Redirects Module Reference
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Audience | public |
| Area | sg-module |
| Pillar | SG-Modules |
| Updated | 2026-05-27 |
What is this for?
Overview
The Redirects module manages URL redirect rules for the site.
It handles permanent redirects (301), temporary redirects (302), pattern-based rules (regex and wildcard), bulk import from CSV, conflict resolution when multiple rules match a URL, and a 404 monitor that surfaces broken inbound links and suggests redirects.
This page is a field-level reference.
For each surface the tables below state what the field is, what it controls, and how it behaves.
Scope
What the Redirects module covers
- One-off redirects — single source → destination redirect entries created from the admin UI.
- Bulk import — CSV upload for importing large redirect sets (site migrations, URL restructures).
- Regex and wildcard rules — pattern-based rules that match categories of URLs rather than a single path.
- Redirect type — 301 (permanent) or 302 (temporary) per rule.
- Priority and conflict resolution — when multiple rules match a request URL, the rule with the highest priority wins.
- Per-site scope — redirects are scoped to the active site in a multi-site SGEN install.
- 404 monitor — a log of inbound requests that returned 404, with auto-suggest for redirect targets based on URL similarity.
What the Redirects module does NOT cover
- CDN-level redirects (e.g. domain forwarding configured in DNS or a CDN edge layer) — those are outside SGEN.
- Login or authentication redirects (e.g. redirect to login page when a gated page is accessed) — those are platform-level access control.
- HTTPS enforcement — that is handled at the server or CDN layer.
- Redirect chains — SGEN does not auto-detect or flatten chains. If rule A redirects to a URL that rule B also redirects, both fire in sequence.
Where to find it
Navigate to SG-Modules > Redirects in the admin sidebar.
The Redirects panel shows the full list of active redirect rules for the current site.
The 404 Monitor tab shows inbound requests that returned 404, sorted by frequency.
Fields
Redirect rule fields
| Field | What it is | Accepted values |
|---|---|---|
| Source URL | The URL path being redirected. Relative path from site root. | /old-page or regex pattern or wildcard pattern |
| Destination URL | The URL the visitor is sent to. Absolute URL or relative path. | https://example.com/new-page or /new-page |
| Redirect type | The HTTP response code served with the redirect. | 301 (permanent) or 302 (temporary) |
| Match type | How the source URL is interpreted. | Exact match / Starts with / Regex / Wildcard |
| Case sensitive | Whether the source URL match is case-sensitive. | On / Off (default: off) |
| Priority | When multiple rules match the same URL, the rule with the highest numeric priority fires. Higher number = higher priority. | Integer, default 10 |
| Status | Whether the rule is active and being evaluated. | Active / Inactive |
| Notes | Internal label for this rule. Not served publicly. | Free text |
| Created | Date the rule was created. | Auto-set |
| Last matched | The last date this rule matched a live request. Useful for auditing stale rules. | Auto-updated |
CSV import fields
Bulk imports use a CSV file with headers.
The import runs validation before applying rules — invalid rows are listed for review and skipped.
| CSV column header | Required | What it maps to |
|---|---|---|
source | Yes | Source URL path |
destination | Yes | Destination URL |
type | No | 301 or 302. Defaults to 301 if blank. |
match_type | No | exact / starts_with / regex / wildcard. Defaults to exact if blank. |
priority | No | Integer. Defaults to 10 if blank. |
notes | No | Internal label for the imported rule. |
# Example CSV for a site migration — 5 sample rowssource,destination,type,match_type,priority,notes/about-us,/about,301,exact,10,Legacy about page/services/web-design,/services/design,301,exact,10,Service URL rename/blog/2020/*,/archive/2020/*,301,wildcard,5,2020 blog archive/old-category/(.*),/new-category/$1,301,regex,8,Category rename with path capture/temporary-sale,/sale,302,exact,10,Sale page — remove after campaignRegex and wildcard syntax
| Match type | Syntax | Example source | Matches |
|---|---|---|---|
| Exact | Literal path | /old-page | Only /old-page |
| Starts with | Literal path prefix | /old-section | /old-section, /old-section/any-subpath |
| Wildcard | | /blog/2020/ | /blog/2020/post-title, /blog/2020/another-post |
| Regex | PCRE regex (no delimiters) | ^/services/([a-z-]+)$ | /services/web-design, /services/copywriting |
$1, $2, etc.# Regex example: capture a slug and pass it throughSource: ^/old-section/([a-z0-9-]+)$Destination: /new-section/$1Type: 301Match type: RegexThis would redirect /old-section/my-article to /new-section/my-article.
