Soft 404
A page that is in fact empty, shows a not-found message or has no value, while the server returns a success (200) status code.
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Why it matters
Google does not count these pages as real content and does not index them, but spends time crawling them. Sold-out products, filter pages with no results and non-existent addresses on single-page applications are common causes. Returning the correct status code improves both crawling and the accuracy of reports.
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Example
A single-page application shows a screen saying “page not found” but returning 200 for every non-existent address. Once the server is set to return 404 on those addresses, the soft 404 warnings in Search Console disappear.
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Common mistake
Leaving product pages empty when the product is permanently discontinued. If the product will not return, the page should redirect to the closest product or category, or return 404/410.
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