Create XML Sitemap In WordPress

A sitemap is a organized directory of all indexable pages on your website. Key benefits of adding an XML sitemap to your WordPress website include:

Automatic Sitemap Generation: Using an automated plugin generates and updates sitemaps continuously. Creating sitemaps manually is complex and often leaves your sitemap out-of-sync with new content.
Improved Search Crawling and Indexing: Sitemaps help search engine bots (like Googlebot and Bingbot) discover and index all important pages, increasing search result visibility.
Faster Search Engine Updates: When you publish or edit content, an active sitemap notifies search engine crawlers to re-index your changes quickly.
Identify Broken Links: When search engines crawl your sitemap and detect broken links, they notify you in search console tools so you can fix errors promptly.
Strengthen Internal Link Equity: Organized sitemap structures reinforce page relationships, helping distribute search authority across your website.

Pre-Requisites

A sitemap is a structured file listing all essential pages and content on a website. Its primary purpose is to help search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo understand your site architecture and crawl content effectively.
WordPress sitemaps use the standard XML format, which provides metadata about each page—including web address URLs, publish dates, and last modification timestamps.
Submitting a sitemap to search engines ensures your pages are cataloged promptly and shown to relevant search engine users.

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HTML and XML sitemaps serve distinct roles for your website visitors and search engines.
HTML sitemaps are designed for human visitors, offering a clickable directory of main pages and sections to help users navigate your site.
XML sitemaps are designed specifically for search engine crawlers, providing a machine-readable index of your site’s URLs to improve crawling efficiency and search visibility.
XML sitemaps are a fundamental component of modern search engine optimization (SEO).

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Native WordPress Core Sitemaps have been integrated into WordPress since version 5.5.
The default WordPress XML sitemap generates automatically and is located at /wp-sitemap.xml.
The XML sitemap hierarchy organizes posts, pages, custom post types, categories, and author archives systematically for search engines.

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The WordPress Schema Plugin For Divi & Blocks allows you to enable, configure, and customize your XML sitemap settings effortlessly.
With this plugin, you can:
- Enable or disable your website XML sitemap
- Include or exclude standard and custom post types
- Include or exclude taxonomies (categories and tags)
- Enable or disable author/user sitemaps
To configure sitemap settings:
- Log in to your WordPress Admin dashboard.
- Click SEO Schema in the sidebar menu.
- Select the Sitemap navigation tab.
- Toggle Enable Sitemap ON. Your sitemap will be active at /wp-sitemap.xml.
  - Select the post types (e.g., Posts, Pages, Products) to include under Post Types.
  - Select content categories to include under Taxonomies.
  - Toggle Enable User Sitemap ON or OFF based on your site requirements.

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To submit your XML sitemap to Google Search Console:
- Log in to Google Search Console and select your website property.
- Click Sitemaps in the left-hand navigation menu.
- Enter your sitemap URL (e.g., https://www.example.com/wp-sitemap.xml) in the Add a new sitemap field.
- Click Submit.
Google will process your sitemap and begin crawling the listed URLs. You can track indexing status and resolve any reported errors directly inside Google Search Console.

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