Changing a post’s URL after it’s published

You may be tempted to open an old post and change the URL when you’re updating it, but this is a place to show caution. When you change the post slug, you break all the existing links that may be pointing to that page. Any links to the old URL will lose traffic and provide a poor user experience that leads to a 404 error. Google will also consider the post URL a new page/post unless you do this correctly.

The fix:

Before you initially publish a post/page, make certain the post slug is the way you want it. If you know that you’ll update the post in the future, consider that in the post slug. As an example, if your page is about 2020 Summer Events in Downtown Atlanta, instead of making the slug 2020-summer-events-in-downtown-atlanta, make the slug summer-events-in-downtown-atlanta.

In addition, if you have installed Yoast SEO, it can automatically remove “stop” words and shorten the post slug, as well as provide additional tips for creating a good post/page slug.