I changed my entry's slug and now the page is returning a 404
Every entry in the CMS has a slug- the portion of the URL that identifies that specific page. For example, in the URL www.yoursite.com/things-to-do/my-event, the slug is my-event. When you change an entry's slug, its URL changes with it. Any links pointing to the old URL- whether from other pages on the site, external websites, search engines, or bookmarks- will stop working and return a 404 page not found error until a redirect is put in place.
Setting up a redirect
Your CMS includes a tool called Retour that allows you to create redirects from old URLs to new ones. A redirect tells the site that when someone visits the old URL, they should automatically be sent to the new one instead.
To create a redirect, go to Retour in the CMS navigation and select Redirects, then add a new redirect. Enter the old URL in the Legacy URL field and the new URL in the Redirect To field. Set the redirect type to 301 (Permanent Redirect) if the change is intended to be permanent, which is the case in most situations.
Once the redirect is saved, anyone visiting the old URL will be automatically sent to the new page and the 404 error will be resolved.
Before changing a slug on a live page
It is worth pausing before changing the slug of any page that is already live, particularly one that receives regular traffic or has been shared externally. While the redirect will resolve the broken link, search engines take time to process the change and there may be a temporary dip in traffic to that page.
If you are unsure whether a slug change is necessary, consider whether the current slug is genuinely problematic or whether it would be simpler to leave it as it is.
If you did not make the change intentionally
Slugs can sometimes be changed accidentally when editing an entry, particularly if the entry title is updated and the slug is set to update automatically with it. If this has happened, you can either restore the original slug directly on the entry- which will immediately fix the URL without needing a redirect- or leave the new slug in place and create a redirect as described above.
Setting up a redirect
Your CMS includes a tool called Retour that allows you to create redirects from old URLs to new ones. A redirect tells the site that when someone visits the old URL, they should automatically be sent to the new one instead.
To create a redirect, go to Retour in the CMS navigation and select Redirects, then add a new redirect. Enter the old URL in the Legacy URL field and the new URL in the Redirect To field. Set the redirect type to 301 (Permanent Redirect) if the change is intended to be permanent, which is the case in most situations.
Once the redirect is saved, anyone visiting the old URL will be automatically sent to the new page and the 404 error will be resolved.
Before changing a slug on a live page
It is worth pausing before changing the slug of any page that is already live, particularly one that receives regular traffic or has been shared externally. While the redirect will resolve the broken link, search engines take time to process the change and there may be a temporary dip in traffic to that page.
If you are unsure whether a slug change is necessary, consider whether the current slug is genuinely problematic or whether it would be simpler to leave it as it is.
If you did not make the change intentionally
Slugs can sometimes be changed accidentally when editing an entry, particularly if the entry title is updated and the slug is set to update automatically with it. If this has happened, you can either restore the original slug directly on the entry- which will immediately fix the URL without needing a redirect- or leave the new slug in place and create a redirect as described above.