Pages giving both 200 and 302 reponce codes?

[PaddyDisplays]

We are having some issues with response codes on our product pages  on our new site. It first came to my attention with the mozbot crawl which was picking up 1000s of 302 redirects, but when I checked them manually there was no redirect (and even the moz toobar was giving a 200 status)

I then check with this tool

http://tools.seobook.com/server-header-checker/?page=single&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.equipashop.ie%2Fshop-fittings-retail-equipment%2Fgridwall%2Fgridwall-shelves%2Fflat-gridwall-shelf.html&useragent=2&typeProtocol=11
And its showing that there are 2 responses at 302 and a 200  ( but with the same bot under googlebot setting only shows the 200 status). I'm also getting no warning about it in WMTs

Does anyone know what's happening here and how worried about it should I be as it seems goggle is using only the 200 status

btw the developer thinks it something to do with how the browser is handling the canonicallink, but I'm not convinced

Thanks

[PaddyDisplays]

just an update, its seems others have had this issue too.  We have been able to change the 302 to a 301 (magento defaults to 302 by default, this can be changed under configuration, web, url options).  I think the redirect something to do with the "Redirect to CMS-page if Cookies are Disabled", even though its set to "no" its seems its redirecting to the canonical instead.

Ultimately I think the solution is under the "Use Categories Path for Product URLs"  which is set to "yes" by default, this make the product urls the same at the canonical (which what google is indexing anyway)

[PaddyDisplays]

Thanks for that Dirk, there should be no redirect at all, let alone a 302 redirect, but now I have a good idea what's going on thanks

[DirkC]

Hi,

The message you get from the seobook tool is quite straightforward - trying the url https://www.equipashop.ie/shop-fittings-retail-equipment/gridwall/gridwall-shelves/flat-gridwall-shelf.html generates a 302

Then the tool tries the redirect url (https://www.equipashop.ie/flat-gridwall-shelf.html) - which gives status 200.

When I visited the site myself - on first visit - I was redirected to https://www.equipashop.ie/flat-gridwall-shelf.html - when I tried a second visit - I remained on https://www.equipashop.ie/shop-fittings-retail-equipment/gridwall/gridwall-shelves/flat-gridwall-shelf.html

I tried again using Incognito browsing - and again I was redirected. I think it has something to do with your cookie settings - when I disable cookies I am always redirected.

Hope this solves your question. Apart from that, if you want to redirect the URL - it's better to use a 301 than a 302

rgds,

Dirk