How to enable SEF URLs in OpenCart 1.5

Search Engine Friendly URLs are urls that use descriptive words instead of variables. Look at the following examples:

As you can see above, having about-us in the URL helps users know what the page is about. It also can play a role in getting you pages higher in the Search Engine Result Pages, making it easier for customers to find your site in Google (and other search engines).

In this OpenCart 1.5 tutorial, we are going to walk you through the steps for enabling search engine friendly URLs.

To enable SEF URLs in OpenCart 1.5:

1. Log in to the OpenCart 1.5 Dashboard as an Administrator
2. Hover over System in the menu, then click on SETTINGS
3. Click the Server tab
4. Next to Use SEO URL's, select Yes
   

   Please note:
   OpenCart 1.5 advises you that mod-rewrite must be enabled and that you will need to rename the htaccess.txt file to .htaccess. All of Web Hosting Hub's servers have mod-rewrite enabled by default, so you'll simply need to rename the file to read .htaccess

   Notes regarding OpenCart 1.5 installations in subfolders:
   Many sites run OpenCart 1.5 directly from http://domain.com. If you by chance have OpenCart installed in a subfolder, such as http://domain.com/store, you'll need to edit your .htaccess file and make the following change:
   
   Find these lines:
   
   

   # If your opencart installation does not run on the main web folder make sure you folder it does run in ie. / becomes /shop/
   RewriteBase /

   ... and update the RewriteBase with your subfolder name, such as:

   # If your opencart installation does not run on the main web folder make sure you folder it does run in ie. / becomes /shop/
   RewriteBase /store

5. After making the changes above, click the Save button in the top right.
   
   You have now successfully enabled SEF URLs in OpenCart 1.5!
   
   After enabling SEF URLs, your next step will be to set descriptive text for your pages to be used in the SEF URLs. For example, you'll need tell OpenCart to use "about-us" in the URL for the about us page.