HTTP Status Codes
HTTP status codes are three-digit numbers returned by a web server in response to a client request, indicating whether the request was successful, redirected, resulted in an error, or failed on the server.
Status codes fall into five classes: 1xx (informational), 2xx (success), 3xx (redirection), 4xx (client error), and 5xx (server error). For SEO, the critical codes are: 200 (OK — page served successfully), 301 (permanent redirect), 302 (temporary redirect), 404 (not found), 410 (permanently removed), and 503 (temporarily unavailable).
Search engines interpret status codes to decide how to handle URLs. A 200 means index the content. A 301 means transfer ranking signals to the new URL. A 404 means eventually remove from the index. A 503 means come back later (Google will retry). Using the wrong code can cause indexing problems — serving a 200 for a non-existent page (soft 404) confuses Google.
Indxel validates that all pages in your sitemap return 200, that redirects use appropriate codes (301 for permanent, 302 for temporary), and that error pages return proper 4xx/5xx status codes instead of soft 404s.
Related terms
301 Redirect
A 301 redirect is an HTTP status code that permanently redirects one URL to another, telling search engines to transfer ranking signals (link equity) to the new URL.
302 Redirect
A 302 redirect is an HTTP status code indicating a temporary redirect — the original URL should be retained in the search index because the redirect is not permanent.
404 Error
A 404 error is an HTTP status code indicating that the server cannot find the requested URL. It signals to search engines that the page does not exist.
Soft 404
A soft 404 is a web page that displays a "not found" or empty message to users but returns an HTTP 200 (OK) status code instead of the correct 404 status code, misleading search engines about the page's existence.
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