What does the Sitemap Checker actually test?

Two things: the sitemap's own structure (valid XML, within the 50,000-URL and 50MB protocol limits, correctly nested if it's a sitemap index) and every URL it lists (live HTTP status, whether it redirects, how long it takes to respond, and whether it has a lastmod date).

Can I check just a homepage instead of a sitemap URL directly?

Yes. If you enter a homepage URL instead of a direct .xml link, the tool checks robots.txt for a Sitemap: directive first, then falls back to trying /sitemap.xml automatically.

Does it follow sitemap index files?

Yes. If your sitemap is a sitemap index file pointing to multiple child sitemaps (common for large sites), the tool recursively fetches and checks each one, up to a safety limit of 50 nested sitemaps and 3 levels of nesting.

How many URLs will it check?

Up to 300 URLs per run. If your sitemap lists more than that, the report shows results for the first 300 in document order and notes how many were left unchecked, so very large sitemaps are still summarized quickly.

What counts as a 'broken' link?

Any URL that returns a 4xx or 5xx status code, times out, or fails to connect. Redirects (3xx) are reported separately since they aren't necessarily errors, but a sitemap full of redirects instead of final URLs is still worth cleaning up.

Is my own site or a competitor's site safe to check?

Yes — this tool only makes standard HTTP requests to publicly listed URLs, identified with a descriptive User-Agent, the same way a search engine crawler or an SEO audit tool would. It cannot access private, password-protected, or internal (localhost/private-IP) URLs.

Why is this better than just checking Google Search Console?

Search Console tells you a sitemap has errors but rarely which specific URLs are affected, and it only reports what Googlebot has already crawled. This tool checks every listed URL live, right now, so you can fix problems before Google's next crawl instead of waiting for GSC to notice them.

Does checking my sitemap affect my SEO or crawl budget?

No. The checks made by this tool are separate from Googlebot's own crawling and have no effect on your search rankings or how Google crawls your site — it's purely a read-only diagnostic run from our server.

Sitemap Checker — Validate Your XML Sitemap & Check Every URL

Enter a sitemap URL or a website's homepage and our Sitemap Checker fetches it server-side (following sitemap indexes recursively), validates the XML structure against the sitemap protocol's size and URL-count limits, and live-checks every listed page for broken links (4xx/5xx), redirects, slow responses, and missing lastmod dates — everything you need to keep your sitemap clean for Google Search Console.

Sitemap or website URL

How to Use the Sitemap Checker — Validate XML Sitemaps & Find Broken Links

1
Enter a sitemap URL (e.g. https://example.com/sitemap.xml) or just the site's homepage — we'll look it up via robots.txt or /sitemap.xml automatically.
2
Click 'Check Sitemap'. The tool fetches the sitemap on the server, follows any nested sitemap indexes, and validates the XML structure.
3
Wait while each listed URL is checked for its live HTTP status — this runs in the background so you can leave the page and come back.
4
Review the summary (broken links, redirects, missing lastmod dates) and the full per-URL results table, then fix the flagged pages.

Why Use Sitemap Checker — Validate XML Sitemaps & Find Broken Links?

A broken or bloated sitemap quietly wastes crawl budget and can stop new or updated pages from being indexed — Google Search Console will flag sitemap errors, but only after they've already affected indexing, and it does not tell you which individual URLs are dead. Our Sitemap Checker closes that gap by doing what GSC doesn't: fetching every single URL in your sitemap and reporting its live status, so you can find and fix 404s, redirect chains, and stale entries before they cost you rankings. It also validates the sitemap itself against the protocol's structural limits (50,000 URLs / 50MB per file) and recurses through sitemap indexes the same way Googlebot does, so multi-sitemap setups are checked end to end, not just the top-level file.

Frequently Asked Questions

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