Redirection plugin review and common issues

First, clear all caches: WordPress caching plugin, CDN cache, and browser cache. Cached pages can serve the old URL response even after a redirect is configured. Next, test using curl in a terminal: curl -I yoursite.com/old-url — this bypasses browser caching. Check for conflicting redirects in .htaccess or Nginx configuration that might fire before Redirection’s PHP redirect. Also verify the redirect source URL matches exactly — including trailing slashes, which Redirection treats as distinct URLs.

Go to Redirection → Options → Logging and reduce the 404 log retention period. Setting it to 7–30 days instead of unlimited prevents unbounded database growth. You can also click Clear Logs to delete all current entries. For high-traffic sites receiving many 404s from bots, consider disabling 404 logging entirely after you have addressed the primary broken URLs — bot-generated 404s rarely require redirect responses.

This error indicates Redirection cannot communicate with its REST API endpoint. Common causes: (1) a security plugin blocking the REST API — check plugins like Wordfence or iThemes Security for REST API restrictions; (2) conflicting .htaccess rules blocking API routes; (3) WordPress REST API disabled by a “Disable REST API” plugin. Temporarily deactivate security plugins to test, then whitelist the Redirection REST endpoint in your security configuration.

Enable the “Regex” option when creating a redirect. For example, to redirect all old paginated URLs (/category/page/2/ through /category/page/99/) to the category root, use the source pattern: /category/page/([0-9]+) with regex enabled, and the target: /category/. The capture group ([0-9]+) matches any number. Test regex patterns at regex101.com before applying them in Redirection to avoid unintended matches.

If you have an exported list of old URL → new URL mappings (from a crawl tool like Screaming Frog or your old CMS), import them via Redirection → Import/Export → Import. Supported formats include CSV (source URL, target URL columns) and .htaccess format. For large migrations, importing via CSV is faster than creating redirects individually. After import, test a sample of redirects using curl or a browser with DevTools to verify the mapping is correct.

Redirection is more feature-rich for pure redirect management: regex support, conditional redirects, 404 logging, and import/export are more developed than what Yoast Premium or Rank Math offer in their bundled redirect tools. For most sites, the redirect manager in Rank Math (free) or Yoast Premium is sufficient. Redirection becomes the better choice when you have complex redirect logic, large redirect imports, or want a dedicated tool separate from your SEO plugin.

Redirects between http and https, or www and non-www, should be handled at the server level — in .htaccess (Apache) or Nginx configuration — not through a WordPress plugin. PHP never loads for properly configured server-level redirects, making them faster and more reliable. Redirection is designed for URL path redirects after the protocol and domain are resolved, not for protocol or domain-level redirects.

Yes, that can happen, especially on older sites with many plugins. This usually happens when the plugin, theme, and add-ons are updated out of sequence. In most cases, testing on staging catches the issue before it reaches the live site. From experience, backups and changelog reviews save a lot of cleanup time.

Start by checking whether another plugin already does the same job. In most cases, overlap is what creates avoidable conflicts and performance issues. A common issue is installing a plugin because it looks convenient without checking the stack first. From experience, a short compatibility review avoids most of the pain later.