SEOhightechnical

Create and submit an XML sitemap

rule · sitemap

XML sitemaps help search engines discover and index all your pages.

Code Example

XML

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
  <url>
    <loc>https://example.com/</loc>
    <lastmod>2024-01-15</lastmod>
    <changefreq>weekly</changefreq>
    <priority>1.0</priority>
  </url>
  <url>
    <loc>https://example.com/about</loc>
    <lastmod>2024-01-10</lastmod>
    <changefreq>monthly</changefreq>
    <priority>0.8</priority>
  </url>
</urlset>

Why It Matters

Search engines may not discover all your pages through links alone—a sitemap ensures every important page gets indexed, especially for large or newly launched sites.

Sitemap Elements

Element	Purpose	Required
`loc`	Full URL of the page	Yes
`lastmod`	Last modification date	Recommended
`changefreq`	Update frequency hint	Optional
`priority`	Relative importance (0.0-1.0)	Optional

Next.js Dynamic Sitemap

TypeScript

// app/sitemap.ts
import { MetadataRoute } from 'next'
 
export default async function sitemap(): Promise<MetadataRoute.Sitemap> {
  const baseUrl = 'https://example.com'
 
  // Static pages
  const staticPages = [
    '',
    '/about',
    '/contact',
    '/pricing',
  ].map(route => ({
    url: `${baseUrl}${route}`,
    lastModified: new Date(),
    changeFrequency: 'monthly' as const,
    priority: route === '' ? 1.0 : 0.8,
  }))
 
  // Dynamic pages from database
  const products = await getProducts()
  const productPages = products.map(product => ({
    url: `${baseUrl}/products/${product.slug}`,
    lastModified: product.updatedAt,
    changeFrequency: 'weekly' as const,
    priority: 0.7,
  }))
 
  // Blog posts
  const posts = await getPosts()
  const blogPages = posts.map(post => ({
    url: `${baseUrl}/blog/${post.slug}`,
    lastModified: post.updatedAt,
    changeFrequency: 'monthly' as const,
    priority: 0.6,
  }))
 
  return [...staticPages, ...productPages, ...blogPages]
}

Large Sites: Sitemap Index

XML

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<sitemapindex xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
  <sitemap>
    <loc>https://example.com/sitemap-pages.xml</loc>
    <lastmod>2024-01-15</lastmod>
  </sitemap>
  <sitemap>
    <loc>https://example.com/sitemap-products.xml</loc>
    <lastmod>2024-01-14</lastmod>
  </sitemap>
  <sitemap>
    <loc>https://example.com/sitemap-blog.xml</loc>
    <lastmod>2024-01-13</lastmod>
  </sitemap>
</sitemapindex>

TypeScript

// app/sitemap.ts - Multiple sitemaps
import { MetadataRoute } from 'next'
 
export async function generateSitemaps() {
  const productCount = await getProductCount()
  const numSitemaps = Math.ceil(productCount / 50000)
 
  return Array.from({ length: numSitemaps }, (_, i) => ({ id: i }))
}
 
export default async function sitemap({
  id,
}: {
  id: number
}): Promise<MetadataRoute.Sitemap> {
  const start = id * 50000
  const products = await getProducts({ start, limit: 50000 })
 
  return products.map(product => ({
    url: `https://example.com/products/${product.slug}`,
    lastModified: product.updatedAt,
  }))
}

Priority Guidelines

Page Type	Suggested Priority
Homepage	1.0
Main category pages	0.8-0.9
Product/service pages	0.7-0.8
Blog posts	0.5-0.7
Legal pages	0.3-0.5
Archive/tag pages	0.3-0.4

Reference in robots.txt

TEXT

User-agent: *
Allow: /
 
Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml

Image Sitemap Extension

XML

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9"
        xmlns:image="http://www.google.com/schemas/sitemap-image/1.1">
  <url>
    <loc>https://example.com/products/widget</loc>
    <image:image>
      <image:loc>https://example.com/images/widget.jpg</image:loc>
      <image:title>Widget Product Photo</image:title>
    </image:image>
    <image:image>
      <image:loc>https://example.com/images/widget-side.jpg</image:loc>
      <image:title>Widget Side View</image:title>
    </image:image>
  </url>
</urlset>

Submit to Search Engines

Shell

# Google Search Console
# 1. Go to https://search.google.com/search-console
# 2. Select property
# 3. Sitemaps → Add new sitemap
# 4. Enter: sitemap.xml
 
# Bing Webmaster Tools
# 1. Go to https://www.bing.com/webmasters
# 2. Submit sitemap URL
 
# Programmatic submission (ping)
curl "https://www.google.com/ping?sitemap=https://example.com/sitemap.xml"
curl "https://www.bing.com/ping?sitemap=https://example.com/sitemap.xml"

What NOT to Include

Exclude	Reason
Noindex pages	Won't be indexed anyway
Duplicate content	May cause issues
404/error pages	Bad user experience
Login-required pages	Can't be indexed
Parameter variations	Use canonical URLs

Exceptions

Staging, utility, login, account, or internal search pages may intentionally use different crawl or index signals if they are not meant to rank.
Temporary migration states can produce noisy intermediate signals; flag the live production URL pattern, not one-off transition artifacts.
When redirects, canonicals, robots directives, or indexability signals conflict, fix the strongest final signal first instead of reporting every downstream symptom as a separate blocker.