Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • MozCon
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      Turn SEO data into actionable content briefs

      Turn SEO data into actionable content briefs

      Learn more
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      Let your business shine with Listings AI

      Let your business shine with Listings AI

      Get found
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Access 20 years of data with flexible pricing
      Moz API

      Access 20 years of data with flexible pricing

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers

        Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. SEO Tactics
    3. Technical SEO
    4. 301 Redirect on a PDF, DOCX files?

    Moz Q&A is closed.

    After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

    301 Redirect on a PDF, DOCX files?

    Technical SEO
    2
    4
    18671
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • IM_Learner
      IM_Learner last edited by

      Hi,

      I have to rename many pdf and docx files. How can I implement 301 redirect on them as they are linked from 'n' number of places?

      Regards,

      Shailendra Sial

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
      • KevinBudzynski
        KevinBudzynski last edited by

        Good eyes--Fixed!

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
        • IM_Learner
          IM_Learner @KevinBudzynski last edited by

          Thanks! It worked. But there is a slight correction in the above code. The word "refresh" will be within double quotes.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • KevinBudzynski
            KevinBudzynski last edited by

            Good way from => http://www.henderson.cc/wp/tag/301-redirect/

            While poking around on the Web, I found an article by John Honeck, entitled “Page by Page redirects in IIS for .asp, .html, .pdf, etc.“. He presented an ingenious method for implementing redirection of a PDF document. Rename or remove the old PDF document from the directory. In its place, create a new folder and give it the exact same name as the outdated PDF, including the use of the .pdf extension.

            Inside the new folder, place a default Web page (index.htm, default.htm, etc.). In the head of the default Web page, place meta redirect code. A user (or Google spider) visits the directory, finds an object with the correct name and the default Web page redirects them to the new content!

            Here’s sample code:

            <title>Moved to new URL: http://www.example.com/pdfs/thenewpdf.pdf</title>

            This page has been moved to http://www.example.com/pdfs/thenewpdf.pdf

            If your browser doesn’t redirect you to the new location please click here

            IM_Learner 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
            • 1 / 1
            • First post
              Last post

            Got a burning SEO question?

            Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


            Start my free trial


            Browse Questions

            Explore more categories

            • Moz Tools

              Chat with the community about the Moz tools.

            • SEO Tactics

              Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers

            • Community

              Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!

            • Digital Marketing

              Chat about tactics outside of SEO

            • Research & Trends

              Dive into research and trends in the search industry.

            • Support

              Connect on product support and feature requests.

            • See all categories

            Related Questions

            • CitimarineMoz

              How effective are 301 redirects in passing page rank?

              301 redirect page rank

              I have a blog which is ranking well for certain terms, and would like to repurpose it to better explain these terms it is ranking for, including updating the url to the new term the blog will be about. The plan being to 301 redirect the old url to new. In the past, I've done this with other pages, and have actually lost much of the rankings that I had earned on the original URL. What is your take on this? Maybe repurpose blog, but maintain original URL just to be on the safe side? Thanks

              Technical SEO | | CitimarineMoz
              0
            • alstam

              301 redirect from dynamic url to static page

              Hi, i want to redirect from this old link http://www.g-store.gr/product_info.php?products_id=1735/ to this one https://www.g-store.gr/golf-toualetas.html I have done several attempts but with no result. I anyone can help i will appreciate. My website runs in an Apache server with cpanel. Thank you

              Technical SEO | | alstam
              0
            • SamKlep

              301 redirect syntax for htaccess

              I'm working on some htaccess redirects for a few stray pages and have come across a few different varieties of 301s that are confusing me a bit....Most sources suggest: Redirect 301 /pageA.html http://www.site.com/pageB.html or using some combination of: RewriteRule + RewriteCond + RegEx I've also found examples of: RedirectPermanent /pageA.html http://www.site.com/pageB.html I'm confused because our current htaccess file has quite a few (working) redirects that look like this: Redirect permanent /pageA.html http://www.site.com/pageB.html This syntax seems to work, but I'm yet to find another Redirect permanent in the wild, only examples of Redirect 301 or RedirectPermanent Is there any difference between these? Would I benefit at all from replacing Redirect permanent with Redirect 301?

