Title: Prevent soft 404 errors (force 404 http response)
Last modified: August 20, 2016

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# Prevent soft 404 errors (force 404 http response)

 *  [peter_quinn](https://wordpress.org/support/users/peter_quinn/)
 * (@peter_quinn)
 * [13 years, 10 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/prevent-soft-404-errors-force-404-http-response/)
 * Is there a way to prevent WordPress from returning soft 404 error pages?
 * For most nonexistent links, WordPress will serve a 404 http response and display
   my custom 404 error page, which is the proper behavior. However, in some circumstances,
   such as a link to a category that no longer exists or a tag that no longer exists,
   WordPress displays a page that looks like a 404 page, but it is not. In Twenty
   Eleven, it says “Nothing Found” and “Apologies, but no results….” with a search
   box; this is served from the page template (e.g. archive.php), not an actual 
   404 page.
 * I don’t like this behavior for 2 main reasons:
 * 1) It’s causing this error, as reported in Google Webmaster Tools: [http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=181708](http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=181708)
 * 2) The content of the soft 404 page is baked into multiple theme files. I don’t
   want to have to edit all of them to match my custom 404 page, which I make adjustments
   to from time to time.

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)

 *  Thread Starter [peter_quinn](https://wordpress.org/support/users/peter_quinn/)
 * (@peter_quinn)
 * [13 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/prevent-soft-404-errors-force-404-http-response/#post-2890015)
 * I’ve determined that the problem occurs when a category or tag is no longer associated
   with a post. Deleting the category or tag from the master list does prevent the
   soft 404.
 * I would prefer to be able to turn this soft 404 behavior off completely. Any 
   ideas?
 * For now I’ll just have to remember to go in and delete unused categories and 
   tags every time I delete a post that has unique categories or tags.
 * Also, you can’t delete the “uncategorized” category. So that’s continuing to 
   cause the soft 404 error in Google Webmaster Tools.
 *  [TulsaWeb](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tulsaweb/)
 * (@tulsaweb)
 * [13 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/prevent-soft-404-errors-force-404-http-response/#post-2890073)
 * I just ran into the same problem with some unused tags.
 * Here’s a hack that will force the 404 template to be used and returns a 404 header:
   [http://wordpress.stackexchange.com/questions/46116/non-existing-blog-pages-are-not-redirected-to-404](http://wordpress.stackexchange.com/questions/46116/non-existing-blog-pages-are-not-redirected-to-404)
 * I didn’t use it, but it seems straightforward enough.
 * By the by, Uncategorized can be renamed and made useful, but it will still have
   uncategorized behaviour, ie: if you forget to choose a category, that category
   will be chosen for you.

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)

The topic ‘Prevent soft 404 errors (force 404 http response)’ is closed to new replies.

## Tags

 * [404-error](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/404-error/)
 * [soft 404](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/soft-404/)

 * In: [Fixing WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/how-to-and-troubleshooting/)
 * 2 replies
 * 2 participants
 * Last reply from: [TulsaWeb](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tulsaweb/)
 * Last activity: [13 years, 7 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/prevent-soft-404-errors-force-404-http-response/#post-2890073)
 * Status: not resolved

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