Where does it look for sitemaps?
Click the icon and it checks robots.txt plus the common sitemap paths, removes duplicates, and follows sitemap indexes down to their children with per-child and total URL counts. No setup and no manual searching.
XML Sitemap Inspector: a Chrome extension to find and check sitemaps
XML Sitemap Inspector is a sitemap finder, viewer and checker for Chrome. Click the icon on any website and it finds the site’s XML sitemaps, shows their URLs as a readable tree and checks them for errors. No typing /sitemap.xml, no pasting URLs into an online validator. Free, with no account.
How can I browse a sitemap?
Open any sitemap in a full-tab viewer with a collapsible path tree, search and filters, CSV, TXT and JSON export, and an XML tab that shows the sitemap formatted, with line numbers and syntax highlighting. Sitemaps with dozens of hreflang alternates per URL, which usually look like a wall of near-duplicate rows, collapse into one row per page with language badges. Image sitemap entries get an image badge that lists up to 200 of their image URLs. Every URL opens in a new tab in one click. Large sitemaps (tens of thousands of URLs) stay smooth because nothing is parsed into the page or held in memory all at once.
What does it check in a sitemap?
Every sitemap is checked against the sitemaps.org spec (malformed XML, missing or invalid loc values, size and URL-count limits, encoding) and against SEO best practices: duplicate URLs, tracking parameters, stale sitemaps and hreflang problems. Two checks that most validators skip:
- Fake-freshness detection. It flags sitemaps where nearly every URL has the same lastmod date, which usually means the generator stamps “today” on everything instead of reporting real update times.
- Current-page check. It tells you whether the page you’re on is listed in its own sitemap, and compares that with the page’s canonical tag.
Is it really 100% local?
No data leaves your browser. There are no accounts, analytics or tracking. The extension only sends requests to the site you’re inspecting, and only when you click.
What does it look like?
Where do I get help?
Questions, bug reports or ideas: email support@lotuswebagency.com or use any channel on our contacts page.
Common Questions
How do I validate an XML sitemap?
It finds the site’s sitemaps as soon as you click its icon. Each one is checked against the sitemaps.org protocol and Google’s guidelines, with examples and a fix for each problem. The viewer lists errors and warnings grouped by severity.
How does it find a site’s sitemaps?
It reads robots.txt, the page’s own sitemap links and 24 common sitemap paths, follows sitemap indexes 10 levels deep, and opens gzipped and plain-text sitemaps. Duplicates are dropped, and every sitemap index lists its child sitemaps with their URL counts and a total.
Does it send my data anywhere?
No. Everything is processed and stored in your browser, and nothing the extension reads or stores is sent to us or anyone else. There are no accounts, analytics or tracking. Its only requests go to the site you’re inspecting, for robots.txt, sitemap files and common sitemap locations.
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