“404 Not Found” is probably the most recognized error on the internet. We’ve all seen it, and as a website owner, you’ve likely dealt with it. But did you know that not all 404s are the same? There are hard 404s and soft 404s.
While they might look similar to users, they behave very differently behind the scenes. Spotting soft 404s is trickier than it sounds. This article explains what makes the two types different and why they matter for your site’s health and visibility.
Hard vs Soft 404: What’s the Difference
At a glance, both hard and soft 404 errors seem to do the same thing. They show a “not found” message when someone tries to visit a page that does not exist. But under the hood, they behave very differently.
A hard 404 is the standard, expected behavior when a page cannot be found. The web server responds with an HTTP 404 status code, which clearly tells browsers and other clients that the page is missing. This is a normal part of how the web works and helps both users and systems understand that the content is no longer available.
A soft 404 looks similar on the surface. The user still sees a page with a “Not Found” message or similar wording. But instead of sending an HTTP 404 status code, the server responds with an HTTP 200 OK code.
This code normally means everything is fine and the request was successful, even though the content is missing or meaningless.
Soft 404s usually happen when a site shows an empty or placeholder page but does not return the correct error code. For example, if a deleted product page still shows the site’s normal layout with a “product not found” message, but responds with an HTTP 200 code, that would be a soft 404.
The key difference is that hard 404s give the right signal. Soft 404s pretend everything is fine when it is not. This makes them harder to catch and fix, even though they can be just as harmful.
Why 404 Errors Matter for SEO
Both hard and soft 404 errors can hurt your site’s visibility in search engines, but they do so in different ways.
Hard 404 errors are usually the result of broken links, deleted pages, or mistyped URLs. When search engines crawl your site and hit a hard 404, they understand the page is gone. This is not always a bad thing. If a page was removed on purpose, a hard 404 is the correct response.
However, if important content was deleted without redirects or if internal links point to pages that no longer exist, this can signal poor site maintenance. Over time, too many unresolved hard 404s can affect how search engines view the overall quality and reliability of your site.
Soft 404s are more problematic. Because the server responds with an HTTP 200 status code, search engines may assume the page is valid. This can waste crawl budget and lead to low-quality pages being indexed.
Search engines may eventually recognize a soft 404 and treat it like a real one, but this process is slow and unreliable. In the meantime, your site may appear to have thin or misleading content, which can harm rankings.
Both types of errors can create a bad user experience. Visitors who click on broken links or land on empty pages may leave your site quickly, which can increase bounce rates and reduce trust. These user signals can also have an indirect impact on search performance.
In short, hard 404s tell search engines the truth, but they still need to be managed. Soft 404s create confusion and require extra attention to detect and correct. Keeping both under control is important for maintaining a healthy and search-friendly website.
How to Identify 404 Errors
One way to identify broken links on a website is to manually visit every page and click on each link. That might work if your site is very small, but for anything beyond a handful of pages, it quickly becomes tedious and unreliable. Another option is to wait until someone tells you that something is broken.
But that is not a real solution either. Most visitors will not take the time to report problems. They will leave your site and move on, and by the time you find out, you may have already lost valuable traffic and potential business.
The better approach is to use a tool that can automatically scan your site and find problems for you.
This is where Dr. Link Check comes in. It is a powerful tool designed to help website owners quickly and reliably find both hard and soft link errors. All you need to do is enter your website’s address.
Dr. Link Check then scans your site and follows all the links it can find, including internal and external ones, as well as links to images, stylesheets, scripts, and other resource files.
For hard errors, Dr. Link Check detects common issues such as HTTP 404 (Not Found), HTTP 500 (Internal Server Error), timeouts, and SSL certificate problems. These are the kinds of issues that break pages or prevent important resources from loading.
But what makes Dr. Link Check stand out is its ability to catch soft errors. The tool looks beyond the HTTP status code and analyzes the content of each page. It flags links that return generic error messages such as “We’re sorry, but this page doesn’t exist” or “Oops, an error occurred.”
It also detects links that point to parked domains filled with ads, domains that are expired or suspended, placeholder pages that say things like “Coming soon,” or don’t contain any content at all.
