[How to] Setup www.yourdomain.com or yourdomain.com (www vs. non-www) - With .htaccess 301 redirects

Most websites are setup to allow access via either www or non-www. Example:

Code:

vbseo.com

or

Code:

www.vbseo.com

However - this can lead to duplication of your content or redundant URLs within the search engines.

For best SEO, you need to choose one version or the other, to ensure full link consistency and consensus, and to maximum crawling efficiency.

There are 2 methods of specify which version to use. One is by using your .htaccess file. The second way is to select your preferred format within Google Webmaster Tools.

Choosing to Use the WWW version of your domain ONLY

Edit your .htaccess file.
At the top, add the following new lines:

Code:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\.example\.com$
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.example.com/$1 [R=301,L]

Note: You must replace example.com with your own site URL.

Once your new .htaccess file is uploaded to the server, your site will ONLY be accessible via the WWW version of your domain.

Anytime a user or search engine tries to access the non-WWW version of your site, they will be automatically forwarded to the WWW version.

Choosing to Use the NON-WWW version of your domain ONLY

• Edit your .htaccess file.
• At the top, add the following new lines:

Code:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^example\.com$
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://example.com/$1 [L,R=301]

Note: You must replace example.com with your own site URL.

Once your new .htaccess file is uploaded to the server, your site will ONLY be accessible via the NON-WWW version of your domain.

Any time a user or search engine tries to access the WWW version of your site, they will be automatically forwarded to the NON-WWW version.


Making Exceptions

As this will only allow 1 way in, some times an exception must be made for other subdomains. If you need to allow an exception (ie, for a CDN), you can use an 'or' statement, you can do so by replacing

www:

Code:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\.example\.com$

with

Code:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !(^www\.example\.com$|^cdn\.example\.com$)

non-www:

Code:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^example\.com$

with

Code:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !(^example\.com$|^cdn\.example\.com$)

where | denotes the 'or' case.

Your CDN subdomain should be blocked via robots.txt at the CDN level. You cannot add it to your local robots file.


Choosing WWW or NON-WWW version of your domain in Google Webmaster Tools

If you are not yet using Google Webmaster Tools, you should be. It provides a wealth of info on how to improve your site for SEO purposes.

Here is a primer on some of the key aspects you should be evaluating with your account:
Google Webmaster Tools - Recommended for All vBSEO Customers

To specify which version of your domain to use, login to your account and go to the following section:

Go to Dashboard > Tools > Set preferred domain

Associate a preferred domain with this site, to always or never show the leading "www." in Google's search results.

Google will then ONLY list the WWW or NON-WWW version of your URLs in the index, whichever you select.


Lighttpd Webserver

Choosing to Use the WWW version of your domain ONLY

Please add the following rule to your lighttpd.conf file. In order to edit lighttpd.conf you can use the following command.

Code:

# vi /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf

After editing lighttpd.conf using the vi editor, please save it and restart lighttpd.

Code:

$HTTP["host"] =~ "^domain\.com$" { url.redirect = ( "^/(.*)" => "http://www.domain.com/$1" ) }

You can restart lighttpd with the following commands.

Code:

# service lighttpd restart
# /etc/init.d/lighttpd restart

Note: You must replace domain.com with your own site URL.

Choosing to Use the NON-WWW version of your domain ONLY

Please add the following rule to your lighttpd.conf file. In order to edit lighttpd.conf you can use the following command.

Code:

# vi /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf

After editing lighttpd.conf via the vi editor, please save your lighttpd.conf and restart lighttpd.

Code:

$HTTP["host"] =~ "^www\.(.*)" { url.redirect = ( "^/(.*)" => "http://%1/$1" ) }

You can restart lighttpd with the following commands.

Code:

# service lighttpd restart
# /etc/init.d/lighttpd restart

Note: You must replace domain.com with your own site URL.

Thanks, I could have used this about a year ago when I first set this up on my sites lol. I'm sure this will be helpful for many users though!

Good point Justin. We'll try to do a better job of getting common questions clearly documented on the site.

www. is deprecated.

I guess it is not a good idea for active forums, because all of my pages indexed with www. so if i drop www. it means my index will be decrease than google have to reindex new pages without www

the htaccess rule 301's it. you shouldn't lose any ranking.

Plus, in the google webmasters portal, you can set www vs non-www right there. so even if all your links are www in there, you can have them send to non-www.

If you already have www indexed, and you are ok with that, I think you are very safe to stick with it.

We use www here and we won't be changing, even though a few of my own private sites are setup without it.

One thing we have to consider is "user behavior". It's quite common when someone types in a domain (from memory) that they may include the www part since it's been used so prominently from the early beginnings of the Web.

or, they type 'site' and hit ctrl + enter, which auto adds http and www and .com to it

Interesting. Good point.

One thing that has always bothered me is sites that allow one or the other, but do NOT redirect the non-preferred version.

I have seen major websites (even recently) that give a 404 error if you enter the domain without the www. part.

that's because IIS sucks

oh, wait... i didn't mean to say thaty out loud

Originally Posted by Joe Ward

Good point Justin. We'll try to do a better job of getting common questions clearly documented on the site.

Sorry, didn't mean for it to sound like I was complaining :P You guys do a great job with presenting useful information here.

Originally Posted by jbartle

Sorry, didn't mean for it to sound like I was complaining :P You guys do a great job with presenting useful information here.

I knew you were not complaining. But - we still have not organized all the information will have available to the level that it should be yet. We're working on it.

Thanks, I did it on all my sites.. I had set the Google preferred domain, but did not have the code in .htaccess

Just posting to make that annoying message go away at the top of the page.