Question: Submit sitemap index or individual child sitemaps?

Lawliet1996

Lawliet1996

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Hi everyone,

I just split my sitemap into multiple parts, and I’m a bit confused about the best way to submit them in Google Search Console.
Should I:
  • Submit only the main sitemap (e.g. sitemap.xml) and let Google read all the child sitemaps from there?
    OR
  • Submit the child sitemaps individually as well (for example sitemaps/LifeStyle.xml based on each category)? < and not submit the sitemap.xml?

What’s the best practice here?
 
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Submit the index sitemap. Child sitemaps should be part of it. No need to submit each child separately unless you want to diagnose issues with specific sections.
 
It’s best to submit the main sitemap, and Google will automatically find and read all the child sitemaps from it.
 
Lawliet1996 said:
Thanks brother, I did not do this I thought by default the crawlers would know just by submitting on GSC - Sitemap but I just saw that for " Best Practices " we should include a line there,
so I would be something like this?
Click to expand...
You can add all like this:
Code: 
User-agent: *
Allow: /

Sitemap: https://site.com/sitemap.xml
Sitemap: https://site.com/Asitemap.xml
Sitemap: https://site.com/Bsitemap.xml
Sitemap: https://site.com/Csitemap.xml
 
I used to submit every child sitemap individually, but it made zero difference in indexing speed for me
 
Submitting only main sitemap is best and sufficient. I use sitemap created by rankmath plugin for my wp site
 
Lawliet1996 said:
Hi everyone,

I just split my sitemap into multiple parts, and I’m a bit confused about the best way to submit them in Google Search Console.
Should I:
  • Submit only the main sitemap (e.g. sitemap.xml) and let Google read all the child sitemaps from there?
    OR
  • Submit the child sitemaps individually as well (for example sitemaps/LifeStyle.xml based on each category)? < and not submit the sitemap.xml?

What’s the best practice here?
Click to expand...
Google Search Console should get the main sitemap (sitemap.xml) because it already links to all the child sitemaps and Google will scan them on their own. If you want further tracking or debugging, you can also send in individual child sitemaps, but you don't have to.
 
The crawlers can access your site even without a sitemap but you're providing a sitemap to them as a blueprint of your content. The crawlers don't get lost if your site has good navigation and accessibility.

A sitemap is like a book index. Is it enough to provide headings in the index or a short summary of each chapter? I just provide headings while it's not wrong to provide summaries. Same is the case with sitemaps. I just provide sitemap index and let crawlers access links through each sitemap. Some people dump all sitemaps. While it's not wrong, it's also not necessary. Imagine having 50 sitemaps with 1k links each. Will you add 50 sitemaps or an index that contains all these sitemaps and automatically updates with new sitemaps as you keep posting content? The index is a permanent placeholder for crawlers to access your sitemaps. It's enough to provide an index.
 
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