What are the SEO considerations when migrating a whole site from http to https

[A_Q]

Hi Mozzers,

I'm in the process of migrating a whole site, which has excellent rankings built through ongoing SEO over the years, from http to https.

What is the safest way of doing this, while maintaining rankings? I'm assuming 301 redirect of every page from http to https?

Thanks!

[gshoosmith]

You got it one, do 301 redirects.

Also do not forget to add a new site with https in webmaster tools.

[ThomasHarvey]

301 Redirects, testing that canonicals are on the https url, working through the site and removing the http:// links and changing to https:// links.

[LoganRay]

Hi,

Cyrus Shepard did a really good post on this not too long ago. There's a lot more to it than simply redirecting the old URLs. Check out the full list here: https://moz.com/blog/seo-tips-https-ssl

Post-launch, you'll want to closely monitor the index. Check back daily (it only takes a few minutes) to ensure that your HTTP URL count is decreasing and your HTTPS count is increasing.