301 Redirect Cheatsheet

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301 Redirect Cheatsheet

I got tired of always having to search google to remember the syntax for issuing seo friendly (300, 301, 302, 303, 305, 306, 307) Redirects using multiple programming languages and methods… so I made my own list!

Redirection Methods

Am I missing something? Most definately! Please use the comment form below to suggest new code.

Redirect with meta http-equiv tags

These go in the section of your html. Usually when you use this meta redirect method you should also use the javascript method, just to be safe.

Refresh meta http-equiv tag

Redirects to http://www.askapache.com after 0 seconds.

<meta http-equiv="refresh" content="0;url=http://www.askapache.com" />

Redirect with javascript

These go in the section of your html.

Basic javascript Redirect method

Will redirect user to http://www.askapache.com immediately

<script type="text/javascript">
window.location.href='http://www.askapache.com';
</script>

Redirect after specific time period

This will redirect to http://www.askapache.com after 2 seconds

<body onload="javascript:setTimeout(function(){window.location.href='http://www.askapache.com'},2000);">

Redirect with PHP

Using “Location” header

<?php
header('Location:http://www.askapache.com');
exit;
exit();
?>

Using “Refresh” header

<?php
header('Refresh: 0; URL=http://www.askapache.com');
exit;
exit();
?>

Ultimate PHP method

It redirects to a page specified by “$url”. $mode can be:

  • LOCATION: Redirect via Header “Location”
  • REFRESH: Redirect via Header “Refresh”
  • META: Redirect via HTML META tag
  • JS: Redirect via JavaScript command
<?php
function do_redirect($url,$mode)
{
    if (strncmp('http:',$url,5) && strncmp('https:',$url,6)) {
        $starturl = ($_SERVER["HTTPS"] == 'on' ? 'https' : 'http') . '://'.
        (empty($_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'])? $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] : $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST']);
        if ($url[0] != '/') $starturl .= dirname($_SERVER['PHP_SELF']).'/';
        $url = "$starturl$url";
    }
    switch($mode) {
        case 'LOCATION':
        header("Location: $url");
        exit;
        case 'REFRESH':
        header("Refresh: 0; URL=\"$url\"");
        exit;
        case 'META':
        exit;
        default:
        ?><script type="text/javascript">
        window.location.href='<?=$url?>';
        </script><?
    }
    exit;
}
?>

Redirect with Perl

Simple 302 Redirect with perl

#!/usr/bin/perl
my $URL = "http://www.askapache.com";
print "Status: 302 Moved\nLocation: $URL\n\n";

Simpler 302 Redirect with perl

#!/usr/bin/perl
print "Location: http://www.askapache.com\n\n";
exit;

Redirect with ColdFusion (CFM)

Using cheader for 301 “permanent” redirect

<cfheader statuscode="301" statustext="Moved Permanently">
<cfheader name="Location" value="http://www.askapache.com">
<cfabort>

Using clflocation for 302 “temporary” redirect

<cflocation url="http://www.askapache.com">

Redirect with ASP (VB Script)

301 Redirect

<%@ Language=VBScript %>
<%
response.status="301 moved permanently"
Response.AddHeader "Location", "http://www.askapache.com"
%>

Redirect with shell script

302 Redirect with sh shell script

#!/bin/sh
echo "Content-type: text/html"
echo "Location: http://www.askapache.com";
echo "";
exit 0;

Redirect with mod_rewrite in apache htaccess

See also Ultimate Apache htaccess article and URL Redirection

301 Redirect

Redirects permanently when a request is made to site.com/thisword.html to http://www.askapache.com

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^thisword\.html$ http://www.askapache.com [R=301,NC,L]

302 Redirect

Redirects temporarily when a request is made to site.com/thisword.html to http://www.askapache.com

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^thisword\.html$ http://www.askapache.com [R,NC,L]

Redirect with mod_alias in apache htaccess

301 Redirect

Redirect 301 /thisword.html http://www.askapache.com

or with RedirectPerm

RedirectPerm /thisword.html http://www.askapache.com

or with RedirectMatch

RedirectMatch 301 ^thisword\.html$ http://www.askapache.com

302 Redirect

Redirect 302 /thisword.html http://www.askapache.com

or with RedirectTemp

RedirectTemp /thisword.html http://www.askapache.com

or with RedirectMatch

RedirectMatch 302 ^thisword\.html$ http://www.askapache.com

Redirect with ErrorDocument in apache htaccess

302 Redirect

Issues a 302 Redirect to http://www.askapache.com when a file is not found. See also Force Apache to output any HTTP Status Code with ErrorDocument

ErrorDocument 404 http://www.askapache.com

Redirect with Python / Django

Thanks to thebjorn for contributing this first one, which issues a 302 Redirect.

from django import http
def view(request):
return http.HttpResponseRedirect('http://www.askapache.com/')

This example was contributed by John and shows how to issue a proper 301 Redirect, additional info on this below the example.

from django import http
def view(request):
return http.HttpResponsePermanentRedirect ('http://www.askapache.com/')

Django includes a number of HttpResponse subclasses that handle different types of HTTP responses. Like HttpResponse, these subclasses live in django.http.

HttpResponseRedirect
The constructor takes a single argument — the path to redirect to. This can be a fully qualified URL (e.g. 'http://www.askapache.com/htaccess/') or an absolute URL with no domain (e.g. '/htaccess/'). Note that this returns an HTTP status code 302.
HttpResponsePermanentRedirect
Like HttpResponseRedirect, but it returns a permanent redirect (HTTP status code 301) instead of a “found” redirect (status code 302).
HttpResponseNotModified
The constructor doesn’t take any arguments. Use this to designate that a page hasn’t been modified since the user’s last request (status code 304).

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Reader Comments

  1. Big B. ~

    Script “Ultimate PHP method” reported Parse error: syntax error, unexpected $end

  2. Stefanos ~

    Great post! I found it really useful. Any idea if the header redirect is seo fiendly. Aa far as I know the best one is the .htaccess one. Any advice on this issue.

  3. John ~

    Heya – the Python example actually would prompt a 302 redirect

    In order to prompt a 301, note that you would need to utilize the HttpResponsePermanentRedirect class a la:

    from django import http
def view(request):
return http.HttpResponsePermanentRedirect ('http://www.askapache.com')

    Reference: httpresponse-subclasses

  4. AskApache ~

    @Luis

    Apache loads every time anyway@… so using it

  5. Mara Alexander ~

    The links under the “Redirect Method” section appear to have been meant to be anchor links, yet they all redirect to your main page (askapache.com). I’m thinking the anchor tags on the page weren’t done correctly.

  6. Luis ~

    Which would be the preferred redirect method: PHP or Mod Rewrite ? Why?
    I’m just curious abut it.

  7. Natasha ~

    This is great information. Thanks a bunch

  8. David Simmons ~

    Excellent collection! Thx

  9. nBridges Media ~

    Thanks for such nice list

  10. thebjorn ~

    Thanks for the list! saved me a bunch of time. If you’d like to add the code for Django/Python it is:

    from django import http
    def view(request):
    return http.HttpResponseRedirect(‘http://www.htaccesselite.com’)

  11. AskApache ~

    @ Ash

    Thanks! I will have to go through and clean up the code, especially adding code to do 307 Temporary Redirects, which should almost always be used instead of a 302 Redirect.

  12. Ash Nallawalla ~

    Thanks for this fantastic checklist! I will send my students to this page.

Go for it!


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