Last September we reported that Google says it is best to keep redirects live for a year or so and even better, keep the redirects live for as long as you possible can.
Gary Illyes from Google said this morning on Twitter that you can remove the redirects "if the new page is already indexed." He did add after that "best practice is to keep the redirects indefinitely, but that's not always feasible." So in the case where that is not feasible, "removing the redirects after signals were passed (i.e. new page indexed and serves for old url) is fine," Gary added. Once the redirect is gone, Gary said "you will not get credited for any new links if the old page is nonexistent / doesn't redirect."
In summary, Google will pass the signals of the links pointing to the redirects when they index it. Once they index it, you should be good. But any new links that Google discovers after the redirect is removed, those won't get any credit.
Here are the set of tweets:
@Trey_Collier if the new page is already indexed, you can remove the old one.
— Gary Illyes (@methode) April 27, 2016
@Trey_Collier 1/2 ok, the BEST practice is to keep the redirects indefinitely, but that's not always feasible (i.e. site moves) @jenstar
— Gary Illyes (@methode) April 27, 2016
@Trey_Collier 2/2 so removing the redirects after signals were passed (i.e. new page indexed and serves for old url) is fine @jenstar
— Gary Illyes (@methode) April 27, 2016
@Trey_Collier you will not get credited for any new links if the old page is nonexistent / doesn't redirect
— Gary Illyes (@methode) April 27, 2016
Forum discussion at Twitter.
