Bing has up to date its sitemap steerage with a renewed give attention to the lastmod tag, highlighting its function in AI-powered search to find out which pages must be recrawled.
Whereas real-time instruments like IndexNow supply quicker updates, Bing says correct lastmod values assist maintain content material discoverable, particularly on often up to date or large-scale websites.
Bing Prioritizes lastmod For Recrawling
Bing says the lastmod subject in your sitemap is a prime sign for AI-driven indexing. It helps decide whether or not a web page must be recrawled or might be skipped.
To make it work successfully, use ISO 8601 format with each date and time (e.g. 2004-10-01T18:23:17+00:00). That stage of precision helps Bing prioritize crawl exercise based mostly on precise content material adjustments.
Keep away from setting lastmod to the time your sitemap was generated, except the web page was actually up to date.
Bing additionally confirmed that changefreq and precedence tags are ignored and now not have an effect on crawling or rating.
Submission & Verification Ideas
Bing recommends submitting your sitemap in one in every of two methods:
- Reference it in your robots.txt file
- Submit it through Bing Webmaster Instruments
As soon as submitted, Bing fetches the sitemap instantly and rechecks it each day.
You possibly can confirm whether or not it’s working by checking the submission standing, final learn date, and any processing errors in Bing Webmaster Instruments.
Mix With IndexNow For Higher Protection
To extend the possibilities of well timed indexing, Bing suggests combining sitemaps with IndexNow.
Whereas sitemaps give Bing a full image of your website, IndexNow permits real-time URL-level updates—helpful when content material adjustments often.
The Bing staff states:
“By combining sitemaps for complete website protection with IndexNow for quick, URL-level submission, you present the strongest basis for maintaining your content material recent, discoverable, and visual.”
Sitemaps at Huge Scale
For those who handle a big web site, Bing’s sitemap capability limits are value your consideration:
- As much as 50,000 URLs per sitemap
- 50,000 sitemaps per index file
- 2.5 billion URLs per index
- A number of index recordsdata assist indexing as much as 2.5 trillion URLs
That makes the usual sitemap protocol scalable sufficient even for enterprise-level ecommerce or publishing platforms.
Fabrice Canel and Krishna Madhavan of Microsoft AI, Bing, famous that utilizing these limits to their full extent helps guarantee content material stays discoverable in AI search.
Why This Issues
As search turns into extra AI-driven, correct crawl indicators matter extra.
Bing’s reliance on sitemaps, particularly the lastmod subject, exhibits that fundamental technical search engine optimisation practices nonetheless matter, whilst AI reshapes how content material is surfaced.
For big websites, Bing’s assist for trillions of URLs provides scalability. For everybody else, the message is less complicated: maintain your sitemaps clear, correct, and up to date in real-time. This offers your content material the most effective shot at visibility in AI search.
Featured Picture: PJ McDonnell/Shutterstock
