HTTP status code
Definition
An HTTP status code is a three-digit number returned by a server to indicate whether a request succeeded, redirected, or failed.
Plain English
200 means "here's the page." 301 means "it moved." 404 means "not found." 500 means "server broke."
Why it matters
- Non-200 responses can prevent indexing.
- Soft 404s (200 status on error pages) waste crawl budget.
- Correct status codes help search engines and AI systems trust your site.