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When to use 301 redirects

Use permanent 301 redirects when you:
  • Delete or unpublish a product, collection, or page
  • Change a URL structure or permalink
  • Migrate content from one URL to another
  • Want to fix broken links that customers are trying to access
301 redirects vs. redirect rules: Use individual 301 redirects for specific URL changes. For pattern-based redirects affecting multiple URLs, use redirect rules instead.

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Create a redirect

1

Open Redirect Pro

From your Shopify admin, open the Redirect Pro app.
2

Go to URL Redirects

Click URL Redirects in the app navigation menu.
3

Click Create redirect

Click the Create redirect button in the top right corner.
4

Enter the redirect details

In the form that appears:
  • Redirect from: Enter the old URL path (e.g., /old-product)
  • Redirect to: Enter the new URL where visitors should be sent
For the “Redirect from” field you only need to enter the URL path, not the full domain. For example, use /old-page instead of https://yourstore.com/old-page.
5

Save the redirect

Click Save redirect. The redirect is now active and will immediately start sending visitors from the old URL to the new one, and transfer search rankings to the new URL.

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Redirect from options

The “Redirect from” field only accepts internal URL paths from your store - no need to add your domain. ✓ Accepted formats:
  • Path only: /old-product (recommended)
  • Path with query parameters: /old-product?variant=12345
✗ Not accepted:
  • Full URLs with your domain: https://yourstore.com/old-product
  • External URLs: https://othersite.com/page
You can only create 301 redirects from broken URLs. Broken URLs display error messages, such as Page not found or 404, on a page or in the page title. If the URL still loads a valid webpage, then the redirect won’t work.

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URLs you cannot redirect from

Certain URL paths are reserved by Shopify and cannot be used for redirects:
  • You can’t redirect URLs that begin with the following prefixes: /apps, /application, /cart, /carts, /orders, /services, or /shop.
  • You can’t redirect URLs that use fixed Shopify paths: /products (the main products index), /collections (the main collections index), /collections/all.
  • You can’t redirect URL paths that are reserved by Shopify: /collections/vendors, /collections/types, /a/, /community/, /tools/
  • You can’t redirect MyShopify domain paths ending /shop or /services
Collection tag filtering: Shopify does not allow redirects for URLs that use collection tag filtering (such as yourstore.com/collections/collection-name/tag-name). Even if no products exist with that tag, the URL path is still considered valid and cannot be redirected. Example of what won’t work:
  • ❌ /cart → /checkout
  • ❌ /products → /collections
These are Shopify platform restrictions that apply to all redirect apps, not just Redirect Pro.

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Redirect to options

The “Redirect to” field accepts both internal paths and external URLs, for example: Internal pages (use path only):
  • /collections/new-arrivals
  • /products/blue-shirt
  • /pages/about
  • / (homepage)
External URLs (use full URL with https://):
  • https://example.com
  • https://blog.yourcompany.com/article
For internal redirects, use paths only (e.g., /products/shirt). For external redirects, include the full URL with https://.

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Redirect limitations and special cases

You cannot redirect from a URL ending in .html to the same URL without .html. Shopify treats these as the same URL because the platform automatically handles HTML formatting for cleaner URLs.Example that won’t work:
  • ❌ /old-page.html → /old-page
Workaround: Redirect to a completely different URL:
  • ✓ /old-page.html → /new-page
URLs with complex query strings or special characters (such as /brands/dell.html?_bc_fsnf=1&interface=type) may not redirect as expected.Test these redirects thoroughly after creation. Consider using simpler URLs when possible.
Creating a URL redirect applies to all language or market subfolders set up using international sales tools.How it works: For example, your primary market is the United States on example.com. You also have a market for Canada on a subfolder at example.com/en-ca. You decide to stop selling a blue t-shirt on your store, so you delete the product, and then create a single URL redirect from /products/blue-t-shirt to /collections/t-shirts.
  • It works for ALL subfolder markets:
    • US (primary) customers are automatically redirected from /products/old-shirt to /collections/shirts
    • Canada customers are automatically redirected from /en-ca/products/old-shirt to /en-ca/collections/shirts
Specific locale redirects: You can still create individual redirects for each subfolder if you want to redirect people to a different destination for each market.For example, if you need to redirect specific locales (such as yourstore.com/en-ca/old-page to yourstore.com/en-fr/new-page), then you can create individual redirects for each subfolder.
301 redirects are cached by browsers and search engines. If you remove a redirect after customers have accessed it, then the redirect might continue to work in their browsers until the cache expires.
You can use URL redirects with your online store’s visibility settings to temporarily redirect customers from hidden content to active content.For example, if you have a /collections/fall collection that you want to temporarily hide during summer and redirect customers to /collections/summer, you can:
  1. Set the fall collection’s Online store visibility to “Hidden”.
  2. Create redirect from /collections/fall to /collections/summer
  3. When the fall collection is hidden, the URL becomes a 404 page which allows the redirect works.
Important: If you later make the fall collection Visible again, the redirect will stop working because redirects only work on 404 URLs.Also works for products: Set products to Draft status or remove from sales channels to make them eligible for redirects.

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Tips for effective 301 redirects

Redirect from: Always use internal paths only (e.g., /old-product). Don’t include your domain name.Redirect to: Use internal paths for pages on your store (e.g., /new-product), or full URLs with https:// for external sites (e.g., https://example.com).
After saving, visit the old URL in your browser to verify it redirects to the correct destination. See redirects troubleshoot guide for testing guidance.
While Redirect Pro supports unlimited visits to each 301 redirect, Shopify has platform limits:
  • Standard stores: 100,000 redirects maximum
  • Shopify Plus stores: 20,000,000 redirects maximum
Keep track of your total redirect count to avoid hitting these limits.

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What happens next

Once saved, your 301 redirect:
  • Takes effect immediately - visitors are redirected right away
  • Preserves SEO - search engines transfer ranking signals to the new URL
  • Handles unlimited visits - 301 redirect visits don’t count toward your usage quota
  • Appears in your redirect list - you can edit or delete it anytime

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Need help?

If you’re having trouble creating a redirect, see our troubleshooting guide: