TL;DR: Hyperlinks pointing to pages that no longer exist, returning 404 errors and harming both user experience and search rankings.
In a nutshell
Broken links damage trust, waste crawl budget, and stop authority flowing through your site. Internal ones happen when pages are deleted or renamed without redirects; external ones occur when other sites move or close. Fix them by 301 redirecting old URLs, updating links, or removing them. For example, a deleted blog post should always redirect to a relevant live page.
Quick answer: Broken links are hyperlinks that point to non-existent pages, returning a 404 error. They damage user experience, waste link equity, and signal poor site maintenance to search engines. Auditing and fixing broken links is one of the cheapest, highest-ROI SEO maintenance tasks available. The IANA HTTP status code registry sets out what each status (404, 410, 301) actually signals.
What Are Broken Links?
Broken links (also called dead links) are hyperlinks on a webpage that no longer lead to a working destination. When a user or search engine follows them, they land on a 404 error page instead of useful content.
Imagine browsing a book where every third footnote points to a page that has been torn out. Frustrating for readers, and a signal to Google that the site is not well-maintained.
Why Broken Links Harm SEO
- Poor user experience: Dead ends frustrate visitors and increase bounce rate
- Wasted crawl budget: Googlebot wastes time crawling URLs that return 404s
- Lost link equity: Broken internal links stop authority flowing through your site
- Signals poor maintenance: Sites with many broken links are seen as less trustworthy
Types of Broken Links
- Internal broken links: Links from one page on your site to another page that no longer exists
- External broken links: Links pointing to other websites that have moved or been deleted
- Broken backlinks: Links from other sites pointing to deleted pages on your site, candidates for link reclamation
How to Find and Fix Broken Links
Common tools include Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, and Google Search Console. An SEO audit will surface all broken links across your site. Fix them by:
- Setting up a 301 redirect from the old URL to a relevant live page
- Updating the link to point to the correct current URL
- Removing the link entirely if there is no good replacement
- Watching for redirect chains created during the fix
Prevention
A good technical SEO strategy includes regular broken link audits, especially after website migrations or content clean-ups.
Two Types of Broken Links
- Internal broken links: links from your site pointing to pages on your own site that no longer exist. Most often caused by deleting or renaming pages without redirecting.
- External broken links: links from your site pointing to pages on other sites that have been removed or moved. Less under your control, but you should still update or remove them when found.
Why Broken Links Hurt SEO
- Lost link equity: backlinks pointing to broken pages on your site pass no value.
- Wasted crawl budget: search engines spend time trying to crawl URLs that no longer exist.
- Poor user experience: users hit dead ends, increasing bounce and reducing trust.
- Quality signal: a site with many broken links signals neglect to Google’s ranking systems.
How to Find and Fix Broken Links
- Run a site crawler (Screaming Frog, Ahrefs Site Audit, Sitebulb) to identify all 404s.
- For broken internal links: update them to point to the correct URL or 301 redirect the old URL to a relevant live page.
- For broken external links: update to a working alternative or remove the link entirely.
- For broken backlinks pointing to dead pages on your site: 301 redirect those URLs to relevant live pages.
Frequently Asked Questions
How often should I check for broken links?
Quarterly is the realistic baseline for most small business sites. After major site changes (migrations, redesigns, content cleanups), do a full check immediately. Real-time monitoring tools alert you to new broken links as they appear.
Do broken outbound links hurt SEO?
Mildly. Google penalises sites that consistently link to broken or low-quality external content. The fix is simple: update or remove broken outbound links during routine content reviews.
How do I find broken links pointing to my site?
Use Ahrefs, SEMrush, or Moz to pull all backlinks, then filter for those pointing to URLs returning 404s. Each broken backlink is a redirect candidate: 301 the dead URL to a relevant live page to recover the link equity.
Are broken anchor links a problem?
Anchor links pointing to non-existent fragments (#non-existent) are not strictly broken in the same way. They don’t return 404s. But they create poor user experience by jumping to unexpected places. Worth fixing during content audits.
Take this further
Fixing broken links is the lowest-effort SEO maintenance task with the highest reliability. Quarterly audits catch issues before they accumulate.
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