Sitemap

A sitemap is a file — usually in XML format — that lists a website’s relevant URLs along with data such as the date each was last changed. It helps search engines like Google discover and crawl every page, even ones that few internal links point to. It is especially useful on large, new or frequently changing sites, where automatic crawling might otherwise miss something. It is typically submitted through Google Search Console to speed the process up. It does not guarantee that a page will be indexed ✕ Indexing is the process by which a search engine stores a page in its index after crawling it, so that the page can appear in search results. More in the glossary → , nor does it directly improve rankings, but it makes the search engine’s job easier. There is also an HTML sitemap, meant to help human visitors find their way around.