To submit a sitemap to Google, open Google Search Console, select your property, click Sitemaps under Indexing in the left menu, paste your sitemap URL into the Add a new sitemap box and click Submit. The sitemap then appears in the Submitted sitemaps table with a status: Success, Has errors or Couldn't fetch. You need owner permission on the property, and the whole thing is free.
That is the easy half. The half most guides skip: a submitted sitemap tells Google which URLs exist, it does not get them indexed. Each URL still needs a crawl, and for the pages that matter you can ask Google for one. This guide covers both halves: the submission, step by step, and what to do after it.
Before you submit: find your sitemap URL
Your sitemap is an XML file, usually at the root of your site. Most platforms create it for you, so you only need to know where it lives.
| Platform | Default sitemap URL | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| WordPress (built in) | /wp-sitemap.xml | Added in WordPress 5.5. An SEO plugin replaces it with its own. |
| WordPress with Yoast SEO or Rank Math | /sitemap_index.xml | A sitemap index that links to one sitemap per post type. |
| Shopify | /sitemap.xml | Generated automatically, no app needed. |
| Wix | /sitemap.xml | Generated automatically. |
| Squarespace | /sitemap.xml | Generated automatically. |
| Webflow | /sitemap.xml | Turn on the auto-generated sitemap in the site's SEO settings. |
| Next.js (App Router) | /sitemap.xml | Served from app/sitemap.ts or a static file in public/. |
| Anything else | /sitemap.xml or /sitemap_index.xml | Also check the Sitemap: line in /robots.txt. |
Open the URL in your browser before you submit it. You should see XML that lists your page URLs (or, for a sitemap index, a list of other sitemaps). If you get a 404, a login page or a page full of errors, Google will get the same. The free sitemap checker finds your sitemap from robots.txt and the common paths, validates the XML and lists the URLs in it, so you know the file is right before Google reads it.
A valid sitemap follows a few rules from Google's sitemap documentation: at most 50,000 URLs or 50MB uncompressed per file, full absolute URLs (https://example.com/page, not /page), and only the canonical URL of each page. Google ignores <priority> and <changefreq>, and uses <lastmod> only when it is consistently accurate.
How to submit a sitemap to Google Search Console, step by step
- Verify your site. If your site is not in Search Console yet, add it as a property and verify ownership first. Our guide to getting your website indexed by Google fast walks through the Domain and URL prefix options.
- Select the property. Sign in to Google Search Console and pick the site in the property selector at the top left.
- Open the Sitemaps report. In the left menu, under Indexing, click Sitemaps.
- Enter the sitemap URL. In the Add a new sitemap box, enter your sitemap. A URL prefix property shows your site address in front of the field, so you type only the path, such as
sitemap.xml. A Domain property needs the full URL, such ashttps://example.com/sitemap.xml. - Click Submit. Search Console confirms with "Sitemap submitted successfully". If you use a sitemap index, submit only the index: Google reads the sitemaps it lists.
- Check the status. Come back after a few hours or a day. Your sitemap is now in the Submitted sitemaps table with columns Sitemap URL, Type, Submitted, Last read, Status, Discovered pages and Discovered videos.
- See which URLs are indexed. Click the sitemap row, then See page indexing. This opens the Page indexing report filtered to the URLs in that sitemap, and it is the screen that tells you whether submitting actually worked.
Google requires owner permission on the property to submit a sitemap in this report.
What do the Sitemaps report statuses mean?
Each sitemap in the table has one of three statuses. Here is what each means and what to do about it.
| Status | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Success | Google fetched and processed the sitemap without errors. | Nothing for the sitemap. Check Discovered pages and then the Page indexing report. |
| Has errors | Google fetched the sitemap but found one or more errors, such as invalid XML, a URL outside the property or too many URLs. | Click the row to see the errors, fix the file, then submit it again. |
| Couldn't fetch | Google could not download the sitemap. | Open the URL in a private window. Check for a 404, a redirect, a robots.txt block, a firewall or a login wall, then submit again. |
If a sitemap that loads and validates fine shows Couldn't fetch right after you submit it, give it a day or two before you change anything. Once Google has read it, the Last read date shows when.
Other ways to submit a sitemap to Google
Search Console is the only method that shows you a status, but it is not the only way Google learns about a sitemap.
| Method | How | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Search Console Sitemaps report | Indexing, Sitemaps, Add a new sitemap, Submit. | Every site. The only option that reports errors and discovered pages. |
| robots.txt | Add a line such as Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml anywhere in robots.txt. | Every site, as a backup. Bing and other engines read it too. |
| Search Console API | Call the sitemaps submit method with the property and sitemap URL. | Developers who auto submit sitemaps for many sites. |
| Ping URL | Retired. Google announced in June 2023 that the sitemaps ping endpoint was going away. | Nothing. Remove old ping calls from your code. |
Do both of the first two: submit in Search Console so you can watch the status, and list the sitemap in robots.txt so every crawler finds it.
