Your website may be reachable with or without www, over HTTP or HTTPS. Choosing a consistent main address simplifies links, tracking and navigation. Each alternative address should lead to the right page at the chosen HTTPS address.
Choose an address that fits your site
Using www does not, by itself, provide a search-ranking advantage. Keep an established address if it meets your needs. Before changing it, check hosting, DNS, CDN and application requirements: their settings can make one form more suitable than the other.
Multiple addresses for the same content do not automatically cause a penalty. The priority is to give visitors and search engines consistent signals. A canonical tag suggests the preferred address to search engines; it does not redirect the browser.
Prepare both variants
- Confirm that both the www and non-www names reach the appropriate service. If a CNAME is needed, see our DNS alias guide. DNS alone will not change the browser’s address.
- Check that every hostname visitors may request over HTTPS has a valid certificate, including the one being redirected. A redirect cannot fix a certificate warning.
- Record the main address configured in your website and any existing redirects. Coordinate the CMS, hosting and any proxy or CDN settings before adding another rule.
Set up a consistent redirect
For a lasting change, plan a permanent redirect to the chosen HTTPS address. First validate the intended behavior, including path preservation. Our cPanel redirect guide explains how to create and test a rule.
- From www to non-www: the rule should match requests containing www and send them to the equivalent address without that prefix.
- From non-www to www: the rule should match requests without www and leave the www destination outside its scope.
- From HTTP to HTTPS: this is a separate setting. If Force HTTPS Redirect is available in Domains, use it only after checking HTTPS and compatibility with the other rules.
A rule should preserve each page’s path when its content remains in the same location. If pages have been reorganized, prepare specific mappings. Avoid rules that send an address to itself, back to the opposite variant or to an unrelated homepage. For a site behind a proxy, also have the application’s recognition of HTTPS checked.
Validate navigation and links
Test all four HTTP/HTTPS and www/non-www combinations, plus an internal page and a harmless URL parameter. Check the final destination, absence of loops and the relevant login, form and checkout flows. Reduce intermediate hops where possible.
Then align internal links, application addresses, canonical tags and sitemap entries with the chosen destination. Caches and search engines do not all update immediately; no rule guarantees a ranking improvement.
Plan the change with Nuagerie
Our team can help you check dependencies and plan a change that fits your website. In your Client Area, provide the affected domain, the intended result and the checks you have completed. Do not include passwords or access tokens in your request.
