News Sitemap Guide: Getting Into Google News

A news sitemap is a specialized XML sitemap designed for Google News. It tells Google which pages on your site are news articles, when they were published, and basic publication details. If you publish news content and want it to appear in Google News results and the "Top stories" carousel, a news sitemap is one of the clearest signals you can send. For a general overview of sitemaps, see our XML sitemap guide.

News sitemaps follow the same basic XML structure as standard sitemaps, but they include additional tags from the Google News sitemap extension. This guide covers the format, requirements, creation process, and the mistakes that trip up most publishers.

What Is a News Sitemap?

A news sitemap is an XML file that lists articles published within the last 48 hours. It uses the news namespace extension to include metadata like the publication name, language, and article title.

Standard sitemaps tell search engines about all the pages on your site. News sitemaps are narrower in scope. They focus specifically on recent news articles and are processed by Google's news indexing pipeline rather than the general web crawler.

You can (and should) have both a standard sitemap and a news sitemap. They serve different purposes and do not conflict with each other.

News Sitemap Format

Here is the structure of a news sitemap with one article entry:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9"
        xmlns:news="http://www.google.com/schemas/sitemap-news/0.9">
  <url>
    <loc>https://example.com/2026/04/breaking-story</loc>
    <news:news>
      <news:publication>
        <news:name>Example News</news:name>
        <news:language>en</news:language>
      </news:publication>
      <news:publication_date>2026-04-21T08:00:00+00:00</news:publication_date>
      <news:title>Breaking Story Headline Here</news:title>
    </news:news>
  </url>
</urlset>

Let's break down each tag.

Required Tags

<loc> -- The full URL of the article. Must be an absolute URL. This is the same <loc> tag used in standard sitemaps.

<news:publication> -- A container for the publication name and language.

<news:name> -- The name of your publication. This must match the name registered in Google Publisher Center. If they do not match, Google may ignore the entry.

<news:language> -- The language of the article, using an ISO 639-1 code. Use en for English, fr for French, de for German, and so on. For simplified Chinese, use zh-cn. For traditional Chinese, use zh-tw.

<news:publication_date> -- The date and time the article was first published. Use W3C datetime format. Full datetime with timezone is recommended: 2026-04-21T08:00:00+00:00. You can also use just the date (2026-04-21), but including the time helps Google order articles accurately.

<news:title> -- The title of the article. This should match the headline displayed on the page.

Tags That No Longer Exist

Google has simplified the news sitemap format over the years. Several tags that used to be part of the spec are no longer supported:

• <news:access> (for subscription/registration content) -- removed
• <news:genres> (press release, opinion, blog, etc.) -- removed
• <news:keywords> -- removed
• <news:stock_tickers> -- removed

If you see tutorials or generators that include these tags, they are outdated. Including deprecated tags will not cause errors, but they will be ignored.

Requirements and Limits

Google enforces specific rules for news sitemaps that differ from standard sitemaps.

48-hour window

Only include articles published within the last two days. Articles older than 48 hours should be removed from the news sitemap. They can (and should) remain in your standard sitemap, but they do not belong in the news sitemap.

This is the most important rule. The news sitemap is for fresh content only.

Maximum 1,000 URLs

A news sitemap can contain up to 1,000 URLs. For most publishers, this is more than enough for a 48-hour window. If you publish more than 1,000 articles in two days, you can create multiple news sitemaps and reference them from a sitemap index.

One news sitemap per site

You only need one news sitemap (or one news sitemap index pointing to multiple news sitemaps). Do not create separate news sitemaps for different sections unless you are approaching the 1,000-URL limit.

Articles only

The news sitemap should only contain article pages. Do not include your homepage, category pages, author pages, or any non-article content. Those belong in your standard sitemap.

Published content only

Do not include draft, scheduled, or paywalled-but-unpublished content. Every URL in the news sitemap should be a live, accessible article.

How to Create a News Sitemap

The approach depends on your publishing platform.

WordPress

Several plugins generate news sitemaps automatically:

• Yoast SEO has a News SEO add-on (paid) that generates a compliant news sitemap
• Rank Math includes news sitemap generation in its PRO version
• Google News Sitemap (free plugin) generates a basic news sitemap

With any of these, the news sitemap is typically available at /news-sitemap.xml and updates automatically as you publish articles.

