XML Sitemap Health Validator

🗺️ Check sitemap URLs and find errors

Sitemap Validator is for SEO teams, developers, and site owners. It reads public sitemaps, checks each listed URL, and returns HTTP status, redirects, response time, sitemap metadata, and clear issue details.

• Use Sitemap Validator to check the URLs in a public sitemap.
• Use XML Sitemap Validator to read and validate an XML sitemap.
• Use Sitemap Index Validator to follow child sitemaps in a sitemap index.
• Use Broken Sitemap Links Checker to find client errors, server errors, timeouts, and network errors.
• Use Sitemap Redirect Checker to find redirects and see their final URLs.
• Use Sitemap Response Time Checker to compare the check time for listed URLs.
• Use Robots.txt Sitemap Validator to find declared sitemaps and check their listed URLs.

📊 Returned data

Each saved row is one checked sitemap-listed URL. It includes the page and source sitemap, HTTP health, redirects, response time, sitemap metadata, and issue details. The Actor also saves a JSON report with totals for sitemap health and page issues.

The Actor saves the first eligible occurrence of a listed URL. If the same URL appears again, it is ignored.

🚀 Running the Actor

1. Open the Input tab.
2. Add one or more public sitemap URLs, sitemap-index URLs, website roots, bare domains, or robots.txt URLs.
3. Set Maximum URLs to check to limit checks across all targets, or leave it empty to return all available results until the source is exhausted.
4. Set Maximum index depth to control how many sitemap-index levels are followed. Use 0 to stay at the submitted or directly found sitemap.
5. Run the Actor and open the dataset or JSON report.

The Actor reads XML URL sets, XML sitemap indexes, plain-text sitemaps, and gzip-compressed sitemap responses. It does not crawl unlisted pages, inspect page content, generate or submit sitemaps, or check search-engine indexation.

✍️ Input

Field	Type	What it does
targets	array of strings	Adds 1–100 public sitemap, sitemap-index, website, domain, or robots.txt targets. Each value must use HTTP or HTTPS.
maxCheckedUrls	integer	Stops after this many sitemap-listed URLs across all targets. Leave it empty to return all available results until the source is exhausted.
maxIndexDepth	integer	Sets how many nested sitemap-index levels to follow, from 0 to 10. Use 0 to check only the submitted sitemap.

This example is the default input from a successful Actor run:

{
  "targets": [
    "https://apify.com/sitemap.xml"
  ],
  "maxCheckedUrls": 5,
  "maxIndexDepth": 2
}

Targets must be public. No source-site login or API key is needed.

📦 Output

The dataset has one row for each sitemap-listed URL checked by the run.

Field	Type	What it does
pageUrl	string	URL listed in the sitemap.
host	string	Host from the listed page URL.
sourceSitemapUrl	string	Sitemap file that listed the page URL.
parentSitemapIndexUrl	string or null	Parent sitemap index, or null when the source sitemap was added or found directly.
indexDepth	integer	Depth below the added or found sitemap target.
sitemapLastmod	string or null	Listed last-modified value, when set.
changefreq	string or null	Listed change frequency, when set.
priority	number or null	Listed priority, when set.
urlStatus	string	ok, redirect, broken, timeout, unreachable, or malformed.
httpStatus	integer or null	HTTP response status, when a response was received.
finalUrl	string or null	Final URL after redirects, when reached.
redirectCount	integer	Number of redirects followed.
responseTimeMs	integer or null	Check time in milliseconds, when a request finished.
issue	object or null	Issue details, or null for a healthy URL.
issue.category	string	redirect, client_error, server_error, timeout, malformed_url, or network_error.
issue.message	string	Short reason for the issue.

Here is a full row from a successful run:

{
  "pageUrl": "https://apify.com/",
  "host": "apify.com",
  "sourceSitemapUrl": "https://apify.com/sitemap/pages.xml",
  "parentSitemapIndexUrl": "https://apify.com/sitemap.xml",
  "indexDepth": 1,
  "sitemapLastmod": null,
  "changefreq": null,
  "priority": null,
  "urlStatus": "ok",
  "httpStatus": 200,
  "finalUrl": "https://apify.com/",
  "redirectCount": 0,
  "responseTimeMs": 631,
  "issue": null
}

The Validation report link opens a JSON report with sitemap checks and totals for sitemap health and page issues. HTTP facts show what the Actor saw during the run and may change later.

💳 Pricing

This Actor uses pay-per-event pricing. You are charged for each sitemap-listed URL checked and saved to the dataset. Invalid targets, unreachable sitemap files, empty sitemaps, and runs with no saved rows do not create this charge.

🔌 Integrations

Use the dataset with the Apify API, schedules, webhooks, and available Apify integrations. You can also export it as JSON, CSV, Excel, XML, RSS, or HTML.

❓ FAQ

Why did my run save no rows?

The target may not have a public sitemap, the sitemap may be empty, or the file may not have been reachable during the run. These cases are logged and skipped.

What happens when the same listed URL appears more than once?

The first eligible occurrence is saved. Later copies are ignored, so one row does not gather every sitemap or target that also contained the URL.

Can it validate a sitemap index?

Yes. It follows child sitemap files up to Maximum index depth.

Does it validate XML online?

It validates supported public sitemap XML. It is not a general XML validator for other XML document types.

Can it crawl my whole website?

No. It checks URLs found in supported sitemap files. Use Website URL Crawler when you need a rendered link crawl.

Does it show whether Google indexed a URL?

No. It reports sitemap and HTTP facts, not search-engine indexation.

📝 Changelog

• 0.1: Added a JSON validation report with sitemap health, format, size, entry, and issue totals.
• 0.0: Initial release.

🆘 Support

For issues, questions, or feature requests, file a ticket and I'll fix or implement it in less than 24h 🫡

🔗 Related Actors

• Sitemap Sniffer — find public sitemap files and export their URL inventory before checking URL health.
• Website URL Crawler & Link Extractor — build a website map from rendered links and public sitemaps.
• Schema Markup Validator — check structured data on the pages listed in a sitemap.
• SSL Certificate Checker — check certificate and TLS details for public HTTPS endpoints.
• Robots.txt Generator — create a robots.txt file with sitemap directives.

Made with ❤️ by Maxime Dupré