Finding and submitting your sitemap

All Shopify stores automatically generate a sitemap.xml file that contains links to all your products, primary product image, pages, collections, and blog posts. This file is used by search engines like Google and Bing to index your site so that your store's pages appear in search results. Submitting your sitemap files to Google Search Console helps Google find and index pages on your site.

If you're on the Basic, Shopify, Advanced Shopify, or Shopify Plus plan, then you can use the international domains feature to create region-specific or country-specific domains. When you use international domains, sitemap files are generated for all of your domains. All of your domains are discoverable by search engines, unless they redirect to your primary domain.

The process of crawling and indexing your site can take time, and Google doesn't guarantee how long it will take. Learn more about what to expect when your site is indexed from Google Search Console Help.

Find your sitemap file

Sitemap files are generated automatically. You can find them at the root directory of your Shopify store's domains, such as johns-apparel.com/sitemap.xml.

The generated sitemap files link to separate sitemaps for your products, collections, blogs, and webpages. Sitemap files are automatically updated when you add a new webpage, product, collection, image, or blog post to your Shopify online store.

If you are on the Basic plan or higher, then you will also have sitemaps for every additional domain you are using for international domains. If you have multiple domains and aren’t using them for international targeting, then make sure all domains redirect to your primary domain.

Add domain properties and verify your site with Google

Before you submit your sitemap, you need to verify your domain with Google Search Console to confirm that you're the owner of your Shopify store. If you don't already have a Google Search Console account, then you need to create an account.

To verify your domain, you need to disable password protection for your online store. If you aren't ready to launch your store, you can disable password protection and then enable it again after verifying your domain.

Steps:

  1. From your Google Search Console account, click and then select Add property from the drop down menu.
  2. On the Select property type dialog box, select URL prefix and then enter the domain you want to add as a property, including the https://.
  3. Click CONTINUE.
  4. In the Verify ownership window, select HTML tag. Or, if you're familiar with other verification methods, choose your preferred method. Learn more about verifying ownership with a TXT record.
  5. In the HTML tag section, click COPY to copy the full meta tag to your clipboard. It's important you copy everything, including the < and >. For example:
<meta name="google-site-verification" content="IV7BPLESttSpBdxSWN1s4zlr4HIcuHkGQYmE3wLG59w" />
  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Online Store > Themes.
  2. Find the theme you want to edit, click the button to open the actions menu, and then click Edit code.
  3. In the Layout section, click theme.liquid.
  4. Paste the meta tag that you copied in step 5 on a blank line directly below the opening <head> tag:

    The meta tag pasted below the opening HTML head tag

  5. Click Save.

  6. Return to Google Search Console and click Verify.

If you're on the Basic plan or higher and using international domains, then repeat these steps to verify each domain that you’ve connected to your Shopify store. For every domain that you verify, paste each meta tag on a separate line in the same theme.liquid file.

Submit your sitemap file to Google Search Console

You can submit your sitemap file to Google Search Console to help Google find and index pages on your site.

Steps:

  1. After your site is verified, go to Google Search Console.
  2. Optional: If you've verified multiple root domains with Google Search Console, then make sure you've selected the right domain in the drop-down menu.
  3. In the Indexing section, click Sitemaps.
  4. In the Add a new sitemap section, enter your domain's sitemap file name: sitemap.xml. Your domain URL is filled in for you and will have a format similar to https://johns-apparel.com/sitemap.xml.
  5. Click SUBMIT.

If you're on the Basic plan or higher and use international domains, then you need to submit the sitemap file for each domain. Sitemap files are always located at the root directory of your Shopify store's domains.

If you sell in multiple languages, then these languages are added automatically to the sitemap files for each of your domains. You don't need to do anything to add them.

After you submit your sitemap files, Google uses these files to crawl and index your store. Your store needs to be accessible for the crawler to work, so ensure your store doesn't have a password active. The process can take time and Google doesn't guarantee how long it takes for your store to be crawled.

To learn more or to troubleshoot, visit Google Search Console Help.

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