Redirect Chain Tracer

hipersoft/redirect-chain-tracer

Follow every URL through its full redirect chain and report each hop's status, location and timing plus the final destination. For SEO migrations, link audits and tracking checks.

Run this scraper →See the API call

Total users

Monthly users

Total runs

Per url traced

$0.002

Last rebuilt

Oct 26, 2026

Overview

Follow every URL through its full redirect chain and get each hop's status code, location and timing, plus the final destination. Essential for SEO migrations, link audits, tracking-link checks and spotting redirect loops or chains that leak crawl budget.

Redirect Chain Tracer input — configure the options in the Apify Console

What it does

Traces each URL hop by hop (301/302/307/308…) to its final URL.
Reports status, target and response time for every hop.
Flags redirect loops, chains that are too long, and the final HTTP status.

Use cases

SEO — audit redirects after a site migration; find chains and loops.
Marketing — verify short/tracking links land on the right page.
QA — confirm HTTPS and www/non-www redirects behave correctly.

Input

{ "urls": ["http://google.com", "https://bit.ly/example"], "maxHops": 15, "method": "GET" }

Field	Type	Description
`urls`	array	URLs to trace.
`maxHops`	integer	Stop after this many redirects (1–30).
`method`	string	`GET` or `HEAD`.
`userAgent`	string	Optional custom User-Agent.

Output

Redirect Chain Tracer output — the results as a clean dataset

{ "url": "http://google.com", "finalUrl": "https://www.google.com/", "hopCount": 2, "finalStatus": 200, "hops": [ { "url": "http://google.com", "status": 301, "location": "http://www.google.com/", "ms": 40 } ] }

Output schema

Field	Type	Description
`url`	string (URL)	The starting URL.
`finalUrl`	string (URL)	The final destination.
`hopCount`	integer	Number of redirects.
`finalStatus`	integer	Final HTTP status code.

FAQ

Does it detect loops? Yes — if the chain exceeds maxHops it's flagged rather than looping forever.

Can I automate it? Yes — via integrations on the Apify platform and the Apify API.

Notes

Original clean-room implementation.

Input

Field	Type	Description
`urls` required URLs	array	The URLs to trace. Each is followed hop-by-hop to its final destination.
`maxHops` Max hops	integer	Stop after this many redirects (1–30). Default: `15`
`method` HTTP method	string · GET, HEAD	HEAD is faster; some servers only redirect correctly on GET. Default: `"GET"`
`userAgent` User agent	string	Optional custom User-Agent header.

API

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/hipersoft~redirect-chain-tracer/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=$APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
  "urls": [
    "http://google.com",
    "https://bit.ly/3xyz"
  ]
}'

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("hipersoft/redirect-chain-tracer").call(run_input={
    "urls": [
        "http://google.com",
        "https://bit.ly/3xyz"
    ]
})

for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item)

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN' });
const run = await client.actor('hipersoft/redirect-chain-tracer').call({
  "urls": [
    "http://google.com",
    "https://bit.ly/3xyz"
  ]
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

Pricing

Event	Price	Paid plans from
URL traced One URL traced through its full redirect chain	$0.002	$0.001

You pay only for what the run returns. Set a maximum cost per run and it stops cleanly at that limit.

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