XML Sitemap Generator

Generate a standards-compliant XML sitemap from your list of URLs. Set lastmod, changefreq, and priority for each entry.

Enter URLs

0 valid / 0 invalid
Enter up to 50,000 URLs, one per line. Max sitemap size: 50MB (uncompressed). Press Ctrl+Enter to generate.
Leave empty to use today’s date for all URLs.

About the XML Sitemap Generator

This tool lets you quickly create a standards-compliant XML sitemap that follows the Sitemaps Protocol. Paste your URLs, configure optional metadata, and generate a ready-to-upload sitemap file.

Real-time validation

URLs are validated on the fly — invalid entries are flagged and excluded from the output so your sitemap stays clean.

Flexible metadata

Set global lastmod, changefreq, and priority values for all URLs. Every element is optional per the protocol.

Copy & download

Copy the generated XML to your clipboard with one click, or download it as sitemap.xml for direct upload to your server.

Why XML Sitemaps Matter for SEO

XML sitemaps are a fundamental component of technical SEO. They act as a roadmap for search engine crawlers, ensuring your important pages are discovered even if they lack strong internal or external links. Here’s why they matter:

  • Faster discovery — New pages and updated content are found by search engines faster when listed in a sitemap, especially for large or newly launched sites.
  • Crawl efficiency — Sitemaps help crawlers prioritize which pages to crawl and how often, saving crawl budget for your most important content.
  • Better indexation — Pages submitted via sitemap are statistically more likely to be indexed compared to relying on discovery through links alone.
  • Metadata hints — The lastmod field tells search engines when content was last updated, influencing recrawl frequency. priority helps signal relative importance within your site.
  • Media discovery — Sitemaps can include image and video metadata, helping your visual content appear in Google Images and Video search results.

Best Practices

  • Include only canonical, indexable URLs — exclude pages with noindex, redirects, or blocks.
  • Set accurate lastmod dates — always reflect the actual last modification time of each page.
  • Use a sitemap index file if you exceed 50,000 URLs or have multiple sitemaps (e.g., pages, images, videos).
  • Submit your sitemap through Google Search Console and list it in your robots.txt file.
  • Keep your sitemap up to date — stale sitemaps with broken links or outdated URLs can harm crawl efficiency.
  • Compress with gzip (sitemap.xml.gz) for faster crawling if your server supports it.
  • Place your sitemap in the root directory of your site (e.g., https://example.com/sitemap.xml).

Frequently Asked Questions

An XML sitemap is a file that lists all important pages on your website and tells search engines when they were last updated, how often they change, and their relative priority. It helps search engines discover and index your content more efficiently, especially for new websites or pages with few external links. Sitemaps follow the Sitemaps Protocol (sitemaps.org) and are one of the most important technical SEO foundations.
A single XML sitemap can contain a maximum of 50,000 URLs and must not exceed 50MB in uncompressed file size. If you exceed either limit, you must split your URLs across multiple sitemap files and create a sitemap index file that references all of them. You can gzip-compress sitemaps for faster crawling.
Submit your sitemap to Google via Google Search Console: go to your property, click "Sitemaps" in the left sidebar, enter the sitemap URL, and click Submit. You can also add the sitemap URL to your robots.txt file by adding a line like `Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml` which allows any compliant crawler to discover it automatically.
`changefreq` (change frequency) is a hint to search engines how often a page is likely to change — values range from "always" to "never." `priority` is a relative importance signal from 0.1 (least important) to 1.0 (most important) that helps search engines prioritize crawling. Both are hints, not directives. Google has stated that changefreq is largely ignored, while priority may carry some weight for crawl prioritization within a site.
No — submitting a sitemap does not guarantee indexing. Search engines use sitemaps as a discovery signal, but they still apply their own crawling and indexing algorithms. Pages must be high quality, have unique content, and be technically accessible (return 200, not blocked by robots.txt or noindex). A sitemap simply increases the chances that your pages will be found and considered for indexing.
Only include pages you want indexed. Exclude thin content pages, duplicate pages, paginated archive pages, admin/login pages, tag or category pages (if they duplicate content), pages with noindex directives, and pages blocked by robots.txt. Focus on canonical, indexable pages that provide unique value. A good sitemap has 80-95% of its submitted URLs indexed.
You only need a sitemap index file if you have more than 50,000 URLs or need more than one sitemap file (e.g., separate sitemaps for pages, posts, images, videos). The sitemap index references multiple sitemap files and follows a similar XML structure. You submit the index file to search engines instead of individual sitemaps.
Yes — the sitemap protocol supports image and video extensions. You can add `<image:image>` and `<video:video>` tags within `<url>` entries to help search engines discover your media content. Google recommends separate image/video sitemaps for large media libraries, but inline tags work well for pages with a few images or videos.