Redirects & server responses
5xx server errors
One of the 136 checks Lala SEO runs on every page of a site in a free audit.
- How serious
- Serious. Can stop pages from appearing in Google, or from working for visitors. Fix these first.
- Based on
- Industry standard: Google does not document this one, so the check follows established practice.
What is wrong
Your web server is returning 500 errors, which means it is telling search engines and visitors that something has broken on your site. This is different from a page not existing—it signals a technical failure that prevents the page from loading at all.
Why it costs you
When Google's crawler encounters a 500 error, it cannot read your page or index it. Visitors who land on these pages see an error message instead of your content, and many will leave immediately. If this happens on important pages, those pages disappear from search results until the errors stop.
How to fix it
Check your server's error logs to find what is causing the failures—common causes are a database connection problem, a plugin or extension conflict, or a recent code change. Once you identify the cause, fix it at the source. If you use a hosting provider, contact their support team with the error log details; they can often pinpoint the issue in minutes. After you fix it, the errors should clear within hours, and your pages will become visible again.
What the audit tests
- The page does not answer with a server error (5xx)
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