Your Yoast SEO sitemap lives at yoursite.com/sitemap_index.xml by default, and Yoast builds it automatically the moment you turn on XML sitemaps under Yoast SEO, Settings, Site Features. You never create it by hand. It updates itself every time you publish, edit, or delete a page, and that single URL is what you submit to Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools.
Yoast SEO puts your sitemap at yoursite.com/sitemap_index.xml. That single index file links out to smaller sitemaps for each content type: posts, pages, categories, and any custom post types you have marked as indexable. Yoast generates the whole structure on the fly, so there is no physical XML file sitting in your server's file directory. Every request to that URL builds the current version fresh.
More than 10 million WordPress sites run Yoast SEO, according to the plugin's own listing on the WordPress.org plugin directory, and every one of them gets this same sitemap structure the moment XML sitemaps are switched on.
If you manage a site that is not on WordPress, or you want the general mechanics of what a sitemap needs to contain, our guide on how to make a sitemap covers the format outside of any single plugin.
Open sitemap_index.xml in a browser and you will see a plain XML list of smaller sitemap files, not your actual pages. Each line points to one sub-sitemap. The naming is predictable, which makes it easy to spot problems at a glance.
| Sitemap file | What it lists |
|---|---|
| sitemap_index.xml | Links to every other sitemap file on the site |
| post-sitemap.xml | Published blog posts |
| page-sitemap.xml | Static pages |
| category-sitemap.xml | Category archive pages, if they are indexable |
| author-sitemap.xml | Author archive pages, if author archives are enabled |
Click through to any individual sitemap, such as post-sitemap.xml, and you will find the actual URLs, each with a last-modified date. Yoast dropped the priority and change-frequency fields back in version 3.5 because, as Yoast's own documentation notes, Google said publicly it does not use those values for most sites.
You do not need to guess the URL. Yoast shows it to you directly inside the plugin settings.
If you do not see that link, the XML sitemaps feature may be turned off, or you are running an older version of Yoast with a different settings layout. Updating the plugin usually restores the standard path. Once you have confirmed the sitemap is live, it is worth walking through your pre-publish SEO checklist so every new page you add actually qualifies for inclusion.
Not strictly. Yoast automatically pings Google and Bing every time you publish or update a post, so search engines usually find new content without any action from you. Manual submission still helps because it gives Google an explicit starting point and lets you monitor indexing status in one dashboard.
To submit it, sign in to Google Search Console, select your property, open Indexing > Sitemaps in the left sidebar, and enter sitemap_index.xml in the field before clicking Submit. If your property is set up as a domain property rather than a URL-prefix property, paste the full URL instead of just the filename. After submission, Google typically shows a status of "Success" within a few hours, though full processing of a large site can take longer.
Bing Webmaster Tools works almost the same way. Sign in, select your site, open the Sitemaps section, click Submit sitemap in the top right, and paste your full sitemap_index.xml URL. Bing Webmaster Tools can also import verified sites and their sitemaps directly from a connected Google Search Console account, which saves a step if you already have that set up. If you have not connected Search Console yet, our walkthrough on how to add Google Search Console to your WordPress site covers verification first.
A Yoast sitemap 404 almost always comes down to one of three things: outdated permalink rules, a second plugin fighting for the same URL, or a caching layer serving a stale response. Work through them in order rather than guessing.
Start with permalinks, since it fixes the issue more often than anything else. Go to Settings > Permalinks in WordPress and click Save Changes without touching any fields. This flushes the rewrite rules that control how sitemap_index.xml resolves. Next, check for a conflicting sitemap source: another SEO plugin, a caching plugin with its own sitemap module, or a security plugin that blocks XML file types. Deactivate suspects one at a time and reload the sitemap after each one, per WPBeginner's troubleshooting guide on this exact error. Finally, purge any page cache or CDN cache, since some configurations serve an old cached 404 response even after the underlying fix is live.
Yoast does not give you a checklist of individual URLs to remove from the sitemap. Instead, exclusion is tied to whether a piece of content is set to noindex, and Yoast automatically drops anything noindexed from the sitemap for you.
