linking structures. Content that earns rankings cannot retain them if key supporting links are dead.

For sites that have experienced ranking drops that cannot be fully explained by content quality or algorithm updates, broken link accumulation is worth investigating as a contributing factor. Understanding why Google may not be indexing certain pages can also shed light on deeper crawl issues connected to broken links. The guide on why Google is not indexing your page covers several scenarios where broken link structures are part of the problem. Similarly, if you are working to build your backlink profile, ensuring your site is technically clean first makes every new link you earn more effective. Resources like the guide on fixing a failed link building strategy highlight how technical site issues can undermine even well-executed link acquisition campaigns.

Conclusion

The ability to find and fix broken links in the website is a foundational skill for any site owner, SEO professional, or developer. Broken links are not a cosmetic problem. They drain link equity, frustrate users, waste crawl budget, and signal poor site maintenance to search engines. The good news is that the tools to identify them are mostly free, the fixes are logical and straightforward, and the SEO benefits of a clean link profile are measurable and lasting. Work through the ten steps in this guide systematically, prioritize by traffic and authority, and build monitoring into your regular workflow so broken links never accumulate undetected again.

Frequently Asked Questions

How often should I check for broken links on my website?

For actively updated sites, a monthly automated crawl is a reasonable minimum. Sites publishing daily content benefit from weekly monitoring. Even low-activity sites should run a full broken link audit at least quarterly, since external sites you link to can go offline at any time without warning.

Do broken external links hurt my SEO ranking directly?

Broken external links do not directly reduce your rankings in the same way broken internal links do, but they contribute to a poor user experience and signal outdated content to search engines. Consistently maintaining clean outbound links is a quality signal that supports overall site authority.

What is the difference between a 301 redirect and a 302 redirect for fixing broken links?

A 301 redirect indicates a permanent move and passes the majority of link equity to the new destination. A 302 redirect signals a temporary move and passes less or no link equity. When fixing broken links caused by permanently deleted or moved pages, always use 301 redirects unless the situation is genuinely temporary.

Can broken links cause a Google penalty?

Broken links alone are unlikely to trigger a manual penalty. However, a site with thousands of unresolved broken links may be flagged for poor site quality during a broad algorithm update, particularly if combined with thin content or other technical issues. Sites already under a penalty should address broken links as part of the recovery process.

Is it better to redirect a broken page or just remove the link?

It depends on the situation. If the broken page once had external backlinks pointing to it, a 301 redirect to a relevant replacement page is almost always better because it recovers the link equity. If the page had no backlinks and low internal traffic, removing the link cleanly is often simpler and avoids creating unnecessary redirect chains. Evaluate each case based on the page’s link profile and historical traffic before deciding.