How to find and fix broken links in a Canvas course
Canvas has a built-in link checker in Course Settings. Here is how to run it, how to read what it finds, and the one-sentence way.
Short answer: in Canvas, go to Settings, click Validate Links in Content in the sidebar, and click Start Link Validation. Canvas lists every item with a bad link; click an item’s name, edit it, fix the link, and run the check again. With Course++, you type: “Check this course for broken links and list them.”
01
In Canvas, by hand
- In Course Navigation, click Settings.
- In the sidebar on the right, click Validate Links in Content.
- Click Start Link Validation. It can take a few minutes on a big course.
- Canvas lists each page, assignment or other item that has a problem link, and what is wrong with it. Click the item’s name to open it.
- Edit the item, fix or replace the link, and save. Then run the check again to confirm the list is clear.
Reading the results
- It checks published and unpublished content, so it is worth running before a term starts, not just during one.
- “Unresponsive” doesn’t always mean broken. Some websites block automated checkers like Canvas’s but load fine for students. Click the link yourself before you replace it.
- Copying content is the usual cause. Text pasted from another course can still point at that old course’s pages and files. Importing the course content instead of copying and pasting it avoids most of this.
02
With Course++, in one sentence
Check this course for broken links and list them.
Course++ is a browser extension for Chrome and Firefox (and Edge, from the Chrome Web Store). You open your Canvas course, open Course++ beside it, and type what you want in plain words. It works inside the Canvas tab you already have open, using your own Canvas account, so it can only do what you can do, and its changes show up in Canvas as yours.
Course++ reads your pages and assignments, collects the links in them, and checks whether each website link still loads. You get a list: which item, which link, and what happened. Then ask for the fix in the same plain words: “Replace the dead link on the Week 3 page with this one,” or “Remove the links that are gone.”
- Links into Canvas are handled differently. A link to a page or file in your own Canvas needs a Canvas sign-in, which the link check doesn’t have. Course++ says it can’t check those from there rather than calling them broken, and checks the item they point at instead.
- Fixes can be undone. Edits to your pages go into Course++’s History, and most can be undone from there. It asks before it deletes anything.
250 FREE credits to try it. No credit card.
Canvas steps checked against Instructure’s own Canvas guides in October 2026. Canvas changes its screens from time to time, and schools turn features on and off, so a button may be named a little differently in yours.