Wants to know how to fix 404 error?
Almost everyone confronts the infamous 404 error at some point in their online surfing. It’s an HTTPS status code to indicate problematic communication between your browser and web server. The issue leads to an invalid website link, prohibiting the intended webpage from loading. Whether it’s a technical problem or just a user-side issue, you must consider all available fixing approaches.
Different Forms of 404 Error
Anything mentioned below primarily indicates a potential 404 error –
- 404 Not Found
- Error 404
- HTTP 404
- 404 Page Not Found
- 404 File or Directory Not Found
- Requested URL Not Found on the Server
- Error 404 Not Found
- HTTP 404 Not Found
- Cannot Find the Page You’re Looking For
There are many reasons to trigger 404. But we would like to focus on the resolving methods to fix it.
Fixing 404 Errors as Website Owner/Developer/Admin
The negative effect actually goes well beyond than user experience with 404 error codes. As the website administrator, it’s your job to keep everything functional and satisfactory throughout the navigation. The primary actions you should implement to fix a 404 error as website admin include –
- Employing a Redirect
It’s a simple strategy to replace the 404 error by redirecting the user to a different yet relevant webpage. Never put the website homepage blindly for all kinds of 404 web pages. It can heavily impact your site’s viewers, given your website’s webpage numbers.
- Creating 404 Webpage
Popular websites feature a custom 404 page while aligning with the brand. There are several ways to keep the users still engaged, letting visitors spend more time on your site. It specifically helps reduce the overall bounce rate.
- Correcting the Links
Carefully review all the URLs (or at least the important ones) on your website. Keep looking for potential errors and edit the back-end URLs. The same goes for all the hyperlinks, so make sure they always point to the designated links.
- Restoring the Webpage
Sometimes, customers may encounter a 404 error code while trying to access unpublished pages. You may restore the old ones, especially when pages are deleted by accident. The same strategy goes for pages that are too popular or valuable.
- Integrating Measures
Maintaining a proactive approach is crucial for certain websites regarding 404 errors. Crawl your website with premium tools to repair 404 errors upon finding them. More webpage on the website means you’ll have to conduct crawling at close intervals (weekly or daily).
Search engines aren’t very strict when it comes to 404 errors as a ranking factor. But having or facing too many 404 codes will surely affect the SEO performance in the long run. So, you better schedule regular crawling to find and resolve the error as soon as possible.
Fixing 404 Errors as Website User/Customer/Visitor
Don’t let the onscreen 404 error code fool you as a technical issue. While looking for information on the internet, you should follow some tricks to see whether a 404 error lies on your side –
- Refreshing the Webpage
Improper loading of the intended webpage can easily trigger 404 errors. Either refresh or reload the page should immediately fix the issue.
- Search the website
Don’t overwhelm yourself with blind searching in the directory. Almost all websites feature a universal search function. Use the bar to locate the page through matching keywords.
- Checking the URL
You should review the entered or loaded URL to justify whether it’s correct. Look for spelling mishaps and misplaced slashes, underscore, or dashes.
- Using Search Engine
Search engines are faster in finding a certain website. All you need is to enter the domain alongside the keyword(s). But it won’t work on websites that no longer exist or function.
- Looking into Directory
Some web pages may require different ways to reach them. Get back to the previous directory to see whether there are alternate ways to navigate to your desired webpage.
- Cache and Cookies
Delete all the cookies and clearing the cache may help resolve the error related to browsers. It’s because some browsers can’t properly reach out to the webpage due to overloaded cookies/cache.
- Using Different Device
Failure to access due to device incompatibility isn’t very common, but not impossible. Changing the device can provide instant access without showing any 404 error codes.
- Contact the Admin
Send a message or make direct contact with the website administration about 404 issues. Either they’ll fix the problem technically or respond to its whereabouts or existence.
Wrapping Up
There are many reasons, besides the website problems, to deliver the 404 message. As a user, you may have to make some extra efforts to confirm the extent of such issues. Meantime, the admins will have to deal with 404 when it’s a technical problem.
Contact Tectera a web development company in Sri Lanka to fix 404 error.