Priority and conflict resolution
| Scenario | Behaviour |
|---|---|
| Two exact-match rules for the same source URL | The rule with the higher priority value fires. |
| One exact-match and one wildcard both matching a URL | Exact match takes precedence regardless of priority value. |
| One wildcard and one regex both matching a URL | Priority value determines which fires. |
| Two regex rules both matching a URL | Higher priority fires. |
| Priority values are equal | The rule created first fires (lower created-at timestamp). |
| A rule is set to Inactive | It is skipped entirely, regardless of priority. |
404 monitor fields
| Field | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Requested URL | The path that returned 404. |
| Hit count | Number of times this URL has been requested and returned 404 within the monitor window. |
| Last hit | Timestamp of the most recent 404 hit for this URL. |
| Referrer (where available) | The URL the visitor arrived from. Useful for identifying which external page is linking to the broken URL. |
| Suggested destination | Auto-suggested redirect target based on URL string similarity matching against existing published pages. Shown as a prompt — not applied automatically. |
| Action | Create redirect button pre-populates a new 301 redirect rule with the broken URL as source and the suggested destination as destination. Editable before saving. |
When to use this
When to use this
Use 301 (permanent) when a URL has been renamed, a page has merged into another page, a site section has been restructured, or old blog post URLs have changed format.
A 301 signals to search engines that the original URL should be replaced by the destination in their index.
Use 301 for the vast majority of production redirects.
Use 302 (temporary) when a page is unavailable for a defined period (maintenance, campaign, seasonal) and will return.
A 302 tells search engines to keep the original URL in the index.
Do not use 302 as a default — incorrect use of 302 instead of 301 on permanent moves slows index updates.
Use wildcard rules for broad path moves — an entire blog year archive, a renamed product category, or a deprecated site section where all subpaths follow the same pattern.
Use regex rules when the redirect logic requires capturing a path segment and passing it through to the destination (e.g. category renames where the slug structure is preserved).
Use bulk CSV import when migrating from another CMS and the redirect list has tens or hundreds of entries.
Prepare the CSV before migration, review the validation report, then apply.
Large imports (500+ rules) should be batched into groups of 100–200 rows per upload to make the validation review manageable.
Use the 404 monitor after a site migration, a URL restructure, or when Search Console reports 404 errors.
The monitor surfaces which broken URLs are receiving real traffic so you can prioritize which redirects to create first.
Check the monitor weekly in the first month after a major content restructure to catch any missed redirect cases.
Configuration
Configuration
See subsections below for each configuration task.
Creating a single redirect
- Open SG-Modules > Redirects from the admin sidebar.
- Click Add Redirect.
- Enter the Source URL — the path being redirected (e.g.
/old-contact). - Enter the Destination URL — where the visitor should land (e.g.
/contact). - Select the Redirect type — 301 for permanent, 302 for temporary.
- Select the Match type — Exact match for a single URL.
- Leave Priority at the default (10) unless this rule needs to override another.
- Add a Note to document why this redirect exists (optional but recommended).
- Save.
Importing redirects from CSV
- Open SG-Modules > Redirects.
- Click Import CSV.
- Download the CSV template to confirm the column format.
- Populate the CSV with source, destination, and optional fields.
