TIL: Netlify stops processing redirect rules as soon as one is applied

My Netlify _redirects file didn’t appear to be working, even though it was processed at build time and outputted to the _site directory. There’s a good support page on this problem.

After trying a few of these fixes, I finally found the right one. TLDR: I put my 404 redirect rule at the bottom of the _redirects file.

You might have a 404 redirect rule that redirects a URI pointing to a non-existent resource to a custom 404 page. It could look like this:

/* /404/index.html 404

That’s what I use, and it works: try visiting https://www.thisdaysportion.com/this-does-not-exist.

That’s good, but bear in mind Netlify will stop processing any of your redirects at this point; therefore, any redirect rules below your 404 rule will not work if the resource your URI points to isn’t there. As most redirect rules deal with resources that are no longer there, this means that redirects will appear not to be working at all.

So: make sure your 404 rule is at the bottom of your _redirects file or, if you’re using one, your netlify.toml config file.