- Webflow & CMS
How to Set Up 301 Redirects in Webflow: A Guide for Nonprofit Website Migrations
Key takeaways
- Any URL that changes during a relaunch without a redirect becomes a broken link that harms visitors, search rankings, and the grant references and funder communications that point to your pages.
- A 301 is a permanent redirect that sends visitors to the new page, and Google documents that permanent redirects do not cost the old URL its PageRank.
- Build the redirect map before design or development starts, using a crawl (for example with Screaming Frog) to inventory every existing URL.
- Sort URLs into three categories (recreated at a new address, retired, or unchanged) and record old-to-new pairs in a spreadsheet that becomes the source of truth for setup and testing.
- Webflow's redirect manager lives in Site settings under Publishing, handles 301s without code, and moves whole folders with a capture group rather than one rule per page.
- Redirects only take effect once the site is published, so test priority URLs (homepage, donation, contact, and grant-referenced pages) after launch and monitor Search Console for remaining 404s.
Summary
A practical guide to setting up 301 redirects in Webflow: when you need them, how to map old URLs to new ones, and how to test them before launch.
Why Redirects Matter When You Launch a New Site
When a nonprofit launches a new website, the URL structure almost always changes. Every URL that moves without a redirect creates a broken link, with consequences in three directions.
For visitors. Anyone following an old link, from a grant application, a funder's website or an email newsletter, lands on a 404 page. For a grant officer checking your charity registration details, that 404 is a credibility failure at exactly the wrong moment.
For search rankings. When a URL changes without a redirect, the search authority the old URL accumulated evaporates. For a nonprofit that has built organic visibility over years, an unredirected migration can cause ranking drops that take months to recover.
For grant references and institutional records. Many nonprofits cite specific pages in grant applications and funder communications, and those references persist long after submission. A funder reviewing a renewal then finds a broken link where your impact page used to be: an entirely avoidable problem.
301 redirects solve all three. A 301 is a permanent instruction: the page at this old URL has moved permanently to this new URL. Google documents that permanent redirects do not cause a loss in PageRank and asks you to keep them for at least a year, the window it needs to move every signal across (Google Search Central, 2026).
Before You Build the Redirect Map
Inventory every URL on the existing site before any design or development begins on the new one.
Crawl the existing site with Screaming Frog and export every URL it finds as a spreadsheet, filtered to HTML pages only. The free version crawls up to 500 URLs (Screaming Frog, 2026), covering most nonprofit sites.
From this list, identify three categories: pages being recreated at new URLs (need a direct 301), pages being retired (redirect to the most relevant equivalent page), and pages staying at identical URLs (no redirect needed).
Record old URL and new URL as two columns. That is your redirect map, the source of truth for Webflow setup and post-launch testing. On every migration I work on, it is built before any Webflow work begins.
How to Set Up Redirects in Webflow
Webflow has a built-in redirect manager that handles 301s without code. It needs a paid Site plan, or a Workspace plan covering the site.
- Open site settings and navigate to Publishing
- Find the 301 redirects section
- In Old path, enter the path after the domain (e.g. /about-us/our-team)
- In Redirect to path, enter the new path (e.g. /team)
- Click Add redirect path
- Publish the site
Paths start with a forward slash and don't include the domain name. Webflow's redirect documentation (Webflow, 2026) adds three rules that decide whether a migration's redirects fire at all. A whole folder moves with a capture group, so an old path of /oldfolder/(.*) redirects to /newfolder/%1 instead of one rule per page. Special characters in the old path, ? and = among them, are escaped with a % in front, so a query string is written as %?category%=food. And rules run oldest first, so a specific redirect goes in before the wildcard that would otherwise catch it.
Webflow sets no hard limit on rule count but recommends a 1,000 maximum, since every rule ships in the site's manifest file for browsers to download.
Bulk Importing Redirects
If you have a long list of redirects, use the redirect manager's bulk CSV import. Prepare a CSV with two columns, the old path and the new path, one redirect pair per row, and upload it.
The redirect map spreadsheet doubles as the source for that CSV with minimal reformatting. One thing to know before pressing Import: a new import overwrites every redirect already on the site rather than adding to them (Webflow, 2026). Export the existing rules first and add your new rows to that file.
