Why they are a problem
Instead of finding an answer, the reader lands on an error page and leaves. The bot spends crawl budget on a URL where there is nothing. Internal broken links also disrupt internal linking: the page they should have led to receives fewer visits.
How to check your site
Яндекс Вебмастере has a section called «Неработающие ссылки». The «Внутренние» subsection shows broken links between pages on your site, while «Внешних» shows links from other sites that lead to non-existent pages on your site. The report is based only on pages known to the bot, so the site should also be crawled with a crawler for a complete picture.
- Error in the address – fix the link
- The page has moved – set up a 301 redirect and update links to the new address
- The page was deleted without a replacement – remove the link or lead to a related resource