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Hello Rankmath team,
I’m looking to change the category name and slug for select categories, but wish to do it without 404s. How do I go about it.
For example I want to rename URL 1 to URL 2 without losing traffic.
This category also has sub-categories, so how would do I make this work correctly?
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Hello,
Thank you for reaching out to us. To change the category name and slug without causing 404s, you can follow these steps:
- Go to Posts → Categories and look for the category you want to edit.
- Hover over it and click the Edit button.
- Here you can edit the slug in the Slug field and update it.
If you have sub-categories, you should also update their slugs accordingly to maintain the hierarchy.
Additionally, if you are using Rank Math, you can enable the Remove parent slugs option in Rank Math SEO settings to remove the parent category slugs from the URLs. This will help you maintain the URL structure and avoid 404s.
After making these changes, it’s important to set up redirects for the old URLs to the new ones. You can use a redirection plugin like Rank Math or any other trusted redirection plugin to create 301 redirects from the old URLs to the new ones. This will ensure that your traffic is redirected to the new URLs without causing 404 errors.
If you’re changing settings on an existing website that’s already receiving traffic, we recommend proceeding with caution and looking into putting redirects in place. If you’ve made any changes, don’t forget to hit the Save Changes button at the bottom of the screen to reflect the changes.
I hope this helps! If you have any further questions or need assistance with anything else, feel free to ask.
Sources:
What Is a Slug in WordPress? » Rank Math
How to Optimize a Category Page » Rank Math
How to Remove the Category Base From WordPress » Rank Math
WordPress Permalink Structure & Changing Individual URLs » Rank Math
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