5 October 2026
A website redesign SEO guide that keeps the rankings
A website redesign keeps organic traffic when every old URL has one deliberate destination, that destination returns a single 301, and the new template still answers the same query.
What a redesign threatens
A redesign threatens rankings when URLs change, content is thinned, or the new template is harder to crawl than the old one. The visual system is not the risk. The URL and the response code are.
Google already associates the old URL with the query, the links and the indexed copy. Change the path without a permanent redirect and that association starts again on a URL with no history. Change the H1 so the page answers a different query and the redirect preserves a page you no longer deserve to rank.
The site migration checklist
A site migration checklist is a list of URLs, status codes and owners, finished before the DNS or the document root changes.
- Crawl the live site and export every indexable URL, plus the URLs in the sitemap and in Search Console.
- Map each URL to one new URL, or mark it as a deliberate removal. One old URL, one destination.
- Implement the map as 301 responses, one hop, on the server. Do not chain a trailing-slash redirect into a second redirect into the new path if you can land in one step.
- Keep the title, the H1 and the intent on the destination. A new layout can change the modules. It should not change what the page is about.
- Rewrite internal links to the new paths so the site does not depend on redirects for its own navigation.
- Launch the sitemap of new URLs and watch coverage, 404s and the old paths for several weeks.
- Check LCP, INP and CLS on the new templates before launch. A faster-looking design can still ship an unreserved hero and a heavy script.
The 301 redirect map
A 301 redirect map is a table from the old path to the new path, returned as HTTP 301, not as a JavaScript push or a meta refresh.
URL structure changes that cause losses
The risk is not a shorter slug. The risk is a slug that no longer names the service, or a pattern that collapses many pages into one.
Moving /services/web-design to /solutions/websites is safe only with a 301 from the old path to the new one. Moving ten service URLs onto a single /solutions page is not a redirect map. It is a content deletion.
Parameter URLs, print views and tag archives should not enter the new index by accident. Decide their status in the map. A new design that forgets them often leaves them returning 200.
| Situation | Response | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Page moved and should keep its place | 301 to the matching new URL | Permanent. One destination that answers the same query. |
| Temporary campaign URL | 302 | The original URL remains the indexed one. |
| Page removed with no successor | 404 or 410 | A redirect to the homepage is a soft collision, not a removal. |
| www and apex, or slash and no slash | 301, one hop | A chain wastes the crawl and can loop. |
Crawl budget, in proportion
Crawl budget optimisation means spending Google’s fetches on URLs you want indexed. For a few dozen pages, the budget is not your constraint. Duplicate URLs are.
If a redesign introduces filters that add a URL per combination, you can create thousands of thin pages. Canonicalise or noindex them, and keep the primary category in the sitemap. Blocking CSS or the whole site in robots.txt is not an optimisation. It hides the page you wanted crawled.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need a 301 for every old URL?
Yes for every URL that has rankings, links or a job in the index. A 301 says the move is permanent and passes the request to one new URL. Sending everything to the homepage throws away the query match.
What is a crawl-budget problem on a small site?
On a brochure site, crawl budget is rarely the limit. It becomes a problem when filters, tags or parameters create thousands of near-duplicate URLs. Block or canonicalise that set. Do not block the pages you want indexed.
When should the new site go live?
After the redirect map is on the server, internal links point at the new URLs, and the main templates meet the Core Web Vitals thresholds you agreed. A visual sign-off without the map is not a launch.