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How to Reduce the Number of Cached Pages in Prerender

Minimize rendering costs and maximize efficiency by limiting unnecessary or repetitive URLs from being cached.

Overview / Introduction

If your Prerender account shows a large number of unique cached URLs, it may be due to query parameter variations, admin pages, or internal routes being rendered unintentionally. This can lead to inflated usage and unnecessary rendering costs.

By adjusting your integration settings and using features like ignored URLs and URL parameter filters, you can significantly reduce usage while still ensuring important pages are indexed and optimized.

Prerequisites

  • Access to your Prerender Dashboard
  • Admin rights to update your server or CDN’s Prerender integration (if applicable)
  • A basic understanding of your website structure (e.g. login paths, dynamic query strings, etc.)

 

Step-by-Step Instructions

Step 1: Avoid Forwarding Internal URLs

Ensure your integration is only forwarding publicly available pages to Prerender. Do not forward internal tools, admin dashboards, or non-public routes.

  • Remove any internal service routes (e.g., /service/internal)
  • Exclude CMS or admin login panels (e.g., /wp-admin, /admin)

Step 2: Configure Ignored Parameters

Tracking or session-specific query strings often cause duplicate cache entries for the same page. Remove or whitelist only required query parameters. We have already configured a set of standard tracking params for you to be ignored, but we cannot determine which params your site uses for logic or tracing.

  1. Go to the Cache Manager in the dashboard.
  2. Click on the URL Parameters tab.
  3. Use the default setting or create your own rules to ignore parameters like ?session_id=, ?utm_campaign=, etc.

You can read more about this here.

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Step 3: Use the Ignored URLs Feature

You can block entire patterns or paths from being cached using Contains or Wildcard match rules.

  1. Open the Ignored URLs section under Cache Manager.
  2. Add rules for pages that should never be cached (e.g., /thank-you, ?preview=).
  3. These URLs will not be stored in cache and will return a 404 for Prerender, preserving quota.

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Step 4: Remove Dead Links

Search engine bots and Prerender may still render pages that no longer exist. Make sure your site doesn't contain dead links that lead to 404 pages.

  • Use a link checker tool to clean up outdated internal links.
  • Purge deleted or unused pages from your CMS or sitemap file.

These changes will lower bounce rate, reduce rendering waste, and improve SEO.

Important Clarification: Removing URLs from cache alone is not enough. If you do not update your integration rules, those URLs will continually be sent to Prerender and recached again.

Confirmation / Verification

After configuration, monitor your Cache Manager to verify that:

  • The number of unique URLs is decreasing or remains stable over time
  • Previously ignored/internal URLs no longer appear in cached results
  • The Ignored URL and URL Parameter rules are being respected

Troubleshooting / FAQ

  • Q: Why do I still see /admin URLs in the cache?
    A: Your integration may still be forwarding them. Check your server or CDN config. If your config is fine, it might take some time for the changes to take effect.
  • Q: How do I test if a URL matches a rule?
    A: Use the test option in the Ignored URLs section before saving a filter.
  • Q: I removed from cache, but it keeps coming back?
    A: Make sure you apply ignore or block rules instead of manually purging only.

Tips / Best Practices

  • Use wildcard ignoring to skip entire folders (e.g., /internal/*)
  • Regularly inspect new query parameters introduced by campaigns or trackers
  • Combine this setup with the “Pages not requested in 30 days” filter to sunset unused URLs

Related Documentation