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How to Check a Redirect CSV Before a Site Migration

A practical pre-launch checklist for validating old-to-new URL coverage, relevant destinations, redirect behavior, and migration monitoring.
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Before launch, compare your redirect CSV with the URLs your site actually uses, confirm each destination is the right live page, and test the redirects—not just the spreadsheet rows. Google’s migration guidance recommends a complete URL inventory, direct permanent redirects for moved content, pre-launch testing, and post-launch monitoring. It does not prescribe a standard CSV format, so the checks below are practical review advice rather than Google-required columns.

What should a redirect CSV review catch?

A useful review answers six questions: Are the important old URLs covered? Does each destination fit its source? Is the redirect type appropriate for the move? Does it lead directly to the final URL? Does the rule work in testing? Are there checks in place for after launch?

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Google’s site-move guidance describes the migration workflow, but it does not define a universal redirect CSV schema or a standard set of spreadsheet validation rules. Treat any suggested columns or checks here as implementation choices for your site.

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How do you check whether the CSV covers the important old URLs?

Do not assume the exported mapping is a complete inventory. Compare its source URLs with independent lists of URLs that matter to the old site. Google recommends using appropriate sources such as sitemaps, analytics or server logs, CMS exports, and Search Console link information. Consider seasonal traffic variation when deciding which URLs to prioritize.

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Include relevant image, video, script, and stylesheet URLs if those assets are moving and need to remain accessible. A page-only list can miss URLs that support important content or functionality.

Practical coverage checks

  • Check that each row has a source URL and a populated destination when a replacement exists.
  • Look for repeated source URLs and decide which mapping is intended; do not let conflicting rows silently determine the result.
  • Compare the CSV’s sources with the URL inventories above and investigate priority URLs that are missing.
  • Check URL formatting and normalization against the redirect implementation: for example, whether it distinguishes paths, query strings, or trailing slashes.

These are practical review checks, not a Google-mandated CSV format. The right normalization and duplicate-handling rules depend on how your site’s redirects are configured.

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How do you check that each destination is relevant?

For each old URL with a replacement, open or otherwise verify the destination. It should be live and represent the moved or consolidated content—not merely be a convenient URL that returns a successful response. A redirect that ends at an unrelated page can frustrate visitors and obscure what happened to the original content.

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Avoid sending large groups of unrelated old URLs to the homepage. Google warns that this can confuse users and may be treated as a soft 404. If a page is genuinely gone and has no relevant replacement, use an appropriate not-found (404) or gone (410) response instead of inventing an irrelevant destination. See Google’s guidance on mapping old URLs to relevant new URLs.

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Is the redirect type right, and does it lead directly to the final URL?

For a permanent URL move, Google recommends a server-side permanent redirect such as 301 or 308 when technically possible. Temporary redirects are intended for a different situation: Google’s redirect guidance distinguishes permanent redirects, which signal that the target should become canonical, from temporary redirects, which generally leave the source eligible to remain in Search results. Choose the type that matches the actual move, rather than treating all redirects as interchangeable.

Check whether an old URL passes through intermediate URLs before reaching its destination. Where possible, point it straight to the final URL. Chains add latency and may not be supported consistently by all user agents; Google advises keeping unavoidable chains low. There is no universal chain-length threshold established by this guidance, so do not treat a particular number as a general rule.

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How do you test a redirect mapping?

Test before launch, both on individual examples and across the rules that will be deployed. Google identifies URL Inspection for checking individual URLs and command-line tools or scripts for larger-scale testing. Its migration guidance also mentions crawling tools such as Screaming Frog as one example for checking whether redirects work as expected.

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Build a practical test report

For each test, it is useful to record the source requested, the response or redirect status, the final URL, and any error. These are helpful reporting fields, not a required Google CSV layout. Confirm that the final destination is the intended live page, rather than stopping the check at the first redirect response.

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  1. Choose representative cases. Include priority pages, different URL patterns, consolidated pages, and any moved assets or unusual cases in the mapping.
  2. Inspect individual URLs. Use URL Inspection where appropriate to check individual URLs and their status in Google’s systems.
  3. Run the full mapping at scale. Use a command-line tool, script, or crawler to exercise the rules, then review failures and unexpected destinations.
  4. Correct and retest. Fix missing rules, irrelevant targets, unintended temporary redirects, errors, or avoidable chains, and run the affected tests again.

What should you check at launch and after it?

When the new site goes live, verify that the redirects are active and that the new URLs have the intended canonical annotations and crawl directives. Remove migration-only noindex directives or crawl blocks that should no longer apply. Submit the new sitemap and update internal links so they point to the new URLs rather than relying on redirects for routine navigation.

After launch, monitor Search Console, server logs, crawl errors, and normal traffic for problems such as missed redirects, unexpected errors, or changes in crawl behavior. Google recommends retaining migration redirects for as long as possible, generally at least one year; that is guidance, not a guarantee that every migration will be complete on a fixed schedule. These steps are part of Google’s site-move and migration guidance.

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