Redirect checker
Follow every hop a URL takes, with the status code and timing for each — so you can find redirect loops, needless chains and the wrong kind of redirect.
Why redirect chains cost you
Each hop is a full round trip: DNS if the host changes, a TCP connection, a TLS handshake, and a request. Three unnecessary hops can add half a second before a single byte of content arrives, on every visit from every visitor.
The classic four-hop chain
http://example.com → https://example.com → https://www.example.com → https://www.example.com/home. Every step is individually reasonable, and together they are wasteful. Redirect straight to the final canonical URL in one hop wherever you can.
301 versus 302
A 301 is permanent: browsers cache it aggressively and search engines pass ranking signals to the target. A 302 (or 307) is temporary: the original URL keeps the ranking. Using 302 for a permanent move is one of the most common and most damaging SEO mistakes; using 301 for a temporary one is painful to undo because browsers remember it.
Loops and mixed schemes
A redirect loop — usually HTTPS redirecting to HTTP which redirects back — makes the page completely unreachable, and often appears only for users behind a proxy or CDN where the server misreads the original scheme. If your chain crosses back to http:// at any point, fix that first.
FAQ
How many redirects is too many?
One is fine, two is tolerable, three or more is worth fixing. Browsers give up somewhere around twenty, but users and crawlers lose patience long before that.
Do redirects hurt SEO?
A single 301 passes almost all ranking signal. Long chains dilute it, waste crawl budget and slow real users, which does hurt.
Why does my redirect work in the browser but not here?
Some redirects are set by JavaScript or by a meta refresh in the HTML rather than by an HTTP status. Those are invisible to a header-level check — and to some crawlers.
Related reading
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