Google Search Console XML Sitemap Error

  • Resolved toxoplasmaarts

    (@toxoplasmaarts)


    5 years, 2 months ago

    Hi there,

    I have Yoast installed on a client’s site and in Google Search Console we are getting a parsing error on the Sitemap that reads: “We were unable to read your Sitemap. It may contain an entry we are unable to recognize. Please validate your Sitemap before resubmitting.” I did submit /sitemap_index.xml.

    When I clicked on it today, it did indeed look different than it has in the past (everything basically minified to a single wrapped line of text), but I don’t seem to be able to download it anywhere and take a look or reformat.

    Any advice appreciated!
    Thanks!

    The page I need help with: [log in to see the link]

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)
  • Plugin Support amboutwe

    (@amboutwe)

    First, this (minified to a single wrapped line of text) will not cause problems at all. What you are seeing is simply the code which is all that Google or other search engines see because they use bots to read the code.

    Why is it happening?
    The stylesheet that converts the code to the columns and makes it human readable is not loading.

    How can it be fixed?
    There are two common causes:

    1. Your sitemap is being cached. If you have cache enabled, please ensure your sitemap is excluded.

    2. The stylesheet loads an error. View the source code of the sitemap and look for the URL that ends in xsl. Open the URL in a browser. Resolve any errors if the page doesn’t look like an empty sitemap. How To View The Page Source of Your Site

    Second, I reviewed the sitemap index and each subsitemap and did not see anything that stood out as a reason for Google to not read the sitemap. Did you submit the sitemap to the Google Search Console profile that matches the preferred URL format including http(s) and www or non-www?

    Thread Starter toxoplasmaarts

    (@toxoplasmaarts)

    Hi @amboutwe – thank you! I did just enable more caching, and discovered that the sitemap name was incorrect in my exclusions.

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)
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