Googlebot 404 errors due to page numbers

zogstrip · May 21, 2026, 2:48pm

Hopefully this will fix the issue without introducing new ones

github.com/discourse/discourse

FIX: Redirect over-range topic page URLs instead of 404 (#40224)

main ← fix-over-range-page-redirect

merged 04:48PM - 22 May 26 UTC

ZogStriP

+34 -19

Requesting `/t/slug/id?page=N` with a page number beyond the topic's last valid …page raised `Discourse::NotFound` and returned 404. This produced a long-running stream of "increase in 404 errors" reports in Google Search Console, because crawlers (and our own `sitemap_recent.xml`) hold cached page URLs that become stale when a topic shrinks — most often after deleted posts or topic splits. The 404 also masked a latent bug for staff: the original check compared the requested page against `topic.posts_count`, a cached column that excludes whispers and ignores active filters (`username_filters`, `replies_to_post_number`, etc.). A staff user navigating to `?page=N` covering whisper posts could be 404'd even though the page contained content they were entitled to see. Replace the 404 with a 301 redirect to the last valid page (or the unparameterized topic URL if the topic fits in one page), using `@topic_view.filtered_posts.count` — the count of posts visible to the current viewer — so the math respects whispers, deletions visible to staff, and active filters. The COUNT query is gated behind `page > 1` so the common case (no `?page=` param) pays nothing extra. Negative pages still raise 404; only the over-range case becomes a redirect. https://meta.discourse.org/t/96337

Topic		Replies	Views
Canonical tag on topic URL Bug	23	2504	February 7, 2017
?page= bug, both in core and in sitemap plugin Bug sitemap	4	625	June 1, 2021
Sitemap plugin - no ?page=… urls in default sitemap Bug sitemap	12	1353	October 18, 2023
Pagination URL scheme not passed through when topic is renamed Feature	22	4052	May 20, 2015
?page= sometimes redirects to a page with a different canonical URL Bug	3	735	October 19, 2020

Googlebot 404 errors due to page numbers

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