How to add or remove the www prefix in domain URLs?

In this article we will show you how to add or remove www url prefix in your website. For Search Engine Optimization (SEO) purposes, it is preferable to have a website respond only to https://www.example.com or https://example.com, not both. Otherwise, search engines see duplicate content on the www and non-www domains, and may downgrade the site ranking.

Removing the www prefix from domain URLs

1. Create an .htaccess file in your public_html directory. If you already have an .htaccess file in the public_html directory, you can modify it. 2. Copy and paste the following lines of text into the .htaccess file

# Remove www from any URLs that have them:
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www\.
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://example.com/$1 [R=301,L]

3. Replace example.com in the final line of text with your own domain name. 4. Save the .htaccess file. 5. To test the configuration, use your web browser to visit http://www.example.com, where example.com represents your domain name. The browser should be redirected to http://example.com.

Adding the www prefix to domain URLs

1. Create an .htaccess file in your public_html directory. If you already have an .htaccess file in the public_html directory, you can modify it. 2. Copy and paste the following lines of text into the .htaccess file

# Add www to any URLs that do not have them:
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\.
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.%{HTTP_HOST}/$1 [R=301,L]

3. Save the .htaccess file. 4. To test the configuration, use your web browser to visit http://example.com, where example.com represents your domain name. The browser should be redirected to http://www.example.com.

Conclusion

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