Soft 404: a "not found" page Google treats as gone

In brief

A soft 404 is a page that returns 200 while showing "not found"-style content: Google treats it as removed and drops it from the index. Return a real 404/410, or restore the content if the page should exist.

CriticalP0 — Deindexing

What is it?

The page returns a 200 status but displays a "page not found" message.

Why it hurts SEO and AI

Google detects these "soft 404s" and treats them as deleted pages: deindexing, while your HTTP monitoring tools see nothing (the status is 200). It is the classic blind spot of SPAs.

When it is NOT a problem

Seogard flagged the page but it genuinely has useful, unique content: it’s a false positive, no action needed.
It’s a deliberately lightweight but legitimate page with real content of its own.

Before

HTTP/1.1 200 OK

<h1>Page not found</h1>
<p>This product no longer exists.</p>

After

HTTP/1.1 410 Gone

<h1>Product removed</h1>
<p>This product is no longer available.</p>

What matters is the HTTP status: "not found" content must come with a 404 or 410, not a 200.

How to fix it

Find the URLs flagged as "soft 404" in the Search Console indexing report.
For content that is genuinely gone, return a 404 (not found) or 410 (permanently removed).
For a page that should exist, restore its real content.
On an SPA, make sure the server returns the right HTTP status, not just a JavaScript display.

This scan checks the HTTP status, noindex and canonical of every page

Is this issue on your site?

Do some of your pages return 200 while being empty? Enter a URL: Seogard catches soft 404s that your HTTP monitoring misses. Free, no credit card.

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Result in ~30 s

What you get back

The Google index reflects your actual site; crawl budget is no longer wasted on dead pages.

Seogard catches this regression automatically — through its monitoring for your metas and canonicals.

Frequently asked questions

Why does Google call it a soft 404 if my page returns 200?

Because the content looks like an error page ("not found", empty): Google trusts the content, not just the status, and treats it as removed.

Is a 404 or a 410 better?

A 404 means "not found" (maybe temporary); a 410 means "permanently gone" and speeds up deindexing. Use 410 when the removal is permanent.

Updated July 10, 2026