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Prevent Publishing Posts with Broken Internal Links

Checks all internal links within post content before publishing. If a linked page or post returns a 404 status, publishing is blocked and the post is reverted to Draft.

Installation:
Add this snippet as a PHP Snippet in WPCode and set it to Auto Insert → Run Everywhere.

Note:
For performance reasons, this check only runs when a post is being published.

Avijit Datta
<10
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php
<?php
<?php
/**
 * Snippet: Prevent Publishing Posts with Broken Internal Links
 * Description: Stops publishing when broken internal links are detected inside content.
 *
 * Curated by: Avijit Datta
 * Agency: CypraWeb Digital
 * Website: https://cyprawebdigital.com
 *
 * Version: 1.0
 */
add_action('transition_post_status', 'cwd_check_internal_links_before_publish', 10, 3);
function cwd_check_internal_links_before_publish($new_status, $old_status, $post) {
    if ($new_status !== 'publish' || $old_status === 'publish') {
        return;
    }
    if (wp_is_post_revision($post->ID)) {
        return;
    }
    preg_match_all(
        '/<a\s[^>]*href=[\"\']([^\"\']+)[\"\']/i',
        $post->post_content,
        $matches
    );
    if (empty($matches[1])) {
        return;
    }
    $site_host = wp_parse_url(home_url(), PHP_URL_HOST);
    foreach ($matches[1] as $url) {
        $link_host = wp_parse_url($url, PHP_URL_HOST);
        if ($link_host && $link_host !== $site_host) {
            continue;
        }
        $response = wp_remote_head($url, array(
            'timeout' => 5,
            'redirection' => 3
        ));
        if (is_wp_error($response)) {
            continue;
        }
        $status_code = wp_remote_retrieve_response_code($response);
        if ($status_code == 404) {
            remove_action(
                'transition_post_status',
                'cwd_check_internal_links_before_publish',
                10
            );
            wp_update_post(array(
                'ID' => $post->ID,
                'post_status' => 'draft'
            ));
            add_filter('redirect_post_location', function($location) {
                return add_query_arg(
                    'cwd_broken_links',
                    1,
                    $location
                );
            });
            break;
        }
    }
}
add_action('admin_notices', function() {
    if (!isset($_GET['cwd_broken_links'])) {
        return;
    }
    echo '<div class="notice notice-error">';
    echo '<p><strong>Publishing blocked:</strong> Broken internal links were detected in the content. Please fix them before publishing.</p>';
    echo '</div>';
});
Hosted with ❤️ by WPCode
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