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I just updated my site to use pretty URL structures.

Old URL: https://digimoncard.io/deck/?deckid=1241
New URL: https://digimoncard.io/deck/green-otk-1241

I've set up my SEO like so:

<meta property="og:url" content="https://digimoncard.io/deck/green-otk-1241" />

<link rel="canonical" href="https://digimoncard.io/deck/?deckid=1241" />

Would this be considered correct practice? Currently, Google has the old-style URLs indexed and I want to avoid duplicate content SEO issues.

However, I'm not entirely sure if the query string URL should be in canonical or if it should be the other way around?

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The canonical URL should be the current URL. so your code between <head> codes should be like this in the new URL:

<meta property="og:url" content="https://digimoncard.io/deck/green-otk-1241" />
<link rel="canonical" href="https://digimoncard.io/deck/green-otk-1241" />

If your old URL is you need to make a permanent 301 redirect to your new URL.

https://digimoncard.io/deck/?deckid=1241 > https://digimoncard.io/deck/green-otk-1241
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    Ah so an actual redirect is needed. I was hoping to avoid that. My concern is that I have over 1200 decks links and the title of the deck could potentially change when a user makes an edit to the deck. Doing so would then render my hardcoded redirect stale
    – GenesisBits
    Aug 25, 2021 at 10:12
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    Although on second thought, maybe the pretty URL shouldn't be updated when a user edits the deck..
    – GenesisBits
    Aug 25, 2021 at 10:13
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    @genesisbits your old urls are indexed in google. If Google gets a 404 error when entering these pages, it means SEO problem and traffic loss for you. Also, when a user clicks on a link, the room will get a 404 error. If you have changed the URL, you have to do a 301 redirect.
    – ardacarofficial
    Aug 25, 2021 at 10:16
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    Aside: "htaccess 301 redirect code" - this code is incorrect. The Redirect directive does not match the query string (or scheme + hostname). For this, you would need to use mod_rewrite instead. See my answer to the follow-up question on Stackoverflow.
    – MrWhite
    Aug 26, 2021 at 1:00
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    If both the old URL and the pretty URL serve the same content and have a canonical tag pointing to the pretty URL you don't need to implement a redirect. However, a redirect is a stronger signal to Google compared to a canonical tag and Google is more likely to always use your pretty URL when you have a redirect compared to relying on the canonical tag.
    – Stephen Ostermiller ♦
    Aug 26, 2021 at 8:13

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