Ssl – Is it bad to redirect http to https

apache-2.2httphttpsssl

I just installed an SSL Certificate on my server.

It then set up a redirect for all traffic on my domain on Port 80 to redirect it to Port 443.

In other words, all my http://example.com traffic is now redirected to the appropriate https://example.com version of the page.

The redirect is done in my Apache Virtual Hosts file with something like this…

RewriteEngine on
ReWriteCond %{SERVER_PORT} !^443$
RewriteRule ^/(.*) https://%{HTTP_HOST}/$1 [NC,R,L]

My question is, are there any drawbacks to using SSL?

Since this is not a 301 Redirect, will I lose link juice/ranking in search engines by switching to https?

I appreciate the help. I have always wanted to set up SSL on a server, just for the practice of doing it, and I finally decided to do it tonight. It seems to be working well so far, but I am not sure if it's a good idea to use this on every page. My site is not eCommerce and doesn't handle sensitive data; it's mainly for looks and the thrill of installing it for learning.

UPDATED ISSUE

Strangely Bing creates this screenshot from my site now that it is using HTTPS everywhere…

enter image description here

Best Answer

The [R] flag on its own is a 302 redirection (Moved Temporarily). If you really want people using the HTTPS version of your site (hint: you do), then you should be using [R=301] for a permanent redirect:

RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{SERVER_PORT} !^443$
RewriteRule ^/(.*) https://%{HTTP_HOST}/$1 [NC,R=301,L]

A 301 keeps all your google-fu and hard-earned pageranks intact. Make sure mod_rewrite is enabled:

a2enmod rewrite

To answer your exact question:

Is it bad to redirect http to https?

Hell no. It's very good.

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