How to create and submit a sitemap

Submitting a sitemap is one of the highest-value, lowest-effort things you can do for a new or growing site: it hands Google a clean list of the URLs you want found. It will not force anything to be indexed — but it removes any excuse for a page to go undiscovered. Here is how to create one, put it in the right place, and submit it properly.

What you are making

An XML sitemap is a machine-readable list of your important URLs, each optionally tagged with when it last changed. If you want the full picture of what belongs in one, the size limits, and why it aids discovery rather than indexing, read what is an XML sitemap first. This guide is the practical how-to.

Step 1: create the sitemap

Pick the method that matches how your site is built — do not hand-write XML if something can generate it for you:

• A CMS or plugin. WordPress with Yoast or Rank Math, Shopify, Squarespace and Wix all generate and update a sitemap automatically. This is the right answer for most sites — an auto-maintained sitemap never goes stale.
• Your framework. Modern frameworks generate one at build time (this very site does). If yours can, use that — the sitemap is then derived from your real routes and cannot drift out of sync.
• An online generator. For a small static site with no CMS, a crawler-based generator will produce a one-off sitemap.xml you upload. Fine for a site that rarely changes; a chore for one that does.
• By hand. Only sensible for a handful of pages. The format is simple:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
  <url>
    <loc>https://example.com/</loc>
    <lastmod>2026-09-10</lastmod>
  </url>
  <url>
    <loc>https://example.com/pricing</loc>
    <lastmod>2026-08-22</lastmod>
  </url>
</urlset>

Step 2: host it at a stable URL

Put the file where crawlers expect it — the site root, so https://example.com/sitemap.xml. Use absolute URLs inside it (the full https:// address, not /pricing), and make sure loading the URL in a browser actually returns the XML.

Step 3: reference it in robots.txt

Add a single line to your robots.txt so any crawler that reads the file finds the sitemap without being told where it is:

Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml

This is a genuinely useful step — it is how search engines other than Google, including Bing, discover your sitemap without a manual submission.

Step 4: submit it in Google Search Console

This is the “submit to Google” part everyone is looking for, and it takes under a minute:

• Open Google Search Console for your verified property.
• Go to Indexing → Sitemaps in the left menu.
• Under Add a new sitemap, enter the path — usually just sitemap.xml — and submit.
• Wait for the status to read Success. Google will report how many URLs it discovered from the file.

You submit once. Google re-reads the file on its own schedule from then on, so an auto-generated sitemap needs no further attention.

Step 5: verify it, and keep it clean

A sitemap full of the wrong URLs sends mixed signals — you are asking Google to index pages your own site says not to. Confirm it validates and that every URL in it is one you actually want indexed, using the sitemap checker. The common mistakes it catches:

• URLs that are noindexed, redirected or blocked. A sitemap should list only final, indexable, 200-OK canonical URLs. Cross- check with the indexability checker if in doubt.
• Non-canonical duplicates. List the canonical version of each page, not every parameter variant.
• A stale or faked lastmod. Only claim a page changed when it did — a sitemap that says every page changed today, every day, teaches Google to ignore the field.
• Over the limits. A single sitemap tops out at 50,000 URLs or 50 MB uncompressed; past that, split it and use a sitemap index file.

What a sitemap will not do

Be clear-eyed about it: submitting a sitemap gets your URLs discovered, not indexed. Google still decides what to index based on crawlability and value, so a sitemap is one step in a larger process. For that whole process — links, requesting indexing, and making pages worth keeping — see how to get your website indexed on Google. And if pages you submitted are sitting unindexed, the discovered — currently not indexed guide explains why a URL Google knows about can still be waiting.