An empty category is not automatically an error page. A seasonally empty but useful page differs from a permanently retired category or a failed product request.
Three situations with different consequences
Fictional example: a gardening site has no seedlings for sale in winter. Its category still explains the season and gives a genuinely maintained availability update. That can answer a visitor’s question. Do not invent a restocking date to fill the space.
For a permanently removed category without an appropriate replacement, a real 404 or 410 response is reasonable. If a relevant successor exists, assess a redirect to it.
If a failed product request merely makes the category appear empty, investigate the outage instead. It is not an intentional assortment decision.
Read the content and the response together
Open the category while signed out and record both its status and visible content. Google may treat empty or error-like pages as soft 404s even when they return 200. A success status alone does not make the page useful.
Check internal links and filters too. Visitors need to know whether nothing is currently available, their filters are too restrictive or the category has been retired. Those causes require clear explanations rather than a blanket redirect to the homepage.
Related check: Match search questions to suitable pages.
For a defined empty-state view with relevant navigation, consider Adapt an existing shop interface.