Broken Link Notifier

Description

The “Broken Link Notifier” WordPress plugin is a vigilant guardian for your website’s links, monitoring and alerting you to broken or dead links as users visit your site. This ensures a seamless user experience and helps prevent search engine ranking penalties. Unlike other broken link checker plugins that can cause performance and timeout issues with full site scans, this plugin focuses on notification, making it a great complement to offsite services that handle full site scans.

This plugin:

• Scans content when users visit a page after the page fully loads, preventing performance lag
• Identifies broken links, including 404 errors, timeouts, images, and embedded YouTube videos
• Notifies you via dashboard notifications, email, Discord, and/or Microsoft Teams
• Provides a list of broken links for easy review and correction
• Allows easy replacement of links straight from the results page (NEW with Version 1.2.0)

With “Broken Link Notifier”, you can:

• Ensure accurate and functional links for your users
• Prevent search engines from indexing broken links
• Maintain a professional and trustworthy website image
• Save time and effort in manual link checking
• Scan multiple pages at a time on the back-end from your WP List Tables

This plugin is a must-have for website owners, developers, and SEO enthusiasts who want to guarantee a smooth and error-free browsing experience for their audience!

IF THIS PLUGIN FLAGS SOME LINKS AS BROKEN WHEN THEY ARE NOT, PLEASE READ THE FAQ BELOW

Demo

Screenshots

Installation

1. Install the plugin from your website’s plugin directory, or upload the plugin to your plugins folder.
2. Activate it.
3. Go to Broken Link Notifier > Settings in your admin menu.
4. Update your notification method(s) and post types.
5. Go to Broken Link Notifier > Omitted Pages, and add any pages that you don’t want to scan, such as pages you know won’t have any links on them. This will speed up the multi-scan option.
6. Page load scans are enabled automatically, so it’s recommended that you test it out by deliberately making some broken links on a test page and then visiting the page. The results should show up on the Broken Link Notifier > Results page, and notify you if you have enabled email, Discord, or Microsoft Teams notifications. Reloading the page will not submit them twice. For testing, you should delete them from the results so they get reported again.
7. It is suggested to run a Multi-Scan on each of your public-facing post types to quickly see if there are any broken links before others encounter them. Also to omit some links that will be reported as false positives. You can omit individual links quickly from the results, or you can go to Broken Link Notifier > Omitted Links to add a domain with a wildcard (*), which will omit all links starting with that domain. See screenshots for examples.
8. If you have any questions, please reach out to me on my Discord support server. I am happy to assist you or fix any issues you might have with the plugin.

FAQ

Why do some links show as broken when they are not?

If the link works fine and it’s still being flagged as broken, then it is likely either redirecting to another page or there is an issue with the page’s response headers, and there’s nothing we can do about it. If it is a redirect on your own site due to permalink modification, then it’s better to fix the link instead of unnecessarily redirecting. You may use the Omit option to omit false positives from future scans as well. If you are seeing a pattern with multiple links from the same domain, you can go to Broken Link Notifier > Omitted Links to add a domain with a wildcard (*), which will omit all links starting with that domain.

If you feel that there is another issue at hand, I am happy to look into it further with you. You can join my Discord support server or use the support forum here on WP.org.

What causes a link to give a warning?

Warnings mean the link was found, but they may be unsecure or slow to respond. If you are getting too many warnings due to timeouts, try increasing your timeout in Settings. This will just result in longer wait times, but with more accuracy. You can also disable warnings if you have too many of them.

What is status code 666?

A status code of 666 is a code we use to force invalid URL code 0 to be a broken link in case warnings are disabled. It is not an official status code.

Can I omit links and pages from scans?

Yes, you can omit links from being checked for validity by using the “Omit” link in the scan results, or by entering them in manually under Omitted Links. Likewise, you can omit pages from being scanned from the results page or Omitted Pages. Wildcards (*) are accepted.

When I click on “Find On Page,” I cannot find the link. Where is it?

Sometimes links are hidden with CSS or inside modals/popups. To find hidden links, go to the page and either open your developer console or view the page source and search for the link. This will show you where it is and which element to look in. Then you can edit the page accordingly. This is more advanced and may require some assistance, so feel free to reach out to me for help.

Why does the dev console show more links that what is scanned on the Multi-Scan?

The Multi-Scan link count does not include links that are filtered out from the pre-check.

What pre-checks are used to filter out broken links?

We skip links that start with # (anchor tags and JavaScript) or ? (query strings), non-http url schemes (such as mailto:, tel:, data:, etc. ), and any links you have omitted.

