An SEO is in a situation where a site needs to move from www.domain.com to new.domain.com and then a few months later back to www.domain.com. John Mueller of Google was asked if they should use 302 redirects but John said, no, use 301 redirects.

Moving back and forth with domains is an SEO nightmare, no SEO wants to deal with such a move. But John said if you have to, he said “a move back & forth like this is possible.” “I’d just use 301’s though,” he added on Twitter.

“This obviously isn’t a best practice (any move adds complexity & makes tracking harder), but sometimes you have to roll with what you’re given,” he also said and also warned not to use the change of address tool for a temporary move like this.

Here are these tweets:

Interested to hear the answer to this (and also what the tech constraints forcing them into the need for that approach) – whilst possible, I would be surprised if it is without any peril at all

— Peter Mindenhall (@PeterMindenhall) February 27, 2023

A move back & forth like this is possible, I’d just use 301’s though. This obviously isn’t a best practice (any move adds complexity & makes tracking harder), but sometimes you have to roll with what you’re given. I wouldn’t use the change of address setting for a temp move.

— johnmu is not a chatbot yet 🐀 (@JohnMu) February 27, 2023

TBH I don’t see it as something which would cause mid-term/long-term issues. It’ll be more like a bump in the road. Just don’t use the change of address tool for something temporary like this.

— johnmu is not a chatbot yet 🐀 (@JohnMu) February 28, 2023

I don’t know about you, but site moves in general are scary but doing one like this, seems like an SEO disaster waiting to happen.

Forum discussion at Twitter.