Broken internal links: how to find and fix 404s inside your own site

What it is

An internal broken link is a hyperlink on one of your pages that points to another page on the same domain — but the destination returns 404 (Not Found), 410 (Gone), or another 4xx status. Common causes are slug renames without redirects, deleted product pages, and migrated CMS routes.

Why it matters

Internal links pass authority between pages. A broken one is a leak. They also damage user trust and bounce rate, and crawlers eventually slow down indexing pages that link to a lot of dead ends. For e-commerce, broken links inside product/category pages directly hurt conversion.

How to fix it

1. Run a site-wide crawl. Use VectraSEO's monitor (or Screaming Frog) to list every broken link grouped by source page. Prioritise pages with the most inbound links.
2. Repoint to the live destination. If the target was moved, update the link to the new URL. Do not rely on a 301 chain — fix the source.
3. Redirect orphaned URLs once. If the destination is genuinely gone, add a 301 from the old URL to the closest equivalent page. Don't mass-redirect to /.
4. Add a CI/CD link check. Wire a broken-link checker into your build or deploy hook so a new broken link blocks the merge instead of being discovered weeks later.