Invalid routes return HTTP 200 with 404 content

A soft 404 happens when a page that should not exist, like a made-up, invalid web address, loads with a normal "success" status code, HTTP 200, instead of the correct "not found" status code, 404. This check requested a deliberately invalid test address on your site and found it returned HTTP 200 even though the page's own content read as a not-found page. Google treats this as a soft 404, which wastes crawl budget on pages that don't really exist and means Search Console can no longer trust your site's status codes at face value, both of which quietly de-prioritise the attention Google gives to your real content. Your developer should configure the application, router, or CDN so unknown routes correctly return HTTP 404, or 410 if the content was intentionally removed, while keeping genuine pages on 200. Budget about thirty minutes to make and verify the change.