Testing Redirects Before Launch
Redirects do nothing until the site is published, so there is nothing to test before then. Test immediately after launch, before announcing the new site publicly.
Visit each old URL and confirm it lands on the right page; for larger migrations, crawl the list in Screaming Frog and check the response codes.
Test by hand every time: homepage, donation page, contact page, any page named in a current grant application, and any page with significant organic traffic in Google Search Console.
After Launch: Monitoring for 404 Errors
Even with a thorough redirect map, some 404s will appear. Monitor them in Google Search Console under Pages → Not Found (404) in the weeks after launch, and add redirects for any legitimate old URLs that should be pointing somewhere.
The Redirect Checklist Before Launch
- Screaming Frog crawl of existing site completed and URL list exported
- Redirect map built
- All redirects entered in Webflow's redirect manager or imported via CSV
- Webflow site published after redirects are added
- Priority redirects tested manually after launch
- Google Search Console set up to monitor post-launch 404s
Further Reading
Two clicks. Three things.
Send the address of your website. Within two working days you get a short email naming the three things a funder would hold against it, including what AI assistants like ChatGPT and Google’s AI Overviews currently say about you. No report, no call, no follow-up unless you ask.
Received. Your three things arrive within two working days.
That did not send. Email hello@socialectric.com with your website address and I will reply from there.
Frequently asked questions
- What is a 301 redirect and why does it matter when we relaunch?
A 301 is a permanent instruction telling browsers and search engines that the page at an old URL has moved to a new one, and to transfer any search authority to the new address. When a nonprofit launches a new website the URL structure almost always changes, and every URL that changes without a redirect creates a broken link. That breaks it in three directions at once: visitors following a link from a grant application or newsletter hit a 404, the search authority the old URL built up evaporates, and funders checking references in past applications find a dead link where your impact page used to be. Google's site move guidance is explicit that permanent redirects do not cause a loss in PageRank, and asks you to keep them in place for at least a year.
- How do I work out which URLs need redirecting?
Inventory the existing site before any design or development work starts on the new one. Crawl the current site with Screaming Frog and export every URL it finds, then filter for HTML pages only; the free version crawls up to 500 URLs, which covers most nonprofit sites. Sort the results into three categories: pages being recreated at new URLs, which need a direct 301; pages being retired, which redirect to the most relevant equivalent; and pages staying at identical URLs, which need nothing. Record old URL and new URL in a spreadsheet, and that redirect map becomes your source of truth for both the Webflow setup and the post-launch testing. For the decisions and sign-off that sit around that map on a larger relaunch, see migration planning and governance.
- How do I add a 301 redirect in Webflow?
Open site settings, go to Publishing, find the 301 redirects section, enter the path after the domain in Old path, such as /about-us/our-team, enter the new one in Redirect to path, such as /team, then click Add redirect path and publish the site. Paths start with a forward slash and do not include the domain name. A whole folder moves with a capture group, so an old path of
/oldfolder/(.*)redirects to/newfolder/%1instead of one rule per page, and special characters in the old path, including?and=, are escaped with a%in front. Webflow's redirect documentation has the full list.- Can I add all the redirects at once instead of one at a time?
Yes. If you have a long list of redirects, Webflow supports bulk CSV import in the redirect manager. Prepare a CSV with two columns, the old path and the new path, one redirect pair per row. The redirect map spreadsheet you built during the inventory doubles as the source for that CSV with minimal reformatting. One caution: a new import overwrites every redirect already on the site rather than adding to them, so export what is already there and add your rows to that file.
- Why are my redirects not working on the staging site?
Redirects entered in Webflow's redirect manager do nothing until the site is published, so there is nothing to test until a publish has happened. Test them immediately after launch and before you announce the new site publicly. Visit each old URL and confirm it lands on the right page, or use Screaming Frog to crawl a list of old URLs and check the response codes for a larger migration. Test these by hand every time: the homepage, the donation page, the contact page, any page referenced in current grant applications, and any page with significant organic traffic in Google Search Console.
- What do we do about broken links that appear after launch?
Expect some, even with a thorough redirect map. Monitor them in Google Search Console under Pages, then Not Found (404), and review that report in the weeks after launch. Add redirects for any legitimate old URLs that should be pointing somewhere. A technical SEO audit is the wider version of the same check.