Internal URL paths contain uppercase letters
In the reportInternal URL paths contain uppercase characters
internal_url_mixed_case · Review item
This appears when a link on your site points to an address with capital letters in its path, such as /About-Us/. Google treats /About-Us/ and /about-us/ as different addresses, so mixed case can split one page into two. Link to one form, preferably all lower case.
Severity: Notice. It is a notice: a risk to keep in mind, not proof that a duplicate exists.
Why it matters
Google's URL structure guide says that its URL handling is case sensitive and treats /APPLE and /apple as distinct URLs, and advises converting all text to the same case where your server treats both alike.
What to do
- Look at the finding: it shows the address, where the capitals are and up to ten pages that link to it.
- Link to one form of the address everywhere, preferably lower case.
- If your server answers both forms, redirect the other form permanently to the one you use.
When to leave it as it is: if the address has always been written this way and only this form is linked, you can leave it; the check does not test whether another form exists.
What we read
We read the <a href> and <area href> links in the HTML of each crawled page, without running JavaScript, resolve them against a <base href> if there is one, and keep the links to your own host, with or without www.; other hosts and subdomains are left out. This rule makes no extra request for a linked URL; the audit may already have crawled it.
An address is reported when its decoded path has at least one capital letter, in any alphabet; the domain and the query are not read, and file names such as /Report.PDF count too. Each address is its own finding, listed with the pages that link to it.
Only pages that answered 200 with complete HTML are read. A page we cannot read reliably without a browser, for example one with unsupported SVG markup or a <select> menu, and a page with a link we cannot resolve, such as one with a space in it, are marked as not checked for all the address checks.
Example & evidence
Illustrative example — one link, not a live audit.
https://bakery.example/ contains:
<a href="/About-Us/">About us</a>The path has two capital letters, so https://bakery.example/About-Us/ is reported with the page that links to it.
A possible correction: link to /about-us/, and redirect /About-Us/ to it.
Confirm & check again
Check for yourself: look at the addresses in your menus and sitemap for capital letters after the domain.
Check again: Full audit — run a new audit of the site. The finding for this address closes when every page that linked to it is crawled again, read in full, and no longer links to it. A linking page that is not crawled again, or cannot be read, keeps the finding open.
Limits & sources
The check reads links as written in the HTML and makes no extra request for those addresses, does not follow redirects, and does not compare them with other versions of the page. Links added by JavaScript are not seen. The check does not prove that a lower-case version exists or shows the same content.
Confidence: High because the address is read directly from the link.
Sources
- Google, URL structure best practices for Google Search — says Google's URL handling is case sensitive, treating /APPLE and /apple as distinct URLs, and advises converting all text to the same case where the server treats them alike. Checked 28 September 2026.
Editorial review: 29 September 2026