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Sitemap Tools2026/05/06

How to Find a Website Sitemap

Learn the fastest ways to find a website sitemap using robots.txt, common sitemap paths, and free discovery tools.

Most websites expose their sitemap in predictable places. If you know where to look, you can often find it in under a minute.

The fastest option is to use the free Find Sitemap tool. Enter a domain, and it checks robots.txt plus common sitemap locations.

1. Check robots.txt

Open:

https://example.com/robots.txt

Look for lines that begin with Sitemap:. A site can list one sitemap or many sitemaps:

Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml
Sitemap: https://example.com/post-sitemap.xml

Robots.txt is the best first stop because it is designed to tell crawlers where the sitemap lives.

2. Try common sitemap URLs

If robots.txt does not list a sitemap, try common paths:

  • https://example.com/sitemap.xml
  • https://example.com/sitemap_index.xml
  • https://example.com/sitemap-index.xml
  • https://example.com/wp-sitemap.xml

WordPress sites often use /wp-sitemap.xml or plugin-specific sitemap indexes. Other platforms may generate /sitemap.xml.

3. Look for a sitemap index

A sitemap index is a sitemap that lists other sitemap files. This is common for large sites. For example, a sitemap index might link to separate post, page, product, and category sitemaps.

After finding a sitemap, run it through the Sitemap Validator to see whether it is a URL set or a sitemap index.

4. Check the CMS or platform

Some platforms have known sitemap patterns:

  • WordPress core: /wp-sitemap.xml
  • WordPress SEO plugins: /sitemap_index.xml
  • Shopify: /sitemap.xml
  • Blogger: generated feed-based sitemap URLs

For Blogger-specific details, read the Blogger sitemap generator guide.

What if no sitemap exists?

If you cannot find a sitemap, the site may not have one, it may block automated requests, or it may expose the sitemap only after a CMS plugin is enabled.

For small sites, you can create a simple sitemap with the XML Sitemap Generator. Enter a website URL and Sitemap Watch crawls up to 100 same-domain HTML pages before generating XML.

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