Shorten and clean URL slugs for on-page SEO

Why this matters

Fix slugs with underscores, capitals, dates or four-plus words so each URL carries the target keyword.

Before you start

• Access to the CMS or code that sets page URLs
• Ability to add 301 redirects on the server or in the CMS

How to apply it

1. Flag slugs that break the rules

   Export URLs from Search Console or a crawler and look for slugs containing underscores, uppercase letters, four or more words, or embedded dates and numbers that are not part of the topic.

   Check: The exported URL list is filtered to a set of slugs containing at least one underscore, capital letter or date segment.

2. Rewrite the slug to two or three words

   Build the new slug from the primary keyword plus at most two supporting words, lowercase only, separated by single hyphens, with dates and arbitrary numbers removed unless the content is date-specific.

   Check: The new slug matches the pattern ^[a-z0-9]+(-[a-z0-9]+)*$ and contains no underscore or uppercase character.

3. Set the slug before publishing new pages

   For new content, set the slug in the CMS URL field before the first publish so no redirect is ever needed, and apply the same rule in page templates and programmatic URL generators.

   Check: The preview or draft URL in the browser address bar shows the clean lowercase hyphenated slug.

4. Redirect changed URLs General best practice

   When an existing live slug changes, add a single 301 redirect from the old path to the new one and keep the old URL out of the sitemap.

   Check: curl -I your production domain/old-slug/ returns HTTP/1.1 301 with a Location header pointing at the new slug.

5. Update internal links and the sitemap General best practice

   Replace internal links that point at the old slug and regenerate the sitemap so it lists only the new URL.

   Check: The regenerated sitemap.xml contains the new slug and no occurrence of the old slug; a site: search for the old path returns no internal pages linking to it.

<goal>
section signal heading pipeline caching render payload snippet target section payload crawl image markup.
</goal>

<context>
section pipeline serp query report locale target locale alt cluster caching priority metadata crawler.
</context>

<discover_first>
caching measure priority sitemap payload route effort caching route metadata verify canonical report signal.
</discover_first>

<constraints>
image payload metadata image cluster serp locale anchor caching heading sitemap layout pipeline pipeline.
</constraints>

<plan>
index index verify index audit crawl page report route crawl section index pipeline effort.
</plan>

<verify>
audit measure section measure snippet render breadcrumb breadcrumb render breadcrumb serp anchor target intent.
</verify>

<report>
caching index metadata route priority serp schema alt intent sitemap route template target redirect.
</report>

Source: @connorshowler on 2026-10-18 · original post · report an error