What can I do if I have the same broken link on a lot of pages?

There are other plugins such as Better Search Replace by WP Engine that will quickly replace URLs on your entire site at once.

Why does my multi-scan page stop loading halfway down?

There is likely an issue with the content on that page causing a redirect. We cannot intercept all redirected content unfortunately. If that is the case, you can omit the page being scanned so you can continue scanning the entire page the next time you try.

Are there hooks available for Developers?

Yes, there are plenty. The following hooks are available:
* blnotifier_html_link_sources ( Array $sources ) — Filter where the links are found in the content’s HTML
* blnotifier_omitted_links ( Array $links ) — Filter your omitted links
* blnotifier_omitted_pages ( Array $pages ) — Filter your omitted pages
* blnotifier_omitted_pageload_post_types ( Array $post_types ) — Filter the post types that you don’t want to scan on page load
* blnotifier_omitted_multiscan_post_types ( Array $post_types ) — Filter the post types that you don’t want to allow for Multi-Scan option
* blnotifier_link_before_prechecks ( String|Array|False $link ) — Filter the link before checking anything
* blnotifier_status ( Array $status ) — Filter the status that is returned when checking a link for validity after all pre-checks are done
* blnotifier_http_request_args ( Array $args, String $link ) — Filter the http request args
* blnotifier_remove_source_qs ( Array $query_strings ) — Filter the query strings to remove from source url on page load scans
* blnotifier_url_schemes ( Array $schemes ) — Filter the URL Schemes skipped during pre-checks
* blnotifier_capability ( String $capability ) — Change the user capability for viewing the plugin reports and settings on the back-end
* blnotifier_suggested_offsite_checkers ( Array $checkers ) — Filter the list of suggested offsite checkers on Multi-Scan page
* blnotifier_notify ( Array $flagged, Int $flagged_count, Array $all_links, String $source_url ) — Action hook that fires when notifying you of new broken links and warning links that are found on page load
* blnotifier_email_emails ( String|Array $emails, Array $flagged, String $source_url ) — Filter the emails that the email notifications are sent to
* blnotifier_email_subject ( String $subject, Array $flagged, String $source_url ) — Filter the subject that the email notifications are sent with
* blnotifier_email_message ( String $message, Array $flagged, String $source_url ) — Filter the message that the email notifications are sent with
* blnotifier_email_headers ( Array $headers, Array $flagged, String $source_url ) — Filter the headers used in the email notifications
* blnotifier_discord_args ( Array $args, Array $flagged, String $source_url ) — Filter the Discord webhook args
* blnotifier_msteams_args ( Array $args, Array $flagged, String $source_url ) — Filter the Microsoft Teams webhook args
* blnotifier_strings_to_replace ( Array $strings_to_replace ) — Filter the strings to replace on the link
* blnotifier_force_head_file_types (Array $file_types, Boolean $docs_use_head) — Filter the list of file types that should force a HEAD request, with the $docs_use_head variable determining whether document types should be included

Where can I request features and get further support?

Join my Discord support server

Reviews

The link checker I’ve been looking for

cantabber February 19, 2025 1 reply

Found this plugin after being serially unhappy with some others in the past, including one with a paid subscription. Yours is great, easy to figure out and does just what I want, when I want it to. And free! Thank you so much for your work and time. I’ll look forward to seeing more from you.

Awesome

MrPhunin February 14, 2025 4 replies

The Best Link Checker Plugin!

Very useful tool, great support

Rolf Allard van Hagen January 9, 2025 1 reply

The developer has been extremely responsive and provided many improvements in a very short time. This very useful tool keeps getting better ??

Best Broken Links Plugin on WordPress

supertrooper2 November 20, 2024 1 reply

This relatively unknown plugin works great and is easy to use. The functionality is very comprehensive and can run checks on all pages or all posts. I hope that more people discover this plugin. I would rate with 10 stars if possible. Many thanks to Aristocles (@apos37) for developing this great plugin.

Very helpful when managing multiple websites

geriwi October 11, 2024 1 reply

I maintain over a dozen websites and have this installed on all of them! I don’t use the email feature because I like a clean inbox and don’t want to get distracted every time something comes up, especially if there is a false positive. However, I can easily see that there are new ones found on the admin bar when I login regularly I dedicate a few minutes here and there to fixing them. I have hundreds of pages and posts, and it’s time consuming to go to a link checker website and check all of my sites each week. This makes it so much easier. I also like that most false positives get immediately resolved when I visit the results page so I don’t have to waste time looking into them. Fantastic job!!!

