What is Broken Link?
A broken link (also called a dead link or 404 error) is a hyperlink that points to a page that no longer exists — returning an error instead of content, creating a poor user experience and wasting crawl budget and link equity.
Why It Matters
Broken links damage three things simultaneously. First, user experience — a visitor clicking a link and landing on a 404 page loses trust in the site. Second, crawl budget — every broken link Googlebot follows is a wasted crawl that could have been spent on a real page. Third, link equity — if external sites link to a page that returns a 404, the authority those backlinks carry is lost entirely.
Broken links accumulate naturally. Pages get deleted without redirects, products are discontinued, external sites restructure their URLs, and links in old content point to resources that no longer exist. Without regular monitoring, a site can accumulate hundreds of broken links over time, each one quietly undermining SEO performance and user experience.
How It Works
Broken link management covers two types:
- Internal broken links — Links within your own site that point to pages that no longer exist. These are fully within your control. The fix is either updating the link to point to the correct URL or adding a 301 redirect from the broken URL to the most relevant existing page.
- External broken links — Links on your site that point to other websites where the page has been removed. These require updating the link to a current URL or removing the link entirely. External broken links do not affect your site's crawl budget but do harm user experience.
- Inbound broken links — Links from other websites pointing to pages on your site that no longer exist. These are the most SEO-damaging because they waste external link equity. The fix is a 301 redirect from the broken URL to the most relevant existing page on your site.
Common Mistakes
Only checking for broken links during annual audits. Broken links appear continuously — every time a page is deleted, a URL changes, or an external resource moves. Monthly or automated monitoring catches broken links before they accumulate into a significant problem.
The other mistake is returning soft 404s instead of proper 404 or 301 responses. A soft 404 is a page that displays a "not found" message but returns a 200 status code. Google may waste crawl budget on these pages and index them as thin content. Broken URLs should return a proper 404 status or, better, a 301 redirect to relevant content.
How I Use This
My SEO automation runs continuous broken link monitoring — scanning internal links, external links, and inbound link targets for 404 errors. When broken links are detected, the system recommends the appropriate fix: redirect, link update, or removal. The advanced SEO audit identifies high-priority broken links — those with external backlinks or high internal link equity — for immediate resolution.
Related Services
How BrightIQ uses Broken Link
This concept is central to the following services:
Related Terms
301 Redirect
A 301 redirect is a permanent server-side redirect that sends users and search engines from an old URL to a new one — transferring the majority of the original page's link equity and ranking signals to the destination URL.
Crawl Budget
Crawl budget is the number of pages a search engine will crawl on your site within a given timeframe — determined by your server's capacity and the perceived value of your content. Managing crawl budget ensures Google spends its limited crawling resources on the pages that matter.
Link Equity
Link equity (historically called link juice) is the ranking value that a hyperlink passes from one page to another — determined by the linking page's authority, the link's relevance, its placement, and whether it is a followed or nofollowed link.
Technical SEO
Technical SEO is the foundation layer of search engine optimisation — the crawlability, indexability, site speed, and structural elements that determine whether search engines can find, understand, and rank your pages.