This translation has not been editorially reviewed yet. The German version is authoritative. Deutsche Fassung →
Indexing
Why should the sitemap name the final address?
Because every sitemap entry that redirects first costs the search engine an unnecessary detour: it requests the entered address, gets a redirect, requests the target — two requests for one page. That's not an error like a dead address, but a silent drain on the fetch budget, and a sign that the list is lagging behind the actual content. Our check counts the sitemap entries that lead to a redirect.
How redirects end up in the sitemap
The most common path: an address changes — a new structure, a new name, a switch to an encrypted connection — and the redirect is set up correctly. Only the sitemap keeps the old entry, because it's generated from an outdated source, or maintained by hand. Externally, everything works, since the redirect catches every request. The detour only becomes visible where requests happen systematically: with the crawler, which has to request the same page twice.
What the check exactly measures
The check requests the addresses listed in the sitemap and counts how many respond with a redirect instead of directly with status 200. The finding is deliberately classed as mild — the pages are reachable, after all. It's still a precise maintenance list, though: every entry named can be replaced by the final address, and the detour disappears.
- Replace the entries named in the report with the redirect's respective target address.
- Switch sitemap generation to reflect the actual page content, so address changes arrive automatically.
- Do a full check of the sitemap after changes like a protocol or domain switch.
FAQ
The pages work fine, though — why change anything at all?
Nothing changes for visitors, but it does for the search engine: every detour uses up one request, and the budget per domain is limited. With a few entries, that's cosmetic; with many, it adds up at the expense of the pages that should actually be crawled.
How can I tell which address is the final one?
The address that's in the browser's address bar after every redirect has run — with the right protocol, the right domain spelling, and the final path. That's exactly the one that belongs in the sitemap and in internal links.
Is a redirect in the sitemap worse than a dead address?
The other way around: the dead address is the serious case, since the sitemap's invitation leads nowhere. The redirect is the mild variant of the same maintenance problem — both share the same cause: the list no longer reflects the actual content.