manifest / seo / broken-link-logger

404 & Broken Link Logger

Logs every 404 hit on your WordPress site (URL, referrer, hit count) and lets you redirect any of them to a working URL in one click — no bloated SEO suite required.

by Mc Glenn Tangalin · github.com/mcglenn07/broken-link-logger · website

★ 0stars

Install

Download source zip No release zip yet

This is the repository archive. It installs, but the folder name will carry the branch suffix and updates will not flow.

Install straight from GitHub with WP-CLI:

wp plugin install https://github.com/mcglenn07/broken-link-logger/archive/refs/heads/main.zip

No built-in updater. New versions won't appear under Dashboard → Updates. Install new releases yourself, or let Git Updater track the repository.

Readme github.com/mcglenn07/broken-link-logger ↗

Logs every 404 hit on your site and lets you redirect it to a working URL in one click, right from the WordPress admin.

Description

Most sites accumulate broken links over time — old blog posts get renamed, products get discontinued, external sites link to pages that no longer exist. Each one is a visitor (or search engine crawler) hitting a dead end. This plugin quietly logs every 404 your site serves and gives you a simple admin screen to do something about it.

Features

Logs every 404 hit: URL, last referrer, hit count, first/last seen.
Hits are grouped and counted, not duplicated — the same broken URL hit 50 times is one row with a count of 50, not 50 rows.
Sortable, searchable admin list table (Tools → Broken Links).
One-click "Redirect this" — turns a logged 404 into a working 301/302 redirect immediately, no separate redirect-manager plugin needed.
CSV export for sharing a broken-link report with a content team or SEO consultant.
Configurable ignore rules: skip logged-in users, skip known bot User-Agents, skip URL patterns (e.g. /wp-content/uploads/*) by glob pattern.
Automatic cleanup of old, unresolved entries after a configurable retention window (default 90 days, 0 = keep forever).
No tracking, no external requests, no bloat — two small custom tables, no JS framework, no build step.
Privacy-conscious: visitor IPs are never stored in plain text, only a salted one-way hash.

Why this instead of a big all-in-one SEO suite?

Many sites already have an SEO plugin and don't want a second one duplicating its redirect manager, or don't want to install a 2MB plugin just to find broken links. This plugin does exactly one job, does it with two small indexed database tables, and gets out of the way.

Installation

Upload the broken-link-logger folder to /wp-content/plugins/, or install the zip via Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin.
Activate the plugin through the "Plugins" screen.
Visit Tools → Broken Links to see logged 404s as they come in.
Visit Settings → Broken Link Logger to tune ignore rules and retention.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does this slow down my site?

Logging only runs on requests WordPress has already determined are a 404 — normal page loads are untouched except for one early, indexed lookup against the redirects table (to see if a redirect rule should fire instead of showing your 404 page).

Does it store visitor IP addresses?

No. A salted SHA-256 hash of the IP is stored for potential future unique-visitor de-duplication, but the raw IP is never written to the database.

What happens to my data if I deactivate the plugin?

Nothing — deactivating just stops new logging. Your data is only removed if you explicitly delete the plugin from the Plugins screen, which removes both custom tables and all plugin options.

Can I bulk-resolve or bulk-delete entries?

Yes, the admin list table supports bulk "Delete" and "Mark Resolved" actions, plus per-row "Redirect this", "Visit", and "Delete" actions.