HTTP Status Codes: A Practical Guide
Every web request returns a three-digit status code. They’re invisible to ordinary users but they decide whether search engines can index a page and whether visitors get the experience you intend.
The codes that matter most
- 200 — what every live page should return.
- 301 — permanent redirect; passes the vast majority of ranking signals.
- 302 / 307 — temporary; use only when the move is genuinely temporary.
- 308 — permanent redirect that preserves the HTTP method (POST stays POST).
- 404 — a few are normal; many on previously ranking URLs is lost value.
- 410 — explicitly “permanently removed”; Google drops faster than 404.
- 500 / 502 / 503 — server-side problems; if Googlebot sees them often, crawl rate drops.
How to use this tool
Single URL mode follows redirects, times each hop, and shows every final response header. Bulk mode lets you paste a list — perfect for sanity-checking a redirect map after a migration. Switch the method to HEAD to test without downloading the body — useful for very large pages.