XML Sitemap Generator

The XML Sitemap Generator produces valid XML sitemap files for submission to search engines. A sitemap lists the important URLs on your site with optional metadata (priority, change frequency, last modification date) to help Google, Bing, and other search engines discover and crawl content efficiently. Sites with complex structure, frequent updates, or new content that hasn\u2019t been discovered via internal links benefit most from sitemaps.

Paste URLs (one per line) or provide a structured list with per-URL metadata, and the tool generates a standards-compliant sitemap.xml. Supports basic URL-only sitemaps, detailed sitemaps with lastmod, priority, and changefreq fields, and sitemap indexes that reference multiple sitemap files (needed when you have more than 50,000 URLs or 50MB of sitemap data). Optional extensions for images, videos, and hreflang. All processing runs in your browser so URL lists stay private.

XML sitemap format follows the sitemaps.org protocol, supported by all major search engines since 2006.

Basic sitemap structure:

<?xml version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"UTF-8\"?>
<urlset xmlns=\"http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9\">
<url>
<loc>https://example.com/page</loc>
<lastmod>2024-05-05</lastmod>
<changefreq>weekly</changefreq>
<priority>0.8</priority>
</url>
...
</urlset>

Required: <loc> — the URL.
Optional:
- <lastmod>: ISO 8601 date (2024-05-05) or datetime (2024-05-05T12:00:00+00:00). Google actually uses this for crawl prioritization.
- <changefreq>: always/hourly/daily/weekly/monthly/yearly/never. Google largely ignores this now but Bing may use.
- <priority>: 0.0 to 1.0. Relative to other URLs on the same site. Google largely ignores; don\u2019t spend time optimizing.

Limits:
- 50,000 URLs per sitemap file
- 50 MB uncompressed size
- For larger sites: split into multiple sitemaps and create a sitemap index file

Sitemap index format:

<?xml version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"UTF-8\"?>
<sitemapindex xmlns=\"http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9\">
<sitemap>
<loc>https://example.com/sitemap-1.xml</loc>
<lastmod>2024-05-05</lastmod>
</sitemap>
...
</sitemapindex>

Compression: gzip the sitemap (sitemap.xml.gz) to reduce transfer size. Both compressed and uncompressed are accepted.

URL encoding: URLs in sitemap must be properly XML-escaped (& becomes &amp;, etc.). The generator handles this automatically.

HTTPS: sitemap URLs should match the canonical URL structure. If your site uses HTTPS, all sitemap URLs should be HTTPS.

Robots.txt reference: add a Sitemap: line to robots.txt pointing to your sitemap:
Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml

Submission:
- Google Search Console: add property, submit sitemap under Sitemaps section
- Bing Webmaster Tools: submit similarly
- Robots.txt reference is also picked up automatically

Image sitemap extension:

<url>
<loc>https://example.com/page</loc>
<image:image>
<image:loc>https://example.com/image.jpg</image:loc>
<image:caption>A caption</image:caption>
</image:image>
</url>

Requires xmlns:image=\"http://www.google.com/schemas/sitemap-image/1.1\" on urlset.

Video, news, and hreflang extensions exist with their own schemas. Use only the extensions your site actually needs.

Compared to CMS-generated sitemaps (Yoast, RankMath), this tool is for sites without a sitemap plugin or when you want manual control. Plugins auto-generate and keep sitemaps updated; this tool is for one-off or custom generation.

Compared to command-line sitemap generators (sitemap-xml, python-sitemap-generator), this tool provides browser UI with validation. CLI is better for automated pipelines; this tool for manual generation.

Compared to Screaming Frog\u2019s sitemap feature, this tool is free and focused on URL list input rather than crawling. Screaming Frog crawls your site first; this tool takes URLs you already have.