Using htaccess to remove single query parameter

Question

For reasons that aren\'t worth going into here, Google have been indexing one of my sites with an unnecessary query string in the URL. I\'d like to modify my htaccess file t

Answer 1

Try this (i tested it with your examples and it is working fine):

RewriteEngine on

RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^(.*)&?query=[^&]+&?(.*)$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^/?(.*)$ /$1?%1%2 [R=301,L]

Also, you should add a condition to apply this rule only on existing files (that's up to you).
If you want it:

RewriteEngine on

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^(.*)&?query=[^&]+&?(.*)$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^/?(.*)$ /$1?%1%2 [R=301,L]

Answer 2

It seems there is a mistake or something. Here is working solution:

RewriteEngine on

RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^(.*)&?query=[^&]+&?(.*)$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /$1?%1%2 [R=301,L,NE]

This code removes just one parameter. Working perfect.