Remove redirect chains and update links to redirected URLs

The problem

Some URLs redirect more than once before reaching the page (for example http → https → www → /new-path/), or your internal links point at URLs that redirect.

How to spot it

• The audit shows the full chain for each affected URL.
• Pages feel slow to open from links or bookmarks.

Why it matters

Each hop is an extra round trip before the page can start loading, which is especially noticeable on mobile networks. Long chains can also stop crawlers before they reach the final page.

What happens if you leave it

Slower page loads from every link and bookmark, and wasted crawl effort.

How to fix it

1. List the chains from the audit. For each one, note the first URL and the final URL.
2. Change the redirect rule so the first URL redirects directly to the final URL with a single 301.
3. Combine protocol and host rules so http://example.com/page goes straight to https://www.example.com/page in one step.
4. Update internal links (menus, content, footer, canonical tags, sitemap) to use the final URLs.
5. When you move pages again in future, update the old redirects to point at the newest destination.

Platform-specific notes

• Apache: order rules so the HTTPS and host canonicalisation happen in one rewrite.
• Cloudflare / CDN: check for redirects at both the CDN and the origin server; they often add an extra hop together.

Common mistakes

• Mixing trailing-slash and non-trailing-slash rules that bounce between each other.
• Redirect loops, where two rules point at each other.

How to check the fix worked

Run curl -sIL https://example.com/old-page and count the HTTP/ lines: there should be one redirect followed by 200. Re-run the audit to confirm.