Soft 404
A soft 404 is a page that returns a 200 (“OK”) status but is actually an error or has no content — such as “Product not found”, an empty category, or everything redirected to the homepage. Google detects these pages and treats them as 404s. It's better to return a real error status from the start.
How soft 404s happen
- the server shows an error page but with 200 instead of 404,
- a category with no products and no description,
- internal search with no results reachable at an indexable URL,
- removed pages redirected to the homepage,
- a page whose content loads only through JavaScript, so the crawler sees an empty template.
How to fix it
| Situation | Right response |
|---|---|
| the page is gone for good | 404 or 410 |
| there's an equivalent | 301 to the equivalent, not the homepage |
| the page should stay | add content |
| an empty technical page | noindex or 404 |
How to check
Enter a URL that definitely doesn't exist on your site in the redirect checker. A correct setup returns 404. If you get 200 or a redirect to the homepage, your site produces soft 404s. More on the report: Soft 404 in Search Console.
Frequently asked questions
Do soft 404s hurt SEO?
Indirectly, yes: Google wastes crawl effort on pages without content, and important pages may be crawled less often. Soft 404s themselves don't get indexed.
How do I spot soft 404s on my site?
Search Console's Pages report has a separate “Soft 404” status. You can also check whether your site's error page returns 404 — enter a non-existent URL in the redirect checker.
How should I handle a product that's gone?
If it's coming back, keep the page with information and similar products. If not, 301-redirect to the category or a successor, and if there's no equivalent, return 404 or 410.
Updated: 2026-10-20