410 Gone.

A 410 Gone response tells clients and crawlers that the requested resource has been intentionally and permanently removed, and no redirect exists. Unlike a 404 (which implies the resource may exist somewhere or may return), a 410 is an explicit declaration of permanent removal—there is nothing at this URL and there never will be again.

410 vs 404 for SEO

Google removes 410 pages from its index significantly faster than 404 pages. If you are deliberately retiring content—removing thin pages, decommissioning old product lines, or deleting spam-attracting URLs—returning a 410 accelerates de-indexing and frees crawl budget more quickly than a 404. For pages with valuable backlinks, a 301 redirect is usually preferable to either status.

When to Use 410

Use 410 when content is permanently removed and you want Google to stop crawling the URL immediately: discontinued products with no replacement, removed author pages on deprecated accounts, outdated regulatory-mandated content, or spam pages you are cleaning up. Return 410 in the HTTP headers while serving a brief user-facing explanation for human visitors who follow old links.