Do you want to know how to find broken links in WordPress and fix them?
In this article, I will guide you through the whole process of finding broken links in WordPress and fixing them step by step.
According to Google, having broken links doesn’t hurt the ranking of other pages on your website. But it surely hurts the user experience. It doesn’t look good when you are linking to a page that has been moved or deleted.
If your website is full of broken links, then it might look unprofessional.
It also affects the user experience when you are linking to a page that is not there or has been removed by mistake. So, finding and removing broken links from your site is very essential to keep a good user experience.
Broken links are nothing but links which points to a page that doesn’t exist.
If you think that it will take a long time to find all the broken links and one by one fix them, then you are wrong. In this article, I will show you the exact process you have to follow to remove broken links easily and affordably.
It really doesn’t take a long time to solve this problem.
If you feel that your site might have a lot of 404 pages, you need to check it and remove them as soon as possible.
So, let’s see how to find them easily…
Method 1: Install “Broken Link Checker” Plugin
This is one of the easiest and most efficient ways to find broken links on your WordPress site. To do this, you just need to install a plugin on your WordPress site. The plugin name is “Broken Link Checker“.
After installing the plugin on your WordPress website, it will automatically scan for all the 404 pages on your site. It will also find all the links that are broken, including deleted pages, moved pages, etc.
Once the plugin is installed, it will scan your website for broken links and display a list of all 404 linked pages with their status in an easy-to-understand format. So, you can easily fix them without wasting too much time.
You can find this plugin in the official WordPress Plugin Repository.
Method 2: Using Broken Links Checker Tool
There are many broken link checker tools available online. Some of them are free while some have a fee.
You can use any of these tools to check your site for broken links. You can simply add the URL of your website and it will do the rest for you. You just need to click on the “Check” or “Scan Now” button to start checking.
Here are some of the popular broken link checker tools:
- Online Broken Link Checker
- Ahrefs Broken Link Checker
- Dead Link Checker
- Dr. Link Check
- Small SEO Tools Link Checker
This is one of the easiest methods to find broken links on your website. You just have to enter your website’s URL and check broken links.
After that, it will list all the broken links to your website.
If you are trying to look for broken links in a large website with hundreds of pages, it might take you a long time to manually check each and every page for broken links. So, this is the best way to find and remove them quickly.
Also, some tools ask for payment after a certain number of checks. However, the free version is sufficient for most people with small to medium size websites.
Method 3: Broken Link Checker Extension
The Broken Link Checker extension for Google Chrome provides a quick way to check any site’s web pages for broken links. You just need to install the extension and then click on its icon that will appear next to the address bar.
After that, a drop-down menu will appear from where you have to select the page you want to check for broken links. Once selected, it will run a quick scan and show all the broken links on your website in a single report.
It helps in generating reports of the pages where there are broken links so that you can easily find and fix them.
Method 4: Use Screaming Frog SEO Spider
You can use the Screaming Frog SEO Spider tool to find broken links on your website. This tool crawls the web pages of your website and gives you an accurate report on broken links, redirects, 404 errors, etc.
This SEO tool has the best crawling feature that helps to identify all 404 errors on your site. To use this tool, you will need a Screaming Frog SEO Spider license which will cost you a few bucks. But there is a free trial version available for everyone so you can try it first and then buy if you like.
You can crawl up to 500 URLs with the free version and the paid versions will allow you to crawl thousands of URLs.
It also has the best user interface which makes it very easy for beginners to use this tool. So, go ahead and try it out to see if it works for you.
Click here to learn more about Screaming Frog
Method 5: Use Xenu’s Link Sleuth
Xenu’s Link Sleuth is available as a free download for Windows. It helps you to find broken links on your website easily.
This tool crawls through websites and finds all the broken links, including links from Javascript, CSS, and image files. It also has a good crawling speed which is why it’s very popular among SEO professionals around the world.
You can download Xenu’s Link Sleuth from its official website.
The tool is free to download and easy to use. So, this is another simple way to find broken links on your WordPress website.
Method 6: Going Through “Edit” Screen
You can also use this method to quickly remove broken links from your website. To do this, you just have to go through the edit screen of each post or page on your site. You will see a link under each post that looks like ” Edit”.
Please note that this is a manual process and it will take time.
Just click “Edit” and you will be able to review your article to see if you find any broken link on the page. To do this, you have to check each link one by one and find if the link really exists or it doesn’t.
While I don’t recommend this method for everyday use, it is the easiest and quickest way to fix a small batch of broken links.
Method 7: Going Through “Broken Link” Emails
This method involves going through your email account for broken links. You just have to go through all emails from your subscribers or customers who report broken links on their blogs. This will help you find broken links on your website.
However, this method is not recommended because there are chances that you might miss some broken links or fail to respond quickly.
So far, we have learned many different ways to find broken links on WordPress websites or blogs. Now, let’s talk about how to fix them.
Fix Broken Links in WordPress
First of all, you have to find the broken links.
To do this, you will have to use one of the above methods I have mentioned. Once you have found the broken links on your blog, it’s time to fix them one by one.
There are different ways to do this.
You can either do it manually or by using plugins for WordPress.
1. Manual Method
The manual method is quite simple but needs time and effort.
To do this, you will have to open each blog post and review it to find and remove any broken links on your website.
The manual method is not recommended for large websites because it will take a lot of time and effort in order to fix all broken links.
So, if you have a large site with hundreds or even thousands of posts, then you should not use the manual method to fix broken links on your site.
So what’s the best way to fix your broken links?
2. The Plugin Method
The plugin method is the best way to fix all broken links on your WordPress site. You just have to install a plugin called “Broken Link Checker“.
And, it will fix all broken links in a matter of minutes.
I personally like this plugin because it’s very easy to use. It will automatically look for broken links on your site and fix the faulty ones.
My Final Words
Finally, I believe this article will help you find and fix all broken links on your WordPress site. I have included 7 different ways to do this. So, go ahead and use which method you want to use and fix your site.
Remember that it’s essential to fix broken links on your site.
Leaving broken links on your site may have a negative impact on your SEO. However, it will be better if you check for broken links before publishing a post.
And, you don’t want your readers to see 404 errors or broken links.
That’s why you need to find and fix them soon.
Note: You can use this SEO tool to check the SEO health of your website.
Thanks for reading this article. I hope you found it useful. And, if you did, please share it on social media to help more people who might need this information. It also helps me reach more people. Thanks!
