Zombie pages are low-quality, outdated, or irrelevant web pages that bring little value, hurt SEO rankings, and waste crawl budget.
What are Zombie Pages?
Zombie pages are those inactive or useless pages that no longer serve a purpose for users or search engines. They usually generate no traffic and dilute website authority.
Why Zombie Pages Matter in SEO:
- Hurt organic visibility and rankings.
- Waste crawl budget and indexing resources.
- Create poor user experience.
- Dilute overall domain authority.
- Risk Google penalties if filled with thin or duplicate content.
Examples of Zombie Pages:
- Old event pages with expired dates.
- Empty category or tag pages.
- Thin affiliate pages with no original content.
- Duplicate product pages.
- Outdated blog posts with zero traffic.
How to Fix Zombie Pages:
- Delete irrelevant content.
- Redirect old pages to relevant new ones.
- Update and refresh outdated content.
- Noindex low-value pages.
- Consolidate similar content into stronger pages.
Example in Practice:
A blog with 1,000 posts but 600 of them get no traffic—these 600 are zombie pages dragging down site performance.