WordPress 5.5 gets a built-in sitemap

WordPress gets built-in support for sitemaps. The developers of the content management system are working on a native sitemap mode for version 5.5, a function that was not standard in the system until now.

The sitemaps will be available in XML format in version 5.5, the developers write in a blog. The index will be located at /wp-sitemap.xml. That xml file points to all sitemap pages indexed by the WordPress site. Sitemaps are indexations of queries on websites that make them easier to find by search engines.

WordPress says the index can store up to 50,000 sitemaps. Individual sitemaps can handle a maximum of two thousand entries. The sitemaps are automatically created for public posts, pages and other things such as tags, and for author pages. According to WordPress, robots.txt refers to the sitemap index by default.

The WordPress sitemap is based on the standard rules for all sitemaps. This means that images and videos are not included. According to WordPress, these are ‘only useful for a small number of websites’. In the future, WordPress’ sitemap may have support for such things, as well as filters and hooks.

WordPress didn’t have native support for sitemaps until now. Website administrators always had to install third-party plug-ins for this. The feature is planned for WordPress 5.5, which will be released later this year.