Converting 4,800 302s to 301: equity consolidation in 19 days

Converting 4,800 302s to 301: equity consolidation in 19 days

Migration aftermath. Status-code audit across 71,000 internal redirect targets.

302 (temporary) ▓▓▓▓▓▓░░░░ 61% (4,800 unique chains)
301 (permanent) ▓▓▓░░░░░░░ 34%
Other ▓░░░░░░░░░ 5%

The 302s were 18 months old — nothing temporary about them. We flipped them to 301.

Measured delta:
— Old URLs still crawled as live: 88% → 11% over 19 days
— Median chain length: 2.4 hops → 1.1 hops
— Target-page median position: 16.2 → 13.4 (↓2.8)

So what: a 302 tells crawlers 'keep the old URL.' For 4,800 chains that meant equity stranded mid-route. The fix was a config flag, not content work.