How long should old redirects stay live after a migration?
- Published November 6, 2026
- Linked from 2 answers
- In a cluster of 51
At least a year, and for any old URL that still gets visits or has valuable links pointing to it, indefinitely. Google’s guide to moving a site with URL changes sets the minimum and gives the reason: “This timeframe allows Google to transfer all signals to the new URLs, including recrawling and reassigning links on other sites that point to your old URLs.” It then adds the view from the visitor’s side: “From users’ perspective, consider keeping redirects indefinitely.”
Why a year is the floor, not the target
| Who still uses the old URL | Why the redirect is still working |
|---|---|
| Googlebot | It has to revisit old URLs to see the redirect and move signals, and some old URLs are crawled rarely |
| Other sites | Links from other sites keep pointing at the old address until their owners change them, which they may never do |
| Readers | Bookmarks, saved links, emails and printed material keep sending people to old addresses |
| Your own systems | Old links inside past newsletters, documents and social posts |
Removing a redirect turns each of those visits into an error page. For pages with links from other sites, the redirect is the only thing still carrying that link to the right page; the site-move guide’s own advice is to ask the sites linking to you to update their links, but you cannot rely on them doing it.
When retiring a redirect is reasonable
Check before removing any redirect, rather than setting a date:
- Server logs or analytics show no meaningful visits to the old URL over recent months.
- Your link data shows no valuable external links still pointing at it.
- The old URL is not in any sitemap, feed or internal link you control.
If all three hold, retiring that redirect costs little. If any fails, keep it. The redirects themselves are cheap to maintain; the risk sits in removing them early.
The time it takes for redirects to pass value and for rankings to settle is a separate question, taken up in how long a 301 takes to pass value. Keep redirects running as long as anything still arrives through them.
Add a comment