Sitemap.xml

Hello @ms100

Thanks for reaching out regarding your sitemap. Your Yoast-generated XML sitemap is at /sitemap_index.xml/. Yoast creates only one based on whether your website uses HTTP(S)/WWW/non-WWW. So I’d recommend submitting that specifically by following this guide.

Also, if the Yoast SEO plugin adds the sitemap index URL in your robots.txt file by default. Do you have a server-level redirect from HTTP to HTTPS? Did you recently move your site to HTTPS?

Hi Maybellyne,

Thanks for your reply.

All URL’s are redirected to HTTPS in the .htaccess file.
We have been using HTTPS from the beginning.

This is what I see in Bing: https://ibb.co/vVMspTf
ingediend = submitted
ontdekt = discoverd by Bing

It’s strange because if it is not the Yoast sitemap, than I thought it could be the WordPress default sitemap.
But the WordPress default sitemap, I think is ‘wp-sitemap.xml’ and not ‘sitemap.xml’.

If you think it is ok to do, than I will juste remove the http version, and hope Bing will just use the https version created by Yoast.
Or would you advise to keep both?

@ms100

I see that you’ve HTTP URLs redirected to HTTPS. Given that, we suggest you simply submit the sitemap with HTTPS URL on both Bing and Google Search Console. Make sure you submit the sitemap_index.xml but not sitemap.xml. By default, sitemap.xml should redirect to sitemap_index.xml when you’ve Yoast SEO activated on your website.

Hi @suascat_wp Thank you for your reply!

I think Bing discovered the sitemap.xml because Bing can find it, because sitemap.xml is available.

So the redirect created by the Yoast plugin, does not seem to prevent the sitemap.xml to be discovered by the (Bing) Search Engine(s).

When I remove the sitemap.xml, Bing will find it again on my server, because the sitemap.xml is still available (although redirected).

Is there any way I can prevent the search engines to (re)discover the https://www.mydomain.nl/sitemap.xml?

Should I block the acces in robots.txt, so they will only be able to find the sitemap_index.xml created by Yoast plugin?

As a rule, you must have a single sitemap on your website. We highly recommend enabling Yoast SEO sitemap — sitemap_index.xml on your website.

If you have a sitemap that is located on?example.com/sitemap.xml, your sitemap is?not?being generated by our Yoast SEO plugin. It is probably generated by another plugin or WordPress core itself. Please disable other sitemap plugins and remove any physical sitemap files via FTP before enabling the sitemaps in our plugin.

As of Yoast SEO 14.5, we?automatically turn off?the default XML sitemap (if you’re using?our?XML sitemaps) and make sure that ours runs flawlessly. You don’t have to do anything.

When I remove the sitemap.xml, Bing will find it again on my server, because the sitemap.xml is still available (although redirected).

It could take some time for Bing to fetch the actual sitemap ‘sitemap_index.xml’ as long as you submit the real sitemap of your website. What it might be showing from sitemap.xml could be cache.

We’ve a lot of helpful FAQs regarding Yoast sitemap preference over other third-party sitemap implementation which you can check here — https://yoast.com/help/faq-xml-sitemaps-wordpress-yoast-seo/

Thanks again for the reply @suascat_wp
I will make sure to only have the Yoast sitemap submitted.
Maybe indeed it was found because of some old cache.
If I might find anything of value in the future, I will share my findings with you.
Thanks for the helpfull support, hope you have a great weekend.