This matters because a sitemap padded with noindexed, thin, or duplicate pages sends mixed signals to Google about what you actually want crawled. Keeping it lean is part of the same discipline covered in our broader sitemap best practices guide.
Yes, but only featured images and gallery images by default, not every image sitting inside your post content. Yoast's own documentation on images in XML sitemaps confirms this scope, and developers can adjust which images appear using the wpseo_xml_sitemap_img filter. If your site depends heavily on image search traffic, such as a photography or ecommerce site, it is worth auditing whether the default behavior actually captures your most important visuals.
If you are choosing between plugins, the sitemap itself is rarely the deciding factor. Rank Math offers more granular controls, including per-post-type toggles and dedicated video or Google News sitemaps, while Yoast keeps the same simple, automated approach it has used for years. Functionally, Google reads either plugin's output the same way, so neither one gives you a ranking edge through the sitemap alone.
The practical difference shows up in day-to-day management. Rank Math gives you a dedicated sitemap settings screen where you toggle content types on and off individually. Yoast handles that exclusion indirectly, through the noindex setting described above, which is less granular but keeps the interface simpler for non-technical site owners.
A handful of avoidable errors account for most of the sitemap problems we see on client audits.
Where is my Yoast SEO sitemap located? By default it sits at yoursite.com/sitemap_index.xml. Yoast SEO builds it automatically once you activate the plugin and turn on XML sitemaps under Yoast SEO, Settings, Site Features.
Do I need to create the Yoast sitemap myself? No. Yoast SEO generates and updates the sitemap on its own every time you publish, edit, or delete content. There is no file to build by hand and no separate sitemap plugin required.
Do I need to submit the Yoast sitemap manually to Google? Not strictly, since Yoast pings Google after you publish, but submitting sitemap_index.xml once inside Google Search Console under Indexing, Sitemaps speeds up discovery and shows you indexing errors in one place.
Why is my Yoast sitemap showing a 404 error? The usual causes are stale permalink rules, a second plugin generating its own sitemap, or a caching layer blocking the URL. Resave Settings, Permalinks in WordPress, deactivate other sitemap plugins one at a time, and purge your cache or CDN, per WPBeginner's troubleshooting guide.
How do I exclude a page or post from the Yoast sitemap? Open the page in the block editor, expand the Yoast SEO panel's Advanced section, and set "Allow search engines to show this page in search results?" to No. Yoast drops noindexed content from the sitemap automatically once you save.
Can I exclude an entire post type or category from the Yoast sitemap? Yes. Turn off "Show X in search results" for that post type under Yoast SEO, Settings, Content Types, or use the wpseo_exclude_from_sitemap_by_post_ids filter for bulk exclusions by ID, per Yoast's own documentation.
How many URLs fit in one Yoast sub-sitemap? 1,000 by default. Once a post type passes that count, Yoast splits it into post-sitemap2.xml, post-sitemap3.xml, and so on, all linked from sitemap_index.xml, and developers can change the cap with the wpseo_sitemap_entries_per_page filter.
Does the Yoast sitemap include images? Yes, but only featured images and gallery images by default, not every image inside your body content, according to Yoast's documentation on images in XML sitemaps.
Does Yoast add the sitemap to robots.txt automatically? Yes, if Yoast is generating your robots.txt file it adds a Sitemap line pointing to sitemap_index.xml automatically. If a robots.txt already existed on your server, you may need to add that line yourself through the Yoast SEO file editor under Tools.
Should I run a separate sitemap plugin alongside Yoast? No. Running two sitemap generators at once is one of the most common causes of the 404 error, since both plugins compete for the same sitemap_index.xml URL. Use Yoast's built-in sitemap and skip extras.
Open yoursite.com/sitemap_index.xml right now and confirm it loads. If it does not, work through the permalinks, plugin, and cache checklist above. If it does, submit it once inside Google Search Console, then move on to the content itself: a clean sitemap only helps if the pages inside it are worth ranking. If you want a second set of eyes on your technical setup, request a free SEO audit from Rankite and we will flag what is actually holding your site back.
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