Submitted is not indexed: what happens next
After you submit, Google downloads the sitemap and adds its URLs to the list of pages it knows about. That is all. Google's own help page is direct about it: there is no guarantee that a URL discovered in a sitemap has been or will be crawled or indexed. The Discovered pages number in the Sitemaps report counts URLs Google read in the file, not pages in the index.
Here is what that looks like at scale. We looked at the sites connected to IndexMachine and their latest state in Google's URL Inspection data. On October 31, 2026, we took the 1,425 of those sites where IndexMachine had not requested a single page yet (most are free accounts), so the numbers show sitemaps as Google had handled them on its own. For each site we counted the sitemap URLs that URL Inspection reported as "URL is unknown to Google": listed in the sitemap, yet with no record at Google. Aggregate counts only, with no site or URL named:
| Sitemap URLs unknown to Google | Sites | Share of the 1,425 sites |
|---|---|---|
| None | 265 | 18.6% |
| 1% to 24% | 385 | 27.0% |
| 25% to 49% | 212 | 14.9% |
| 50% to 74% | 206 | 14.5% |
| 75% to 99% | 271 | 19.0% |
| All of them | 40 | 2.8% |
| No result stored yet | 46 | 3.2% |
On more than a third of the sites (517, or 36.3%), Google had no record of at least half the URLs their own sitemap listed, and only 265 sites (18.6%) had every sitemap URL known to Google. Listing a URL in a sitemap does not mean Google has found it. Most of those URLs have nothing wrong with them: Google simply has not got to them yet. To see where a single page stands, the URL Inspection tool shows its state, last crawl and canonical. For URLs stuck as discovered, our guide to fixing Discovered - currently not indexed covers internal links, crawl waste and server speed.
How often should you submit your sitemap to Google?
Once. After a successful first read, Google re-reads your sitemap on its own schedule, separate from its regular crawl of your site, and picks up new URLs and changed <lastmod> dates without another submission. Resubmit only when something big changes: a new sitemap location, a site migration, a large batch of new pages, or after fixing errors. Submitting the same unchanged sitemap every day does not make Google crawl faster.
What does help is an accurate <lastmod>: when a page changes, its date in the sitemap should change too, and only then. A sitemap where every URL shows today's date teaches Google to ignore the field.
Do you need to submit a sitemap to Google?
Not strictly. Google finds most pages by following links, and a small, well-linked site can get indexed without a sitemap. But submitting one costs a minute and helps in exactly the cases where indexing is slow: a new site with few links pointing to it, a large site where some pages sit deep in the structure, and a site that adds pages often. Submit it.
After the sitemap: getting the URLs indexed
Once the sitemap is in, the remaining work is per URL: find the pages Google has not indexed, make sure each one is worth indexing and linked from your other pages, and ask Google to crawl it with Request indexing in URL Inspection. By hand, that is one URL at a time, with a daily quota, every day.
IndexMachine does that part on autopilot. It picks up new URLs from your sitemap automatically, and its Chrome extension presses Google's own Request indexing button in your Search Console every day for the pages that still need it, using your full daily Google quota on every site. Pages Google already shows as indexed are skipped, so no quota is wasted, and every requested page is tracked until it is on Google. New sitemap pages also go to Bing, Yandex, Seznam, Naver and the other IndexNow engines with unlimited IndexNow, no daily cap.
See which of your sitemap URLs Google has not indexed
A free IndexMachine account imports your Search Console sites and your sitemap pages, then shows which ones Google has not indexed yet. Turn on daily Request Indexing in your own Search Console when you want them on Google.
FAQs
How do I submit a sitemap to Google without Search Console?
Add a Sitemap: line with the full sitemap URL to your robots.txt. Google and other engines read it when they crawl robots.txt. You will not see a status or errors that way, so Search Console is still the better option.
How long does it take Google to read a submitted sitemap?
Usually hours to a few days. The Last read column in the Sitemaps report shows when Google last processed it. Reading the sitemap is not indexing: the pages in it can take days or weeks, and some never get indexed.
Should I submit a sitemap index or every sitemap?
Submitting the sitemap index is enough, since Google follows the sitemaps it lists. Submitting the child sitemaps one by one as well is allowed and gives you a separate row, and a separate Page indexing filter, for each of them.
Why does the Sitemaps report show fewer discovered pages than my sitemap has?
Google counts the URLs it could read and accept. Duplicates, URLs outside the property, malformed entries or a sitemap Google has not fully processed yet lower the number. Open the sitemap row to see any errors.
Can I submit a sitemap to Google for a site I don't own?
No. You must be a verified owner of the Search Console property. For a site you manage for someone else, ask the owner to add you as an owner or to submit it themselves.