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SEO

XML Sitemap

An XML sitemap is a file (typically `sitemap.xml`) that lists the URLs on your site you want search engines to crawl and index, along with metadata like last-modified date and update frequency.

A sitemap does not guarantee indexing, but it is the most reliable way to tell search engines which pages you consider canonical and how often they change. For sites larger than a few hundred pages, it dramatically improves crawl efficiency.

The sitemap should only contain canonical, indexable URLs that return HTTP 200. Including redirected, 404, or `noindex` URLs wastes crawl budget and confuses signals. Most modern frameworks generate sitemaps automatically; verify the output reflects what you actually want indexed.

Sitemaps are referenced in `robots.txt` (`Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml`) and submitted directly in Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools. For very large sites (>50,000 URLs), split into multiple sitemaps under a sitemap index file.

Related terms

  • Canonical URL

    A canonical URL is the preferred version of a page, declared via the `<link rel='canonical'>` tag, that tells search engines which URL to index when the same content is reachable at multiple URLs.

  • robots.txt

    robots.txt is a text file placed at the root of a website that gives crawling instructions to bots, specifying which paths they may or may not request.

  • Orphaned Page

    An orphaned page is a page on your site that has zero internal links pointing to it, making it nearly impossible for search engines to discover during normal crawling and resulting in minimal organic traffic.

← Schema Markup

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