Send broken links!

photokitchen September 5, 2024 3 replies

After installation I received an email with broken links, however, these links where NOT broken.This does not make sense, as you take time for something what doesn’t exist.

Contributors & Developers

Changelog

1.2.1

• Update: Added a method column to the results page
• Fix: Links being added from invalid sources
• Tweak: Links without a source will be automatically removed
• Fix: Some links are being added to results without a source
• Update: Added option to pause auto-verification on results page
• Update: Admin bar count is reduced in real time if results are removed
• Tweak: Update notice on results page from “trash” to “clear” (props @cantabber for pointing it out)

1.2.0

• Update: Added code 413 to warnings and automatically code files larger than 10 MB with 413 when using GET requests (allowing redirects option)
• Update: Added an option for forcing documents to use HEAD requests
• Fix: Gifs, videos, and other large files timing out (props @mrphunin)
• Update: Added a Replace Link action to link column on results page (props a4jp-com for suggestion)
• Update: Added a Trash Page action to source on results page; must enable it in Settings (props @mrphunin for suggestion)
• Fix: Sometimes no permission for trash error; changed Clear Result action to use ajax instead
• Tweak: Renamed all other action links on link and source columns on results page
• Tweak: Changed Edit link to “Edit Page” (props a4jp-com)

1.1.4.2

• Tweak: Added support for translations on some other info boxes
• Update: Added an info box to the top of the results page with clarification on trashing results
• Fix: Undefined array key “HTTP_REFERER”

1.1.4.1

• Update: Added an option to pause front-end scanning (props @ravanh)
• Update: Added status codes to settings, allowing you to change types, deprecated hooks will only work if codes in settings have no been saved: blnotifier_bad_status_codes, blnotifier_warning_status_codes

1.1.4

• Update: Added field for user agent and option to mark status code 0 as broken instead of warning (props @ravanh)

1.1.3.8

• Update: Allowed max redirects to be 0 to show redirect status code instead of the final status code

1.1.3.7

• Fix: Multi-Scan redirecting if content is not found or if pages have shortcodes that redirect

1.1.3.6

• Update: Added settings for allowing redirects and setting max redirects amount (props @ravanh)

1.1.3.5

• Fix: Fatal error on helpers.php at line 1001

1.1.3.4

• Fix: Fatal error when trying to uncheck all post types in settings (props @ravanh)

1.1.3.3

• Fix: Added support for links starting with // (props pauleipper)

1.1.3.2

• Fix: Added full path to multi scan links to support multisite (props oddmoster)

1.1.3.1

• Fix: Added full path to “Edit” link to support multisite (props oddmoster)

1.1.3

• Update: Added a link search page

1.1.2

• Fix: Warnings from Plugin Checker

1.1.1

• Update: Auto-delete omitted links on Results page
• Fix: Some links not being deleted due to special characters

1.1.0

• Fix: YouTube links showing broken

1.0.9

• Fix: Umlauts in links showing broken (props ralf d)
• Tweak: Removed donate link, nobody donates anyway, working on premium version instead

1.0.8

• Update: Added demo to readme.txt

1.0.7

• Fix: Results page rescan not working on some links
• Fix: Offsite checker links broken XD

1.0.6

• Fix: wp_mail_failed logging error
• Update: Added a string replace for "×" => "x", which is being converted in images with sizes (ie _100x66.png)
• Update: Added a new filter blnotifier_strings_to_replace for replacing simple characters

1.0.5

• Update: Added a re-scan verification when loading results page as some false-positives occur with poor connections
• Tweak: Updated plugin tags
• Update: Added other plugins to bottom of help page
• Update: Added an option in settings to include/exclude image src links
• Tweak: Changed default timeout to 5 seconds

1.0.4.2

• Fix: Emailing empty content if already added to results; stopped duplicate emails

1.0.4.1

• Fix: MS Teams integration error with logging

1.0.4

• Fix: Undefined variable on help page
• Update: Added support for checking YouTube video links (props shirtguy72)
• Update: Added support for iframe links (props shirtguy72)
• Update: Added support for image source links

1.0.3.1

• Tweak: Fix minor issues found by WP repo plugin reviewer

1.0.3

• Tweak: Updates recommended by WP repo plugin reviewer
• Fix: Settings saved notification not echoing
• Tweak: Removed links post type and help docs post types if installed

1.0.2

• Tweak: Added nonce to Page Scan JS
• Update: Added Multi-Scan and Page Scan results to results page
• Tweak: Changed “Full Scan” references to “Multi-Scan”

1.0.1

• Deployment