Retire or archive outdated website content

Identify the actual state

Review expired offers, past events, replaced documents and articles whose facts have changed. Record current use, incoming links, language versions and owner. A popular page is not necessarily accurate; a little-used page may still be essential.

The content operations guide helps set review triggers. An automatic date must not pretend that a person checked the facts.

• Pages for review inventoried.
• Accuracy separated from use.
• Decision owner identified.

Choose an appropriate action

Choose an action based on the question still being asked, not content age. Fictional example: a course is no longer offered, but its syllabus remains useful to former participants; an explicit archive may be appropriate. If a new offer serves a different need, do not treat it as an automatic replacement. Update or merge when continuity can be explained.

If a page has a relevant replacement, redirect the old URL there. Without one, serve a real 404 or 410 response with a useful help page. Google’s crawl-error guidance distinguishes these situations.

For a public page requested with GET, start with its remaining value to the reader. A useful archive can remain available with status 200, clear historical context and obsolete actions removed. A genuinely equivalent replacement can justify a permanent redirect. A page that only announces its absence while returning 200 may instead be interpreted as a soft 404.

Choosing 404 or 410 describes a situation, not an SEO deadline. In HTTP, 404 does not specify whether absence is permanent; 410 expresses a likely permanent disappearance known to the server. Google documents these responses within the same processing family, except for the special case of 429. Do not promise faster deindexing with 410. Also check the help message, old links and translations.

• Update, archive or removal justified.
• Redirect targets a true equivalent.
• HTTP status fits pages without replacement.

Scroll the table horizontally to read every column. With a keyboard, focus the table area and use the arrow keys.

• Google Crawling Infrastructure : HTTP status codes

  Consulted on 22 October 2026; Google crawler handling of redirects, soft 404s and 4xx responses.

• RFC 9110 : 410 Gone

  Consulted on 22 October 2026; the meaning of 404 and 410 differs from a search engine’s timing.

Repair paths to the old content

After deciding, update menus, cards, contextual links, sitemap, sharing previews and documents referring to the URL. Check the English version too: withdrawing a French page does not necessarily make its English equivalent obsolete.

Redirect chains can obscure destinations and slow the journey. The broken-links guide helps repair internal references without sending everything home.

• Internal links repaired.
• Sitemap and translations reviewed.
• Redirects short and relevant.

Check after publication

Open the old URL as someone following a bookmark or email: check status, message and any destination. Fictional example: an old campaign used a tracking parameter; test that address as well as the URL without it. Check internal search and cards, then monitor errors. A technically accessible destination must still address the old link’s intent.

Keep a private editorial record of the decision and date so obsolete content is not republished later. On the public site, people only need the status and information that helps them.

• Old URLs tested.
• Visitor paths checked.
• Internal decision retained.