Four Versions of Your Site, Competing With Each Other
With www and without, with https and without. If more than one loads, you have been competing with yourself since launch.
Why one site becomes four
A certificate gets added and the old insecure version is left working. From that moment there are two sites, and with www that becomes four.
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The site gets a certificate
The secure version starts working and everyone reasonably assumes the move is complete.
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The old versions keep loading
Nothing redirects them, so every page exists at several addresses and your links are split between them.
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Everything agrees on one
One version chosen, the others redirected in a single hop, and canonicals, internal links and the sitemap made to match.
Your website probably has four addresses.
With www and without. With https and without. Each combination is, as far as a search engine is concerned, a different website containing identical pages.
If more than one of them loads, you are competing with yourself on every single page you own, and you have been since the day the site launched.
The Honest Version: It Is Usually Already Handled
Most modern hosting sorts this out
Managed WordPress hosts and most decent setups redirect everything to one version automatically. If yours does, this is not a job and I will tell you so in about a minute.
When it is genuinely broken
Older sites, custom builds, sites moved between hosts, and sites where somebody added an SSL certificate without redirecting the old insecure version. That last one is the most common by far.
Adding https to a site is not the same as moving to https. If the old version still loads, you now have two sites rather than one.
What it actually costs you
Not a penalty. Split strength. Links pointing at one version do not fully help the other, and Google has to decide which one to show, which it may do inconsistently across your pages.
On a small new site this is minor. On a site with years of links behind it, it is quietly expensive, because the links you earned before the split are supporting an address you no longer promote.
Why This Matters More on Older Sites
The cost of this problem grows with age, which is why it is worth checking even if the site seems fine.
Your links were earned over years
Every mention of your site anywhere points at whichever version existed at the time. Sites that ran on http for five years have five years of links pointing at http addresses.
If those do not redirect, that value sits on a version you are no longer using and does not transfer.
Google may have chosen differently than you
Where both versions load, Google picks one per page rather than for the whole site. It is entirely possible to have half your pages indexed on one version and half on the other, which splits everything twice over.
And the symptoms look like something else
This rarely announces itself. It shows up as pages that will not climb, or rankings that seem lower than the content deserves. People spend months on content when the actual problem is that their site is two sites.
Which is why the four-address check is worth doing before any bigger diagnosis.
What You Can Check Yourself First
This is one of the quickest checks in SEO and it settles the question completely.
1. Try all four addresses
In a private browser window, load each of these in turn: http with www, http without www, https with www, https without www.
Every single one should end up at the same final address in the bar. If any of them stays where it is, that version is live and needs redirecting.
2. Test with and without a trailing slash
Load one of your inner pages with a slash on the end and then without. Both should settle on the same version. If both load and stay put, that is another duplicate of every page on the site.
3. Check which version Google chose
Search site:yourdomain.com and look at the addresses in the results. If you see a mix of www and non-www, or any http results at all, Google is holding more than one version.
4. Look at your internal links
View the source of your homepage and look at how your own menu links are written. Sites often link internally to the version they are not canonicalising, which sends a contradictory signal on every page.
If all four checks come back clean, you do not need this service and nobody should sell it to you.
How Sites End Up With Four Versions
Almost always historical rather than deliberate.
SSL added without redirects
A certificate was installed and the http version left working. The most common cause by a wide margin.
Host migration
The new host serves both versions because nobody carried the old redirect rules across.
Conflicting redirect rules
Two rules fighting each other, sometimes producing a loop where the browser gives up entirely.
Internal links using the wrong version
Your own menu pointing at http or the non-canonical version, contradicting your redirects on every page you own.
Canonical tags disagreeing
Tags naming one version while redirects point at another. Google receives two different instructions and picks for itself.
Trailing slash inconsistency
Both versions of every address resolving, silently doubling your page count without anyone noticing.
What the Fix Involves
1. Pick one version and commit
Which one genuinely does not matter for ranking. What matters is that everything agrees. Https is the obvious default now; www or not is preference.
2. Redirect the other three in one hop
Each of the other versions should reach the chosen one in a single step. Chains are common here and they waste crawl on every request.
3. Make everything else agree
Canonical tags, internal links, the sitemap, and the property in Search Console. A redirect saying one thing while your links say another is a mixed signal you are sending thousands of times a day.
4. Verify by request
Every combination requested afterwards, including trailing slash variants, to confirm they all land in one place in one step.
When You Do Not Need This
All four checks already pass. Then it is done. This is a genuinely binary problem and you have the answer for free.
Your site is new and on modern hosting. It was almost certainly configured correctly on day one.
You are mid-migration. Handle it as part of that job rather than separately, because the migration will overwrite whatever is set now.
Price and Turnaround
Scope |
Price |
Turnaround |
|---|---|---|
Standard site |
$149 |
1 – 2 days |
With internal link cleanup |
$299 |
3 – 5 days |
Complex hosting or conflicting rules |
From $449 |
1 week |
A small job with a disproportionate effect on older sites, because it consolidates years of links that were split across versions.
Common Questions
Does www or non-www rank better?
Neither. Google has been explicit about this. Pick one and be consistent, which is the only part that matters.
Will changing versions hurt my rankings?
Briefly, if you switch which one is canonical. Which is why I would rather consolidate to whichever version already has the most links behind it.
Do I need both in Search Console?
Use a domain property, which covers every version at once. It is the simplest way to see everything in one place.
Is http still a problem in 2026?
Only if it still loads. Most browsers warn on it, so the visitor damage usually arrives before the SEO damage does.
What about trailing slashes?
Pick one convention and redirect the other. Most systems default to a trailing slash on directories and none on files.
Will this fix duplicate content warnings?
It fixes the biggest single source of them. Duplication from filters and archives is a separate job.
How long before Google consolidates?
Usually a few weeks. It has to recrawl and reassign, and older sites with more history take a little longer.
Can I do this myself?
If you are comfortable with server configuration, yes, and it is a small change. The part people get wrong is the internal links and canonicals afterwards.
Try loading all four right now
In a private window, load your site with and without www, with and without https. If they do not all end up in the same place, tell me and I will confirm free.
Or email info@shazzseo.com