How to find broken links on your website

You can find most dead links with a free report, a checker tool and half an hour of clicking. You don't need to read code.

Broken links come in two kinds. Internal ones point to another page on your own site. External ones point to someone else's. MDN says to keep both to a minimum.¹

Start with what Google already knows

If your site is set up in Google Search Console, its Page indexing report lists addresses where Google got a 404.² Open the report and look for the "Not found (404)" group.

A few things to know before you trust it:

• Google may have found the address as a link from another page. It might not be a link you control.²
• The report shows only addresses that returned a 404 in the past month.²
• In general, Google recommends fixing only the 404 errors that you link to yourself or list in a sitemap.²

So a link on your own menu is a good place to start.

Run a link checker

A link checker visits your pages, follows each link and reports the ones that fail. Wikipedia describes two kinds: plug-ins for content management systems, and standalone broken-link checkers.³

Which tool should you use? That depends on how your site is built, and the choice is yours. Look for one that:

• checks both internal and external links
• lists the page each broken link sits on, so you know where to fix it
• shows the status code it got back
• lets you export the results

If your site runs on a website builder or hosting platform, check its help pages first. It may already have a built-in report. Ask the support team if you can't find one.

Read the tool's own instructions before you run it, and only scan sites you own or manage.

Know what the tools miss

Automatic checking may not catch links that return a soft 404.³ Google describes it as a user-friendly "not found" message that doesn't come with a 404 response code.²

You'll only spot those by looking. Your checker's report is a starting point, not a guarantee.

Walk through the site by hand

Wikipedia says broken links can be found manually or automatically.³ For a small site, doing it by hand is often quicker than it sounds.

Go to your main menu and click every item. Then open your most visited pages and click the links inside them. Pay most attention to:

• the footer and sidebar, which carry links on every page
• old posts that point to other sites
• buttons that send people to downloads, bookings or contact pages
• any page you edited, renamed or deleted recently

Do it on your phone too. Menus sometimes differ there.

Keep a list

Make a simple table with four columns: the page the link is on, the broken address, what you plan to do, and whether it's done. A spreadsheet is fine. You'll thank yourself when you come back to it.

Once the list is built, move on to repairs. Each dead link gets one of three fixes, and the repair guide helps you pick. If you're unsure why a link fails at all, the page on missing pages covers the usual causes. Mistyped addresses and pages moved or deleted without redirection are common causes.¹

How often to check

There's no magic schedule. Check after any big change, such as a redesign, a rename or a move to a new host. Otherwise, a quick pass every few months catches the slow decay of links pointing outward.