Soft 404

A soft 404 is a page that tells users it does not exist, or has little or no real content, while the server returns a 200 OK success code instead of a proper error. Google detects these pages, reports them in Search Console and generally keeps them out of its index.

Written by Paul Hoda, SEO consultant since 2005. Last updated 8 November 2026.

Why soft 404s happen

A normal missing page should return a 404 or 410 status code. A soft 404 sends mixed signals: the server says everything is fine, but the content says otherwise. Google looks at the page itself and, if it judges the page to be an error or effectively empty, labels it a soft 404. Typical causes include:

  • A custom not found page that is set up to return 200 instead of 404.
  • Empty category or search results pages saying no products found.
  • Out-of-stock or discontinued product pages with almost nothing left on them.
  • Pages that rely on JavaScript to load content, where rendering fails or an API error leaves a blank page.
  • Redirecting large numbers of removed pages to the homepage or an unrelated page, which Google may treat as a soft 404.
  • Very thin content, such as template pages with placeholder text.

Why they matter for SEO

Soft 404s waste crawling effort, because Google keeps fetching pages that offer nothing. On large sites this eats into crawl budget. More importantly, Google sometimes flags pages that are meant to rank, such as a product page that looks empty because content failed to load. Those pages then drop out of search results. Soft 404s also hide real problems, because analytics and monitoring tools see a successful page rather than an error.

How to find soft 404s

  1. Open the Page indexing report in Google Search Console and look for the Soft 404 reason.
  2. Inspect affected URLs with the URL Inspection tool and view the rendered page to see what Google saw.
  3. Test your error page: request a made-up URL and check the status code it returns.
  4. Crawl the site to find very short pages and empty listing pages.

How to fix them

  • Page is truly gone: return a proper 404 error status code.
  • Page was removed on purpose: a 410 Gone code also works and says the removal is permanent.
  • Page has a close replacement: use a 301 redirect to that specific page, not the homepage.
  • Page should rank: add useful content and make sure it renders for Googlebot, then request reindexing.
  • Empty listing pages: add helpful content, hide them until products exist, or use a noindex tag.
  • Out-of-stock products: keep the page useful with details, alternatives and expected dates.

A common myth

Some site owners redirect every dead page to the homepage to save link value. Google has said irrelevant redirects like this may be treated as soft 404s anyway, so the value is not kept and users end up confused.

Further reading: Google on HTTP errors, including soft 404s.

Key Takeaways

  • A soft 404 looks missing or empty but returns a 200 success code.
  • Google reports soft 404s in the Search Console Page indexing report.
  • Removed pages should return a real 404 or 410 status.
  • Mass redirects to the homepage can be treated as soft 404s.
  • Pages that should rank need real content that renders for Googlebot.

Related Terms

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