Set a redirect variation

Send visitors to a different page with redirect variations.

Redirect variations allow you to split all the traffic that arrives on a certain page (i.e., the origin page) and direct some portion of it to a new page (i.e., the destination page). Redirect variations can be helpful if you're testing a full-page redesign or redirecting specific audiences to specific landing pages.

How redirect variations work

Your optimization type and configuration determines which visitors will be redirected. You define which origin page visitors land on to trigger the redirect and which destination page visitors are sent to.

When a visitor lands on the origin page, Optimize checks if they should be redirected. If a redirect variation is triggered, the visitor is taken off the origin page and sent to the destination page before the origin page loads in their browser — i.e., these visitors never see the origin page. Visitors who are not redirected see the origin page like normal. For example:

Which visitors are redirected?

Visitors are chosen to be redirected based on the optimization type and its settings:

• Personalize — you set a target audience (e.g., visitors in New York)
• Test — Optimize randomly allocates a fixed percentage of traffic (e.g., 50% of visitors)
• AI Optimize — AI determines which visitors are redirected based on performance against the target goal

How to set redirects

Redirects work best when they’re in their own optimization. Since you can’t mix them with other variation types, it’s a good idea to group all your redirects for a single origin page together.

Create a redirect optimization

This workflow will create a new optimization and 1 redirect variation. You can add additional redirect variations afterwards.

Open your Optimize site in Webflow, then:

1. Click Optimizations in the Navigation panel
2. Click New optimization
3. Choose Redirect to another page
4. Choose the optimization type and click Continue
5. Choose the origin page (i.e., where the visitor lands on)
6. Click Select page & continue
7. Define the destination page (i.e., where the visitor is redirected to)
   • Simple URL — paste the destination page URL in the URL field at the bottom
   • Complex URL — toggle Redirect code editor to On, then enter custom JavaScript in the Redirect JavaScript field
8. Rename the redirect variation in the Variations panel
9. Click Save > Done

Add another redirect variation

New redirect variations use the same origin page that's already configured in the optimization.

Open your Optimize site in Webflow, then:

1. Click Optimizations in the Navigation panel
2. Click the redirect optimization
3. Click Add variation
4. Define the destination page (i.e., where the visitor is redirected to)
   • Simple URL — paste the destination page URL in the URL field at the bottom
   • Complex URL — toggle Redirect code editor to On, then enter custom JavaScript in the Redirect JavaScript field
5. Rename the redirect variation in the Variations panel
6. Click Save > Done

How to configure a redirect click goal

To measure conversions across the origin page and destination page(s), your goal must include events from every page involved. Because Optimize only lets you create goals on pages where an optimization runs, you’ll need to set up temporary optimizations on any destination pages to capture those events.

• Stage 1 — create a temporary optimization and goal events for each destination page
• Stage 2 — create goal events for the origin page
• Stage 3 — add all goal events to a new "hero" custom goal

1: Create destination page goal events 

Open your Optimize site in Webflow, then:

1. Create an AI Optimize optimization > select a destination page
2. Create a click goal that targets any CTA you want to track
3. Note each goal’s Selector value (e.g., .margin-right-15)
4. Click Create to save the goal
5. Delete the temporary AI Optimize optimization — the goal events remain saved
6. Repeat the process for each destination page you're redirecting to

2: Create origin page goal events

In the redirect optimization:

1. Create a click goal for any CTA you want to track
2. Note the goal’s Selector value
3. Click Create to save the goal

3: Create a combined custom goal

In the redirect optimization:

1. Create a custom goal
2. Select all events with the corresponding Selector names
3. Check Set as target
4. Click Create
5. Rename the goal in the Goals panel

FAQs

Will redirects impact SEO?

As long as you follow these best practices, SEO should not be impacted:

Use canonical tags — your redirect target should include a canonical URL pointing to the original page to preserve search indexing.

Don't use 301 redirects — Optimize handles redirects without 301s, avoiding this pitfall altogether.

How do I confirm the redirect is working?

When previewing a redirect variation, you’ll see the original page begin to load, followed by the redirect target. A “URL mismatch” warning will appear — this is expected and confirms the redirect is functioning.

Will redirects affect other optimizations?

If your original page has other optimizations running, those optimizations will still run on the original page before the redirect is triggered. Results for their No Change variations may be impacted due to the redirect.