Migrating Magento URLs to Shopify Without Losing SEO (The Smart Way)

Migrating from Magento to Shopify is a big step, but if you skip the redirects, you risk hurting your SEO and losing valuable traffic.

One of the most overlooked parts of any eCommerce migration is handling URL redirects. If your Magento URLs change and you don’t redirect them properly, customers will land on broken pages, and search engines will drop your rankings.

In this guide, we’ll show you how to map Magento URLs to Shopify, preserve your SEO with 301 redirects, and how to use AI to automate the process and save hours of manual work.

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Why Magento to Shopify Redirects Matter

Since Magento & Shopify do not have the same URL structure, if someone clicks an old link in Google, bookmark, or an old social media post, they’ll hit a 404 error unless you've added a redirect.

That results in:

• Lost traffic
• Lost sales
• Damaged SEO rankings

Redirects ensure customers and search engines can find your new content without interruption.

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Magento vs. Shopify URL Structures

Here’s a quick comparison:

‍Magento URLs may include:

• .html suffixes
• Nested category paths
• Custom routes from CMS or blog modules

Shopify follows a fixed structure:

• Products → /products/*
• Collections → /collections/*
• Pages → /pages/*
• Blogs → /blogs/news/*

You'll need to create a redirect strategy to account for these differences.

Unlike Shopify, which enforces a consistent URL structure across all stores, Magento gives developers and merchants a lot of control over URL formatting.

This flexibility is powerful but it makes redirect planning more complex during a migration to Shopify, where structure is fixed.

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Mapping Magento URLs to Shopify (Including Wildcard Rules)

You can start by manually creating a mapping between Magento and Shopify URLs. For each old URL, write the equivalent Shopify version:

1. Export your Magento URL list
2. Create a spreadsheet with two columns: “Redirect From” and “Redirect To”
3. Match the paths manually

If your Magento URLs follow a consistent structure, wildcard redirects can make this much faster.

Example wildcard rules:

Redirect From: /clothing/*
Redirect To:   /products/*


Redirects /clothing/red-shirt.html to /products/red-shirt

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Redirect From: /*.html
Redirect To:   /products/*


Redirects /blue-jeans.html to /products/blue-jeans

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Redirect Ninja supports wildcard rules on the Pro plan and allows you to test them before going live.

For more information on wildcard redirects checkout the full guide.

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How to Export Magento URLs Before Migrating

The easiest way to get a list of URLs from a Magento store is to use its XML sitemap. Most Magento stores automatically generate a sitemap that can be accessed publicly at:

<https://your-store.com/sitemap.xml>


This file usually includes all indexable URLs such as product pages, category pages, CMS pages, and sometimes blog posts. It’s a quick and reliable way to retrieve clean, structured URLs for redirect mapping. Checkout this [EXTERNAL] post for info about how to generate sitemaps in Magento 2

If the sitemap is not available or doesn’t include everything, you can also try:

• Using the Magento Admin: Navigate to Marketing → SEO & Search → URL Rewrites
• Crawling the site using a tool like Screaming Frog

Once you have your list, organize URLs by type (products, categories, CMS, blog, etc.) to make redirect planning easier and more accurate.

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Setting Up Redirects in Shopify

Shopify has a built-in redirect feature you can use manually or in bulk.

To add redirects:

1. Go to your Shopify admin
2. Navigate to Content → Menus → URL Redirects
3. Add the old and new URL paths

You can also upload a CSV with two columns:

• Redirect from
• Redirect to

This works well for smaller migrations. For larger stores with hundreds or thousands of URLs, manual mapping becomes time-consuming and error-prone.

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Automate It with Redirect Ninja's AI Assistant, Kevin

Redirect Ninja includes an AI-powered assistant named Kevin that automates redirect suggestions.

How it works:

1. When a 404 occurs, Kevin scans your store to find the best match
2. It compares the broken URL with your product catalog, collections, pages, and blog posts
3. Kevin suggests the most relevant redirect
4. You approve or reject it

Over time, Kevin learns from your choices and gets smarter with each decision.

All approved suggestions become true 301 redirects, helping you preserve SEO and avoid broken links with minimal effort on your part.

This feature is available on the Business plan ($29.99/month), and it’s ideal for:

• Magento to Shopify migrations
• Large stores with inconsistent URL patterns
• Store owners who don’t want to deal with spreadsheets

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SEO Best Practices During Migration

To protect your rankings and visibility:

• Implement redirects before launching the new store
• Always use 301 (permanent) redirects
• Submit your Shopify sitemap to Google Search Console
• Monitor for new 404s after launch with a 404 tracking tool like Redirect Ninja
• Prioritize redirects for top-performing pages using Google Analytics or Search Console

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Frequently Asked Questions

What happens if I don’t redirect old Magento URLs after migrating to Shopify?

If you don’t redirect your old Magento URLs, customers and search engines will encounter 404 errors. This can lead to lost traffic, reduced sales, a higher bounce rate, and a drop in SEO rankings. Proper 301 redirects ensure a smooth transition and preserve your search visibility.

Do Magento and Shopify use the same URL structure?

No. Magento allows custom, flexible URL structures (often with .html suffixes and category paths), while Shopify uses a fixed, standardized format like /products/product-name or /pages/about-us.

Can I use my Magento sitemap to create redirects?

Yes. Most Magento stores generate a sitemap at /sitemap.xml, which includes all important indexable URLs. This can be downloaded and used to create a redirect mapping for your Shopify migration.

Does Shopify support wildcard redirects?

Not natively. However, Redirect Ninja supports wildcard redirects on the Pro plan. Wildcards are useful for redirecting multiple URLs that follow the same pattern, such as /clothing/* to /products/*.

How does Redirect Ninja’s AI assistant (Kevin) work?

When a customer lands on a broken page, Kevin analyzes the 404 and searches your Shopify store for the most relevant destination. You can approve or reject suggestions, and Kevin learns from your feedback to improve future recommendations. Approved suggestions become real 301 redirects.

Is it okay to launch the new Shopify store before setting up redirects?

It’s best to implement redirects before launch. However, if you miss any, Redirect Ninja can catch them as they occur using real-time 404 tracking and AI suggestions.

Do AI-generated redirects count as 301 redirects in Shopify?

Yes. Once approved, Redirect Ninja creates permanent 301 redirects inside Shopify. These pass SEO value and are preferred by search engines.

👉 Try Redirect Ninja’s Business Plan and let Kevin automate the redirect cleanup.

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