How to Manage Bulk Redirects for Your Multilingual Shopify Store

If you're a high-growth Shopify merchant using Shopify Markets or a third-party app to sell globally, you are managing more than just one website, you're managing a collection of language and country-specific URLs. When you restructure your site, change product handles, or migrate to a new platform, you face a massive logistical challenge: managing thousands of redirects across multiple languages.

This post will show you how to solve the problem of mass multilingual redirects, ensuring your international customers always find the right page and that your global SEO equity remains intact.

Quick Answer

You can efficiently manage bulk, multilingual redirects on Shopify, and doing so is crucial for international SEO. The most effective method is using a dedicated redirect management app like SC Easy Redirects to facilitate CSV bulk upload. This allows you to import thousands of language-specific redirect pairs in a single step. This process not only protects your existing SEO rankings in every market but also eliminates the manual, error-prone task of updating global 404s one-by-one, ensuring a seamless experience for your international buyers.

What is SC Easy Redirects?

SC Easy Redirects is a Shopify app designed to simplify the complex and often time-consuming task of managing redirects. Unlike Shopify's native redirect tool, which is limited to manual, one-by-one entry, this app provides essential features like bulk CSV import and export, automatic 404 monitoring, and the ability to handle complex regex (wildcard) redirects. This allows merchants to manage large-scale URL changes efficiently.

Who needs SC Easy Redirects?

The app is essential for any merchant who:

• Manages Multilingual Content: Needs to upload thousands of language-specific redirect pairs (e.g., /fr/old-page to /fr/new-page) efficiently via a single file.

• Is Migrating to Shopify: Must handle a large volume of URL changes from a legacy platform without losing SEO authority.

• Changes URL Structures Often: Requires an easy way to update paths in bulk after major collection or product handle updates.

• Wants to Protect SEO: Needs continuous monitoring of 404 errors to quickly turn broken links into functional, authoritative 301 redirects.

Why Bulk Redirects Matter for You

• Protect Existing SEO Equity: A 301 redirect passes roughly 90-99% of the SEO "authority" or "link juice" from the old URL to the new one, preventing ranking drops in specific international markets.

• Prevent Frustrating 404 Errors: International customers will land on the correct page immediately, rather than seeing a "Page Not Found" message in their native language.

• Maintain Link Authority: Ensures valuable external backlinks pointing to your old, language-specific URLs continue to work and benefit your store.

• Save Time: Allows you to manage thousands of redirects in minutes using a single CSV file, rather than hours of manual entry.

How to Set Up Bulk Redirects on Shopify

Setting up bulk, multilingual redirects efficiently requires a tool that can handle large datasets and common path structures, like SC Easy Redirects.

Step 1: Prepare your store

• Finalize Structure: Ensure your new, multilingual URL structure is finalized (e.g., all new product handles are set across all languages).

• Gather Data: Compile a complete list of your old (Source) URLs and their corresponding new (Destination) URLs. This is your master redirect list.

• Format for Language: Crucially, your list must include the language path or subdomain.

• Source: /fr/collections/old-collection-handle

• Destination: /fr/collections/new-collection-name

Step 2: Install and configure the app(s)

• Install SC Easy Redirects: Add the app from the Shopify App Store.

• Access Bulk Upload: Navigate to the app's dashboard and locate the Bulk Upload or Import feature. This is where you will input your data.

Step 3: Create rules and logic

• Create the CSV: Use a spreadsheet program (like Excel or Google Sheets) to create a file with at least two columns: Source (old URL path) and Destination (new URL path).

• Upload the File: Upload your completed CSV file. The app will process the list and apply thousands of individual, language-specific redirects in the background.

Step 4: Test the flow

• Manual Spot Check: Don't rely solely on the import. Manually test a few high-priority redirects from your list for each language path.

• Test /es/old-product to ensure it lands on /es/new-product.

• Test /de/old-product to ensure it lands on /de/new-product.

• Check Redirect Type: Use a free online HTTP header checker tool to verify that the redirects are applied. 

Step 5: Go live and monitor

• Launch: Once tested, you are ready to go live with the changes that necessitated the redirects.

• Monitor 404s: Use the 404 monitoring dashboard within SC Easy Redirects. This feature will automatically log any requests that result in a 404 error, allowing you to quickly spot any language redirects you missed and add them to your list.

Examples and Use Cases

Here are a few use cases where bulk, multilingual redirects are essential:

Recommended Setup

For reliable, bulk redirect management on a multilingual Shopify site, you need a powerful, specialized tool.

• Main app – SC Easy Redirects: This is the primary solution for all your redirect needs. Its core strength lies in its ability to handle massive CSV imports and provide continuous, intelligent 404 monitoring, which is critical for sites with thousands of language-specific URLs.

• Supporting app – Shopify Markets / Translate & Adapt: Used to properly generate the correct language subfolders/subdomains in the first place, ensuring the URLs you are redirecting to are valid.

Best Practices

• Map Language to Language: Always ensure your redirects are specific: /de/alt-url must map to /de/neue-url, not the English page.

• Minimize Redirect Chains: Never redirect Old URL A to Old URL B to New URL C. This is called a "redirect chain" and slows down the page load and dilutes SEO value. Redirect directly from A to C.

• Prioritize Critical Pages: Before importing, check that your top-traffic, highest-ranking language pages are correctly mapped.

• Test with the Language Path: When testing, always include the language subfolder in your manual URL test (e.g., www.yourstore.com/fr/old-page).

• Audit Your 404s Monthly: Use the app's 404 monitoring dashboard to catch any broken links that naturally appear over time.

Summary

Scaling your Shopify store globally means scaling your technical maintenance. You can run a global store and handle major site restructures without compromising your SEO or customer experience. By leveraging the bulk CSV import feature of an app like SC Easy Redirects, you can implement thousands of language-specific 301 redirects in a single action, protecting your rankings across all markets.

If you are facing a migration or a large-scale URL change on your multilingual site, you can try SC Easy Redirects to handle the heavy lifting of global 301 management.