XMLSitemap

XML Sitemap is a file that lists the pages of a website in XML format, intended to help search engines discover and crawl content. The standard is defined by sitemaps.org, and the common file is named sitemap.xml located at the site root. The file uses the urlset element with the namespace http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9. Each url entry includes a loc element with the page URL and may also include lastmod (the last modification date), changefreq (how often the page is expected to change), and priority (the relative importance of the page). There are also optional extensions for images, videos, and news items.

A sitemap index file can reference multiple sitemap files, using sitemap entries with loc and lastmod. This structure enables organizations with large sites to organize crawlable content across several files. Sitemaps help search engines discover pages that might not be reached through normal navigation, especially new or updated content, pages behind deep navigation, or dynamically generated resources. They complement but do not guarantee indexing or rankings. Sitemaps should be used in combination with robots.txt, good internal linking, and quality content.

Practical considerations include limits and generation methods. A typical sitemap may contain up to 50,000 URLs and must not exceed 50 MB when uncompressed; for larger sites, multiple sitemaps and an accompanying index are used. Sitemaps are usually generated automatically by content management systems or plugins and placed at the site root or referenced by the index. Major search engines, such as Google and Bing, support the protocol and provide submission and monitoring tools to help manage sitemaps. Best practices also include excluding private content and ensuring the sitemap remains accessible to crawlers.