- Upload the file.
- Review the validation report — rows with errors are listed with the reason.
- Correct any invalid rows in the CSV and re-upload, or proceed with valid rows only.
- Confirm the import.
Working with the 404 monitor
- Open SG-Modules > Redirects > 404 Monitor tab.
- Sort by Hit count to see the most-requested broken URLs first.
- Review the Suggested destination for each entry.
- Click Create redirect to open a pre-populated redirect form.
- Confirm or edit the destination URL.
- Set the redirect type (typically 301).
- Save.
Examples
Examples
Example 1 — Post-migration 301 bulk import.
An agency migrates a 200-page site from a legacy CMS to SGEN.
The old CMS used /page/slug URL format; SGEN uses /slug.
They generate a CSV mapping every old URL to its new equivalent, upload it via the bulk import, review the 3-row validation report (3 rows had missing destinations), fix those rows, and re-import.
All 200 redirects are live within minutes.
Example 2 — Temporary campaign redirect.
The marketing team runs a campaign using the short URL /summer-sale pointing to the current season's sale landing page /sale/summer-2026.
They create a 302 redirect from /summer-sale to /sale/summer-2026.
After the campaign ends, they set the rule to Inactive.
The /summer-sale URL will be reused next season pointing to a different destination.
Example 3 — Regex redirect for a renamed service category.
The site renames its /services/digital-marketing section to /services/growth-marketing.
All subpages follow the pattern /services/digital-marketing/slug.
The team creates a regex rule: source ^/services/digital-marketing/([a-z0-9-]+)$, destination /services/growth-marketing/$1, type 301.
A single rule covers all subpages without needing one rule per page.
Example 4 — 404 monitor after a blog restructure.
After reorganizing blog categories, the team checks the 404 Monitor a week later.
Three old category archive URLs are receiving daily traffic from external links.
The monitor shows the hit counts and suggests destinations.
The team creates 301 redirects for all three directly from the monitor interface.
Edge cases
Edge cases
Rule order when match types conflict.
Exact match always beats wildcard and regex regardless of priority value.
If you have an exact-match rule for /services/contact and a wildcard rule for /services/*, the exact-match rule fires when a visitor hits /services/contact.
Redirect loops.
A redirect loop occurs when rule A redirects to a URL that rule B redirects back to rule A.
SGEN does not detect loops at save time — the browser will report a redirect loop error.
If a URL is erroring, check all rules where that URL appears as a source or destination.
Regex with special characters in source path.
Characters like ?, #, or & in the source URL path must be handled carefully.
Query strings are not matched by the redirect module's source field — redirects apply to the path only, not the query string.
If you need to redirect URLs that differ only by query string, consult the platform engineering team.
Priority value collisions.
When two rules have the same priority and both match, the older rule (lower created-at) fires.
This is deterministic but may not reflect intent.
Assign explicit priority values when building overlapping rule sets to make the intended order explicit.
Inactive rules are not removed.
Setting a rule to Inactive preserves it in the list.
Rules that are no longer needed should be deleted rather than left Inactive, to prevent the list from becoming unmanageable.
CSV import — encoding.
The CSV must be UTF-8 encoded.
Files exported from Excel default to Windows-1252 on some systems.
If imported rules show character corruption, re-save the CSV as UTF-8 from the source application.
Related features
Related
- SEO module — when you restructure URLs, update the sitemap configuration alongside creating redirects. A redirect without a sitemap update can leave old URLs submitted to search engines.
- 404 monitor and Search Console — the 404 monitor complements Google Search Console's Coverage report. Use both: the monitor for inbound broken links, Search Console for indexed broken URLs.
- Ecommerce module — product URL changes (discontinued products, category renames) need redirect coverage. Create redirects before setting old product pages to draft or archived.
Related reading
| Topic |
|---|
| SEO Module Reference |
| Ecommerce Module Reference |
| Tracking & Consent Module Reference |