Once the scan is complete, you get a searchable report that highlights all issues found. You can filter results to focus on specific problems and download the full report in PDF or CSV format for further analysis or documentation.
For ongoing peace of mind, Dr. Link Check can also monitor your site automatically. You can schedule daily, weekly, or monthly scans and get email notifications when something breaks. This helps you catch problems early before they affect your visitors or your site’s reputation.
How to Fix 404 Errors
Fixing 404 errors starts with understanding their cause. Once you have identified broken or misleading links, you can begin cleaning them up one by one. The goal is always the same: either restore the correct content or guide users and search engines to the right place.
Hard 404 errors usually happen when a link points to a page that no longer exists. To fix them, begin by updating or removing any internal links that lead to missing pages. If a page has been moved or renamed, set up a redirect to its new location. On Apache servers, this can be done with a simple rule in the .htaccess file:
Redirect 301 /old-page /new-page
This tells the server to send visitors and search engines from the old URL to the new one using a permanent redirect. In WordPress, redirection plugins make this process even easier. You can set up rules without touching server files, which is especially useful for non-technical users.
If the broken link is an external link, meaning it points from your site to another website, the solution is to either update, remove, or replace it. You cannot control what happens on the destination site, but you can control whether or not you continue linking to it.
If the page no longer exists or has changed significantly, consider linking to an archived version using the Wayback Machine. This allows users to still access the original content, even if the live version is gone. If no archive exists or the content is no longer useful, it is best to remove the link or find a more relevant alternative.
For content on your own site that is permanently gone and has no suitable replacement, returning an HTTP 404 or 410 status code is the correct response. These status codes make it clear that the page is no longer available. A 410 response is slightly stronger than a 404, as it explicitly tells search engines that the page is gone for good. In Apache, you can do this with a simple directive:
Redirect gone /old-page
To improve the user experience, it is also a good idea to customize your 404 page. Rather than showing a generic message, offer helpful links, a search bar, or navigation back to your homepage. This keeps users engaged and gives them a path forward.
If you identify soft 404 errors on your site, they can be a bit trickier to fix. Resolving them requires a careful look at how your site responds to missing content. If a product, article, or page is gone, make sure your site returns a proper 404 or 410 status. Displaying a “not found” message with a 200 OK status misleads search engines and users alike.
In content management systems like WordPress, this can happen if themes or plugins override error handling. Some themes may show a “not found” message on a template but fail to return the correct HTTP status code.
You can test this by visiting a fake URL and checking the response code using your browser’s developer tools. If the response is 200, you may need to modify your theme’s 404.php template or adjust settings in your SEO plugin to return the correct status.
Another common cause of soft 404s is placeholder content. If your site displays a message like “coming soon” or “site under construction” across multiple pages, make sure those pages are not indexed unless they are truly useful. Empty or generic pages should return a 404 or be excluded from indexing using meta tags or your robots.txt file.
Cleaning up 404 errors is not a one-time task. Sites grow, links change, and content gets removed. Keeping your site clean requires regular attention and a plan for handling outdated or missing pages in a way that serves both users and search engines.
Takeaways for Website Owners
Hard and soft 404 errors may look similar on the surface, but how they work and how you fix them are very different. Hard 404s return the correct HTTP status code and are usually caused by broken or outdated links. Soft 404s are more subtle.
They return an HTTP 200 OK status even though the content is missing, misleading, or empty. This makes them harder to detect and more likely to slip through unnoticed.
Both types of errors hurt the user experience and can negatively impact your search engine visibility. That is why it is important to identify and fix them as early as possible.
You should regularly check your site for broken internal and external links, make sure pages that are truly missing return the correct status code, and avoid showing thin or placeholder content where real content is expected.
To stay ahead of these problems, consider using a tool like Dr. Link Check. It automatically scans your site, identifies broken and misleading links, and helps you keep your site clean and functional with minimal effort.
A well-maintained site does not just avoid errors. It keeps visitors engaged, improves SEO, and reflects a level of professionalism that builds long-term trust.