404 page in dev server returns 200 status code instead of 404

[tats-u]

Have you read the Contributing Guidelines on issues?

• I have read the Contributing Guidelines on issues.

Prerequisites

• I'm using the latest version of Docusaurus.
• I have tried the npm run clear or yarn clear command.
• I have tried rm -rf node_modules yarn.lock package-lock.json and re-installing packages.
• I have tried creating a repro with https://new.docusaurus.io.
• I have read the console error message carefully (if applicable).

Description

If you try to access to assets that don't exist, they must be 404, but 200 are returned. It makes harder to debug because it is confusing with existing assets.
If you try to load static CSS files in your site, the content of 404 page will be tried to be interpreted as CSS.

Reproducible demo

No response

Steps to reproduce

1. Create a Docusaurus site
2. node --run start (Node 22)
3. Launch your browser
4. Press F12 to open the Dev tab, then switch to "Network" tab
5. Open http://localhost:3000/foo/bar/baz/qux/quux or a URL in localhost:3000 where no page exists
6. Check its status code

Instead of 3–6, you can run curl -I http://localhost:3000/foo/bar/baz/qux/quux.

Expected behavior

Status code is 404

Actual behavior

Status code is 200

$ curl -I http://localhost:3000/foo/bar/baz/qux/quux
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
X-Powered-By: Express
access-control-allow-origin: *
Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8
Accept-Ranges: bytes
Content-Length: 2106
ETag: W/"83a-NUMvx01I1roo/HRoilxs0XiYpLg"
Vary: Accept-Encoding
Date: Sun, 20 Apr 2025 14:47:05 GMT
Connection: keep-alive
Keep-Alive: timeout=5

Your environment

• Public source code:
• Public site URL:
• Docusaurus version used: 3.7.0
• Environment name and version (e.g. Chrome 89, Node.js 16.4): Node 22.13.1
• Operating system and version (e.g. Ubuntu 20.04.2 LTS): Windows 11

Self-service

• I'd be willing to fix this bug myself.

[Codimow]

what? it works js fine

[tats-u]

What do you mean?

[arshitas]

Hi @tats-u I see the issue was opened a few months back, are you still able to reproduce this issue with the given software versions?

[tats-u]

@arshitas If it works correctly in your environment, please show me proof.

[tats-u]

PS> git remote -v
local   github.com:tats-u/docusaurus.git (fetch)
local   github.com:tats-u/docusaurus.git (push)
origin  https://github.com/facebook/docusaurus.git (fetch)
origin  https://github.com/facebook/docusaurus.git (push)
PS> git status
On branch main
Your branch is up to date with 'origin/main'.

Untracked files:
  (use "git add <file>..." to include in what will be committed)
        .yarnrc.yml

nothing added to commit but untracked files present (use "git add" to track)
PS> curl -I http://localhost:3000/foo/bar/baz/qux/quux
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
X-Powered-By: Express
access-control-allow-origin: *
Accept-Ranges: bytes
Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8
Content-Length: 3153
Vary: Accept-Encoding
Date: Thu, 02 Oct 2025 21:47:04 GMT
Connection: keep-alive
Keep-Alive: timeout=5