This help page is an overview of different methods for redirecting a website or web page, and the situations where each method is preferred.

Please proceed with caution. If you make mistakes, your website may become unreachable.

Redirect Methods

• .htaccess

  A .htaccess (pronounced dot-aitch-tee-access) redirect is powerful, flexible, and preserves your search engine page ranking. In most cases, you should use this method.

• Forwarding or an A Record

  Forwarding is a very good and easy redirect method if you just bought an extra domain name, and want to point it to an existing website.

  Redirecting with an A record has limitations, but can be used in some cases. In cases where an A record will not work, you can use the .htaccess method instead.

  Both of these methods can redirect entire websites, but not individual pages.

• Meta Refresh

  A meta refresh redirect is not as good as a .htaccess redirect. However, some web hosts may not allow you to use a .htaccess file. In that case, use a meta refresh.

  A meta refresh can only redirect a single web page at a time.