Dead Link Fixer: Broken Link Checker with Wayback Replacements

What does Dead Link Fixer do?

Dead Link Fixer is a broken link checker that goes one step further: for every dead link it finds, it looks up the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine and hands you an archived replacement URL you can paste straight into your page.

Point it at your website (or paste a list of URLs) and get a clean table of 404s, 410s, soft 404s, server errors, DNS and TLS failures and redirects, the pages each bad link appears on, its anchor text, and a suggested fix. It uses the Wayback Machine's official, keyless Availability API, so there is no scraping of archive.org.

Why use Dead Link Fixer?

Link rot quietly damages SEO, reader trust and citations. Most link checkers stop at "this link is broken" and leave you to hunt for a replacement by hand. Dead Link Fixer:

• ✅ Finds broken links across a site crawl, a set of pages, or a plain URL list
• 🗄️ Finds a Wayback Machine copy for each dead link, optionally the copy closest to a date you choose (for example, when you first published the link)
• 🧭 Suggests a fix for every row: use the archived copy, update a redirected link to its final URL, or restore/redirect an internal page
• 🤝 Never cries wolf: links blocked by robots.txt or by access controls (401, 403, 429) are reported as unverified, not broken
• 🕵️ Detects soft 404s: pages that answer 200 OK but say "page not found"
• 🤖 Respects robots.txt for every page it crawls and every link it checks
• ⏱️ Runs on Apify, so you can schedule monthly link audits, call it through the API, and send results to Google Sheets, Slack, Zapier or Make

Useful for bloggers, publishers, SEO agencies, librarians, Wikipedia-style editors, documentation teams, legal and research teams who must keep citations alive.

What data does Dead Link Fixer extract?

Field	Type	Description
linkUrl	string	The link that was checked
category	string	broken, client_error, server_error, network_error, redirect, unverified or ok
httpStatus	number	Final HTTP status code (empty for network errors)
errorCode	string	For example ENOTFOUND, TIMEOUT, ROBOTS_TXT_DISALLOW
foundOnPages	array	Pages on your site that contain the link
anchorTexts	array	The visible link text used
archiveUrl	string	Wayback Machine replacement URL, when one exists
archiveTimestamp	date	When that archived copy was captured (UTC)
suggestedFix	string	Plain-language next step
finalUrl, redirectCount	string, number	Where redirects end up
soft404	boolean	true when a 200 page looks like a "not found" page

A run summary (pages crawled, links checked, problems, archive copies found) is saved to the key-value store as SUMMARY.

How to find and fix broken links

1. Click Try for free (or Start).
2. Add your website's home page to Start URLs.
3. Pick a Mode: Crawl site (default), Start pages only, or URL list.
4. Leave Find Wayback Machine replacements on.
5. Click Start and wait for the run to finish.
6. Open the Output tab, sort by Pages linking, and fix the links that appear most often first.
7. Export to CSV or Excel, or schedule the Actor to run monthly.

How much will it cost to check broken links?

Dead Link Fixer uses pay-per-event pricing, so you only pay for work done:

Event	What it means
Link checked	One unique link checked (healthy or not)
Archive replacement found	Charged only when a usable Wayback Machine copy is returned for a dead link

Current prices are shown on the Pricing tab. Set Max links to check and your run's maximum cost to cap spending; the Actor stops cleanly when your limit is reached. Archive lookups that fail or are rate-limited are never charged.

Input

See the Input tab for every option. The ones that matter most:

• Start URLs: your site or pages. In URL list mode, each URL is itself checked as a link.
• Max pages to crawl / Max links to check: hard caps for cost control.
• Preferred archive date: YYYY, YYYYMM or YYYYMMDD. The archived copy closest to that date is returned.
• Output only links that need attention: switch off to get a full link inventory.

Example input:

{
  "startUrls": [{ "url": "https://example.com/blog/" }],
  "mode": "crawlSite",
  "maxPages": 100,
  "findArchivedCopies": true,
  "archiveTargetDate": "2019"
}

Output

You can download the dataset in various formats such as JSON, HTML, CSV, or Excel.

[
  {
    "linkUrl": "https://old-supplier.example/catalogue.html",
    "category": "broken",
    "httpStatus": 404,
    "errorCode": null,
    "foundOnPages": ["https://example.com/blog/seed-sources"],
    "foundOnPageCount": 1,
    "anchorTexts": ["seed catalogue"],
    "archiveStatus": "found",
    "archiveUrl": "https://web.archive.org/web/20190412093011/https://old-supplier.example/catalogue.html",
    "archiveTimestamp": "2019-04-12T09:30:11Z",
    "suggestedFix": "Replace with the archived copy: https://web.archive.org/web/20190412093011/https://old-supplier.example/catalogue.html"
  },
  {
    "linkUrl": "https://example.com/old-page",
    "category": "broken",
    "httpStatus": 200,
    "soft404": true,
    "archiveStatus": "not_archived",
    "suggestedFix": "Restore the page or add a 301 redirect to the closest live page."
  }
]

Tips for faster, cheaper runs

• Start with Start pages only on your most important pages, then widen to a full crawl.
• Turn off Check internal links if you only care about outbound citations.
• Keep Max concurrency at 5 or lower for small sites; it is politer and avoids rate limits.
• The Internet Archive limits how fast anyone can query it. If it starts refusing requests, the Actor pauses, then skips further archive lookups for that run rather than failing (and does not charge for them).

FAQ, disclaimers and support

Does it scrape archive.org? No. It calls the Wayback Machine's public Availability API once per dead link, spaced out to respect the Internet Archive's limits.

Why is a link marked "unverified"? The site refused automated access (401, 403, 429) or its robots.txt disallows the URL. We don't call it broken because a person might still reach it.

Can it check pages that need JavaScript to show links? Not in this version; it reads the HTML the server sends.

This Actor only reads public pages and links you point it at. It does not collect personal data. Our Actors are ethical and do not extract any private user data, such as email addresses, gender, or location. They only extract what the user has chosen to share publicly. We therefore believe that our Actors, when used for ethical purposes by Apify users, are safe. However, you should be aware that your results could contain personal data. Personal data is protected by the GDPR in the European Union and by other regulations around the world. You should not scrape personal data unless you have a legitimate reason to do so. If you're unsure whether your reason is legitimate, consult your lawyers.

Found a bug or want a feature? Open an issue in the Issues tab. For programmatic access, see the API tab. Not affiliated with the Internet Archive.