If Site Auditor returned an error that you're questioning, use the steps in this article to verify that it correctly reported this error.

4XX Errors are HTTP response status codes a server returns in response to a client request. It means that the request contains bad syntax or cannot be fulfilled. In other words, these errors typically occur when a URL has restricted access or rights, or doesn't exist.

To verify that our site auditor is reporting correctly, you can check the status of your URL at https://httpstatus.io. Open Site Auditor, then click "4XX Errors" to view which URLS are flagged with this error.

The dashboard will show you a list of URLs for which the site auditor has found 4XX errors. Copy each of these URLs,

Open https://httpstatus.io in a new browser tab, then copy and paste each URL in the Link URL column into the status tool. If that page confirms the 400 error, we're correctly reporting the error.

Some of the most common 4XX errors that our site auditor will report are:

Site Auditor will detect when HTTP is not redirecting correctly to HTTPS. These errors typically occur when a website uses HSTS technology to handle redirects.

If a user previously visited the HTTPS version of the website, HSTS will force the browser to go to HTTPS each time they return. However, if a user hasn't visited the HTTPS version, HSTS will not automatically redirect them if they arrive on the HTTP version of the site, which results in Site Auditor reporting an error.

Follow these instructions to check for a potential issue with HSTS:

This is because HSTS automatically redirects you to HTTPS after you visit HTTPS for the first time. However, as you've seen, it did not redirect you during step 1 of the instructions above.

Canonical tags are used to avoid duplicate issues when unique content is accessible from different URLs. You can access your page's source code to verify if pages reported by our site auditor have missing canonical tags.

From the Site Auditor dashboard, locate the Missing Canonical Tag issue, then click on it to view the affected pages.

To verify the issue, open the flagged page in a new tab, then right-click and select View Page Source.

A new tab will open showing your page's source code. Press Control+F to open the search bar and search for rel="canonical".

If your browser's search tool returns zero results, your page has a missing canonical tag.

A page with a missing meta description can harm your website's SEO. You can easily access your page's source code to confirm that Site Auditor reports this issue correctly.

First, Open Site Auditor, then click the Missing Meta Description error to view affected URLs.

The slideout will show you a list of pages without a meta description. Open a page from the slideout in a new tab, then right-click the page and click "View Page Source."

A new tab will open showing your page's source code. Press Control+F to open the search bar and search for <meta name=”description".

Once you've found the Meta Description within your code, verify that the attribute "Content" is placed right after it has a description of your page between quotation marks (i.e., content="Careers page").

If you can't find a description, your page is missing a meta description, and you will need to add one using your CMS or directly in your website's source code.

In case of a 5XX error, a bug or server misconfiguration might be blocking the request, even though the page may actually exist on the server. This differs from a 404 error, which means the page simply doesn't exist on the server.

If you're unsure whether our site auditor is reporting correctly, you can manually verify the link status at https://httpstatus.io/. If this page confirms a 500 error, then we're reporting it correctly at our end.

If the dead link checker does not show a 500 error, this indicates that the web server where the site resides is likely blocking our crawler. You must whitelist our user agent in your web host's firewall settings.

Using your browser's developer tools, you can verify this error directly on your website. From the Test section of Site Auditor, click on Duplicate Titles.

The slideout will display a list of pages that the Site Auditor has flagged for duplicate titles. It will also show the title used and any matching duplicate content found on those pages.

Open the page with a duplicate title in a new tab, then right-click the page and click "Inspect" to open the browser developer tools.

The developer tools will open on the right or bottom of your screen. Select the “Elements” tab, press Control+F to open the search bar, and paste the page title you previously copied to your clipboard.

You will find the count of found matches to the right of the search bar. Use the arrows next to it to find the title on your page. This title should be placed between the attributes <title> and </title> in your code.

You can fix these errors by changing one of the duplicate page titles.

An alt attribute (often called an "alt tag") provides search engines with descriptive information about an image, which impacts your on-page SEO.

To verify this error manually, navigate to Site Auditor, then click Missing Alt Attributes to view which resource URLs have been flagged for missing alt text.

A slideout will appear showing a list of pages containing images lacking alt attributes and the corresponding resource URLs. Clicking on a flagged URL will open a second slideout, indicating which page includes that image.

Visit the page where the resource URL was found, then open your web browser's developer tools by right-clicking and selecting "Inspect".

The developer tools will open on the right or bottom of your screen. Select the “Elements” tab. Press Ctrl + F to open the search bar and paste the image URL. Then, delete the root domain from this URL (for example, if your image URL is "yourdomain.com/page/image.jpg", paste only "/page/image.jpg" in the search bar).

Look for the resource URL with the image tag "<img src=". Images with an alt attribute appear in your website's code along with the tag alt="" and a descriptive text between the quotation marks:

An H1 tag is used to indicate a webpage's title and provide information to search engines about the content of a specific page. It is important to add this tag to each of your pages for SEO purposes. However, multiple H1 tags within a page can also harm your SEO.

First, open Site Auditor. Then, locate the Missing H1 error and click on it to view the affected URLs.

To validate the page, click the URL below to open it in a new tab. Once the page has opened, open your web browser's developer tools by right-clicking and selecting "Inspect".

The developer tools will open on the right or bottom of your screen. Select the “Elements” tab.

Press CTRL+F to open the search bar and type <h1>. You will find the count of found matches to the right of the search bar. You can use the arrow next to it to find where all tags are placed within the code.

To show where each of your H1 tags is located in your page, right-click at the end of the line of code you want to reveal and select "Scroll into View".

If you have any questions, please contact our friendly support team by following these instructions! We're available 24/5 to help 😄