XML Sitemaps is a free plugin for the WordPress content management system. It helps site admins significantly improve website SEO. The plugin seamlessly integrates with WordPress, making it easy for anyone to generate XML sitemaps.

There are similar standalone applications like A1 Sitemap Generator that also generate sitemaps, but XML Sitemaps achieves the same results largely through automated processes. That means you can save a considerable amount of time and effort required to administrate your site.

Improve SEO

SEO is a term that refers to the process of optimizing a site to make it more visible in search engines. Ensuring the proper indexing of a site is an essential step, which is why XML sitemaps come into play. Sitemaps inform search engines where to find pages and when they were last updated, so you don't need to wait for bots and spiders to crawl your site. Sitemaps also make unlinked orphan pages more visible and easier to find.

Automated

XML Sitemaps is integrated with WordPress, so it is unnecessary for site admins to manually update sitemaps as pages and posts are added or removed. XML Sitemaps also modifies sitemaps automatically to reflect updates and ensure proper formatting so that search engines can easily discover new pages.

Licensed under the GPL

For more experience site admins, XML Sitemaps is licensed under GPL, meaning it is both free to use and modify without the need for permission or the requirement that modifications be shared. That means XML Sitemaps can be modified to better suit individual website needs.

A simple yet effective tool

Sitemaps are important for many sites, especially ones that are large and updated often. The XML Sitemaps tool makes maintaining sitemaps a trivial task, requiring only the initial setup. In some cases, even the initial setup is unnecessary, as the plugin will operate using the default settings.