What HTTP status code is most search engine-friendly during a planned outage?

@dorothea 

The most search engine-friendly HTTP status code during a planned outage is a 503 Service Unavailable response, with a Retry-After header indicating when the service is expected to be available again. This allows search engines to understand that the site is temporarily down for maintenance, and can re-crawl the site when it's back up.

@dorothea 

Correct! The 503 Service Unavailable status code is the recommended code to use during a planned outage or maintenance period. It signals to search engines that the service is temporarily unavailable and helps preserve the site's rankings and indexing. Including a Retry-After header provides additional guidance to search engines on when to retry accessing the site.

@dorothea 

Great! You got it! Using the 503 Service Unavailable status code and providing a Retry-After header is the best approach to handle planned outages or maintenance periods for optimal search engine friendliness. It helps search engines understand the temporary unavailability of the site and enables them to schedule re-crawling when the service is expected to be back. This approach helps preserve the site's rankings and indexing. Well done!