Custom CMS or Static Site

If you run a custom CMS, you need to build the news sitemap programmatically. The logic is straightforward:

1. Query your database for articles published in the last 48 hours
2. Generate the XML with the required tags for each article
3. Serve the file at a consistent URL (like /news-sitemap.xml)
4. Update it every time you publish or unpublish an article

Here is a simplified example in pseudocode:

articles = getArticlesPublishedAfter(now - 48 hours)
for each article:
  add <url> with:
    <loc> = article.url
    <news:name> = "Your Publication Name"
    <news:language> = article.language
    <news:publication_date> = article.publishedAt
    <news:title> = article.title
output as XML with news namespace

Manual creation

For small publishers who post a few articles per week, you can maintain the news sitemap by hand. Just remember to remove articles older than 48 hours and keep the total under 1,000.

Submitting Your News Sitemap to Google

There are two steps: submitting through Search Console and registering with Google Publisher Center.

Google Search Console

Submit your news sitemap the same way you submit a standard sitemap. Go to Search Console > Sitemaps > Add a new sitemap, and enter the URL of your news sitemap. See our full guide to submitting sitemaps to Google for detailed steps.

You should also reference the news sitemap in your robots.txt:

Sitemap: https://example.com/news-sitemap.xml

Google Publisher Center

Google Publisher Center is where you manage your publication's presence in Google News. You will need to:

1. Go to Google Publisher Center
2. Add your publication
3. Verify ownership
4. Configure your publication settings, including your publication name (this must match what is in the news sitemap)

Having a news sitemap alone does not get you into Google News. Your site must meet Google's content policies, and your publication should be set up in Publisher Center. The news sitemap is one piece of the puzzle.

Common Mistakes

Publication name mismatch

The <news:name> in your sitemap must match the publication name in Google Publisher Center exactly. A mismatch causes Google to disregard the news sitemap entries. Check for extra spaces, different capitalization, or abbreviations.

Keeping old articles in the news sitemap

Articles older than 48 hours should be removed. Google will not penalize you for having them, but it signals that your sitemap is not being maintained properly. It can also slow down processing if the file grows unnecessarily large.

Including non-article URLs

Category pages, tag pages, author archives, and the homepage do not belong in the news sitemap. Only actual article pages should be listed.

Missing publication_date

Every article entry must include <news:publication_date>. Without it, Google cannot determine when the article was published, which defeats the purpose of the news sitemap.

Using incorrect date formats

The date must be in W3C datetime format. Common mistakes include using formats like 04/21/2026 or April 21, 2026. Stick to YYYY-MM-DD or the full datetime format YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ssTZD.

Forgetting to include the news namespace

The <urlset> tag must include the news namespace declaration:

xmlns:news="http://www.google.com/schemas/sitemap-news/0.9"

Without this, the news-specific tags will not be parsed.

News Sitemap vs. Standard Sitemap

Both are XML sitemaps, but they serve different audiences within Google's systems.

| | Standard Sitemap | News Sitemap | |---|---|---| | Purpose | General web indexing | Google News indexing | | URL limit | 50,000 per file | 1,000 per file | | Content scope | All pages on your site | Articles from last 48 hours | | Special tags | None required | news:publication, news:title, news:publication_date | | Update frequency | When content changes | Continuously as articles publish |

You should have both. The standard sitemap covers your entire site for regular search. The news sitemap focuses on fresh articles for Google News. For examples of standard sitemap formatting, see our XML sitemap examples.

Does a News Sitemap Guarantee Google News Inclusion?

No. A news sitemap improves your chances by making it easier for Google to find and classify your articles. But Google News inclusion depends on multiple factors:

• Your site must follow Google News content policies
• You need original reporting or news coverage, not rehashed content
• Your site must be technically accessible (fast, mobile-friendly, no aggressive interstitials)
• You should be registered in Google Publisher Center

The news sitemap is one signal among many. It is necessary for reliable discovery but not sufficient on its own.

Keeping Your News Sitemap Healthy

Once set up, a news sitemap needs ongoing maintenance:

• Remove articles older than 48 hours on a rolling basis
• Add new articles immediately on publish
• Verify that the publication name stays consistent
• Monitor Search Console for errors in the news sitemap report
• If you rename your publication, update both Publisher Center and the sitemap simultaneously

Automate this if possible. A news sitemap that requires manual updates is a news sitemap that will eventually fall out of date.

References

• Google News Publisher Help: Sitemaps
• Sitemaps.org: News Sitemap Extension
• Google Search Central: News Sitemap