sitemap.xml

sitemap.(xml|js|ts) is a special file that matches the Sitemaps XML format to help search engine crawlers index your site more efficiently.

Sitemap files (.xml)

For smaller applications, you can create a sitemap.xml file and place it in the root of your app directory.

app/sitemap.xml

<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
  <url>
    <loc>https://acme.com</loc>
    <lastmod>2023-04-06T15:02:24.021Z</lastmod>
    <changefreq>yearly</changefreq>
    <priority>1</priority>
  </url>
  <url>
    <loc>https://acme.com/about</loc>
    <lastmod>2023-04-06T15:02:24.021Z</lastmod>
    <changefreq>monthly</changefreq>
    <priority>0.8</priority>
  </url>
  <url>
    <loc>https://acme.com/blog</loc>
    <lastmod>2023-04-06T15:02:24.021Z</lastmod>
    <changefreq>weekly</changefreq>
    <priority>0.5</priority>
  </url>
</urlset>

Generating a sitemap using code (.js, .ts)

You can use the sitemap.(js|ts) file convention to programmatically generate a sitemap by exporting a default function that returns an array of URLs. If using TypeScript, a Sitemap type is available.

import { MetadataRoute } from 'next'

export default function sitemap(): MetadataRoute.Sitemap {
  return [
    {
      url: 'https://acme.com',
      lastModified: new Date(),
      changeFrequency: 'yearly',
      priority: 1,
    },
    {
      url: 'https://acme.com/about',
      lastModified: new Date(),
      changeFrequency: 'monthly',
      priority: 0.8,
    },
    {
      url: 'https://acme.com/blog',
      lastModified: new Date(),
      changeFrequency: 'weekly',
      priority: 0.5,
    },
  ]
}

Output:

acme.com/sitemap.xml

<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
  <url>
    <loc>https://acme.com</loc>
    <lastmod>2023-04-06T15:02:24.021Z</lastmod>
    <changefreq>yearly</changefreq>
    <priority>1</priority>
  </url>
  <url>
    <loc>https://acme.com/about</loc>
    <lastmod>2023-04-06T15:02:24.021Z</lastmod>
    <changefreq>monthly</changefreq>
    <priority>0.8</priority>
  </url>
  <url>
    <loc>https://acme.com/blog</loc>
    <lastmod>2023-04-06T15:02:24.021Z</lastmod>
    <changefreq>weekly</changefreq>
    <priority>0.5</priority>
  </url>
</urlset>

Generate a localized Sitemap

import { MetadataRoute } from 'next'

export default function sitemap(): MetadataRoute.Sitemap {
  return [
    {
      url: 'https://acme.com',
      lastModified: new Date(),
      alternates: {
        languages: {
          es: 'https://acme.com/es',
          de: 'https://acme.com/de',
        },
      },
    },
    {
      url: 'https://acme.com/about',
      lastModified: new Date(),
      alternates: {
        languages: {
          es: 'https://acme.com/es/about',
          de: 'https://acme.com/de/about',
        },
      },
    },
    {
      url: 'https://acme.com/blog',
      lastModified: new Date(),
      alternates: {
        languages: {
          es: 'https://acme.com/es/blog',
          de: 'https://acme.com/de/blog',
        },
      },
    },
  ]
}

Output:

acme.com/sitemap.xml

<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9" xmlns:xhtml="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
  <url>
    <loc>https://acme.com</loc>
    <xhtml:link
      rel="alternate"
      hreflang="es"
      href="https://acme.com/es"/>
    <xhtml:link
      rel="alternate"
      hreflang="de"
      href="https://acme.com/de"/>
    <lastmod>2023-04-06T15:02:24.021Z</lastmod>
  </url>
  <url>
    <loc>https://acme.com/about</loc>
    <xhtml:link
      rel="alternate"
      hreflang="es"
      href="https://acme.com/es/about"/>
    <xhtml:link
      rel="alternate"
      hreflang="de"
      href="https://acme.com/de/about"/>
    <lastmod>2023-04-06T15:02:24.021Z</lastmod>
  </url>
  <url>
    <loc>https://acme.com/blog</loc>
    <xhtml:link
      rel="alternate"
      hreflang="es"
      href="https://acme.com/es/blog"/>
    <xhtml:link
      rel="alternate"
      hreflang="de"
      href="https://acme.com/de/blog"/>
    <lastmod>2023-04-06T15:02:24.021Z</lastmod>
  </url>
</urlset>

Generating multiple sitemaps

While a single sitemap will work for most applications. For large web applications, you may need to split a sitemap into multiple files.

There are two ways you can create multiple sitemaps:

By nesting sitemap.(xml|js|ts) inside multiple route segments e.g. app/sitemap.xml and app/products/sitemap.xml.
By using the generateSitemaps function.

For example, to split a sitemap using generateSitemaps, return an array of objects with the sitemap id. Then, use the id to generate the unique sitemaps.

import { BASE_URL } from '@/app/lib/constants'

export async function generateSitemaps() {
  // Fetch the total number of products and calculate the number of sitemaps needed
  return [{ id: 0 }, { id: 1 }, { id: 2 }, { id: 3 }]
}

export default async function sitemap({
  id,
}: {
  id: number
}): Promise<MetadataRoute.Sitemap> {
  // Google's limit is 50,000 URLs per sitemap
  const start = id * 50000
  const end = start + 50000
  const products = await getProducts(
    `SELECT id, date FROM products WHERE id BETWEEN ${start} AND ${end}`
  )
  return products.map((product) => ({
    url: `${BASE_URL}/product/${id}`,
    lastModified: product.date,
  }))
}

In production, your generated sitemaps will be available at /.../sitemap/[id].xml. For example, /product/sitemap/1.xml.

In development, you can view the generated sitemap on /.../sitemap.xml/[id]. For example, /product/sitemap.xml/1. This difference is temporary and will follow the production format.

See the generateSitemaps API reference for more information.

Returns

The default function exported from sitemap.(xml|ts|js) should return an array of objects with the following properties:

type Sitemap = Array<{
  url: string
  lastModified?: string | Date
  changeFrequency?:
    | 'always'
    | 'hourly'
    | 'daily'
    | 'weekly'
    | 'monthly'
    | 'yearly'
    | 'never'
  priority?: number
  alternates?: {
    languages?: Languages<string>
  }
}>

Version History

Version	Changes
`v13.4.5`	Add `changeFrequency` and `priority` attributes to sitemaps.
`v13.3.0`	`sitemap` introduced.

generateSitemaps

Learn how to use the generateSiteMaps function to create multiple sitemaps for your application.