Internal links are the unsung heroes of your website. They help visitors navigate, distribute page authority, and give search engines a clear picture of your site structure. But when these links point to URLs that then redirect elsewhere, you’re creating unnecessary complications.
The problems with redirected internal links
When you have internal links pointing to URLs that 301 redirect to another destination, you’re essentially creating a detour on your website. It’s like giving someone directions to your shop that include an unnecessary roundabout – they’ll get there eventually, but the journey takes longer and wastes resources.
Technical impact
Each redirect adds loading time to your page. While a single redirect might only add milliseconds, multiple redirects across your site compound the issue.
More critically, redirects waste your crawl budget. When Google crawls your site, it allocates a certain amount of resources to discover and index your pages. Having Googlebot navigate through redirect chains means fewer resources for your important content.
User experience concerns
Site speed affects user experience, and redirects slow things down. Users on mobile devices or slower connections will feel this impact the most.
Additionally, analytics tracking can be messy with redirects. You might see inflated bounce rates or inaccurate user journey data because of these redirect chains.
How to find redirected internal links
Most decent SEO tools will help you identify redirected internal links as part of their site audit functionality. You don’t need anything fancy – if your tool can crawl your website, it can spot these redirect issues. Here are examples using the two tools I tend to use, but similar processes work in most SEO tools.
Using SE Ranking
SE Ranking’s site audit tool makes finding redirected links straightforward:
- Run a comprehensive site audit
- Navigate to the “Issues” section
- Look for “Redirected internal links” under the warnings
The tool will show you exactly which pages contain links to redirected URLs and what the final destination is.
Using SEMRush
If you’re a SEMRush user, their site audit function works similarly:
- Set up a project for your website
- Run a site audit
- Check under “Issues” for “Internal links leading to redirects”
Fixing the problem properly
The solution is refreshingly simple – update the internal links to point directly to the final destination URL – that’s it! This eliminates the redirect chain completely, improving both technical performance and user experience.
For WordPress users, a database search and replace plugin can make this process less painful if you have numerous instances of the same redirected URL. Use it with care, or get your web developer to do it.
For larger sites, prioritise fixing redirected links on your most important pages first – your homepage, key landing pages, and high-traffic pages and posts.
This simple maintenance task delivers a disproportionate benefit relative to the effort required. It’s one of those rare SEO fixes that improves things for both search engines and users simultaneously – making it well worth prioritising in your next technical SEO sprint.
Need some help with this? Take a look at my SEO 1:1 – this is just one fix I’ve worked through on a call.