              Technical SEO | | SamKlep
              1
            • musthavemarketing

              301 redirects delay in picking up

              Hi I have been involved in the redesign/development of a website which has up until now had a lot of international traffic.  On day of migration I uploaded all the 301 redirects to the website (wordpress) using Simple 301 redirect plugin.  I tested a number of them and they appeared to be working. I also submitted the new sitemaps to Search Console. Since migration international traffic - particularly from countries such as india, Phillipines, Sri Lanka etc have significantly dropped off whereas the local traffic and some of the international traffic such as USA has remained fairly consistent.  Looking at Analytics and entrances recently it appears as though search results are/were showing a number of pages with 404's (one in particular which received significant traffic and for which I had created a 301 redirection) - I have checked this page using the old url and it re-directs correctly for me and today asked a colleague in India to also check - he is getting the redirection fine.  Does Google.in take a significantly longer time to pick these up in search results? Or am I missing something?

              Technical SEO | | musthavemarketing
              0
            • ztalk112

              301 redirect: canonical or non canonical?

              Hi, Newbie alert! I need to set up 301 redirects for changed URLs on a database driven site that is to be redeveloped shortly. The current site uses canonical header tags. The new site will also use canonical tags. Should the 301 redirects map the canonical URL on the old site to the corresponding canonical for the new design . . . or should they map the non canonical database URLs old and new? Given that the purpose of canonicals is to indicate our preferred URL, then my guess is that's what I should use. However, how can I be sure that Google (for example) has indexed the canonical in every case? Thx in anticipation.

              Technical SEO | | ztalk112
              0
            • Liggins

              Updating inbound links vs. 301 redirecting the page they link to

              Hi everyone, I'm preparing myself for a website redesign and finding conflicting information about inbound links and 301 redirects. If I have a URL (we'll say website.com/website) that is linked to by outside sources, should I get those outside sources to update their links when I change the URL to website.com/webpage? Or is it just as effective from a link juice perspective to simply 301 redirect the old page to the new page? Are there any other implications to this choice that I may want to consider? Thanks!

              Technical SEO | | Liggins
              0
            • bewoldt

              How to create a delayed 301 redirect that still passes juice?

              My company is merging one of our sites into another site. At first I was just going to create a 301 redirect from domainA.com to domainB.com but we decided that would be too confusing for customers expecting to see domainA.com so we want to create a page that says something like "We've moved. please visit domainB.com or be redirected after 10 seconds". My question is, how do I create a redirect that has a delay and will this still pass the same amount of juice that a regular 301 redirect would? I've heard that meta refreshes are considered spammy by Google.

              Technical SEO | | bewoldt
              0
            • TrevorMcKendrick

              301 Redirect with an Exact Domain name Match

              My Client had a site that ranked for a pretty competitive two word phrase, but for a variety of reasons had to transfer the site to a different domain name (with none of the previous keywords). We've 301'd everything just fine to the new site, but our traffic for that two word phrase, as well as related long tail traffic, is beginning to drop. Could the drop be related to something that we didn't do well in the transfer? Or is it due to the new domain name now not being an exact match? Sitenote question: Our Google Analytics is still set up for the former domain name and shows data just fine. Is there any reason to switch GA to the new domain? What are the pros/cons? Much thanks in advance!

              Technical SEO | | TrevorMcKendrick
              0

            Get started with Moz Pro!

            Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

            Start my free trial
            Products
            • Moz Pro
            • Moz Local
            • Moz API
            • Moz Data
            • STAT
            • Product Updates
            Moz Solutions
            • SMB Solutions
            • Agency Solutions
            • Enterprise Solutions
            • Digital Marketers
            Free SEO Tools
            • Domain Authority Checker
            • Link Explorer
            • Keyword Explorer
            • Competitive Research
            • Brand Authority Checker
            • Local Citation Checker
            • MozBar Extension
            • MozCast
            Resources
            • Blog
            • SEO Learning Center
            • Help Hub
            • Beginner's Guide to SEO
            • How-to Guides
            • Moz Academy
            • API Docs
            About Moz
            • About
            • Team
            • Careers
            • Contact
            Why Moz
            • Case Studies
            • Testimonials
            Get Involved
            • Become an Affiliate
            • MozCon
            • Webinars
            • Practical Marketer Series
            • MozPod
            Connect with us

            Contact the Help team

            Join our newsletter
            Moz logo
            © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
            • Accessibility
            • Terms of Use
            • Privacy

            Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.