What belongs in a sitemap
A sitemap should help crawlers find the pages you want indexed. For a tool website, that usually means the homepage, key category pages, live tool pages, helpful guide articles, legal pages that should be public, and other stable canonical URLs.
What to remove
- Deleted tools and retired routes.
- Filtered search URLs with query strings.
- Duplicate aliases that redirect elsewhere.
- Pages marked noindex.
- URLs that return 404, 410, or empty results.
Why cleanup helps
A clean sitemap reduces wasted crawling and prevents stale URLs from looking like active content. It also makes it easier to spot accidental route changes after a redesign.
Common mistakes
Do not include every possible search or filter combination. Also avoid listing HTTP and HTTPS versions of the same page. Pick the final canonical URL.
FAQ
Should redirects be in the sitemap?
No. List the final destination whenever possible.
How often should I update the sitemap?
Update it whenever public indexable pages are added, removed, renamed, or canonicalized.