News sitemaps: The Complete 2026 Guide

A news sitemap is a specialized XML file for publishers. It informs Google News of new articles within the last 48 hours. Standard sitemaps do not provide the specific metadata that Google News requires. A news sitemap delivers article titles, publication dates, and keywords in a format Google News processes directly.

Google News uses this data to evaluate timeliness and relevance. Articles older than 48 hours are automatically dropped from coverage. The sitemap must be updated continuously as new articles publish. The specification is at developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/sitemaps/news-sitemaps.

The news sitemap uses the standard XML namespace plus xmlns:news="http://www.google.com/schemas/sitemap-news/0.9". Each URL entry contains a <news:news> block with <news:publication>, <news:publication_date>, <news:title>, and <news:keywords>.

The <news:publication> element includes <news:name> matching the site name in Google News Publisher Center and <news:language> using an ISO 639 language code. The <news:publication_date> must follow W3C Datetime format. The title must match the HTML title tag of the article.

Before submitting a news sitemap, register your site in Google News Publisher Center. The site must produce original news content. Google reviews the application against its content policies. Approval is not automatic.

Once approved, the site name in Publisher Center must match the <news:name> in the sitemap. Any mismatch causes the sitemap to fail. The registration process and policy are documented at support.google.com/news/publisher-center.

News sitemaps must be updated within 48 hours of article publication. Articles outside this window are ignored. Updates should happen as close to publication time as possible. A daily news site should regenerate its news sitemap after each publishing batch.

Google News crawlers check submitted sitemaps frequently during the day. A stale sitemap causes articles to be missed. Set up automated regeneration triggered by the CMS publish hook. Do not include old articles or evergreen content in the news sitemap.

Each article listed in a news sitemap must be original. Duplicate content from syndication sources does not qualify. Paywalled articles are acceptable if the paywall does not block Googlebot. The article must contain substantial text content, not just video or images.

Article titles must match the visible page title. Misleading or sensational titles violate Google News policies. Articles that promote hate speech, harassment, or deceptive practices are rejected. The content policy is described at support.google.com/news/publisher-center/answer/9605242.

Google Search Console reports per-article errors in the news sitemap section. Common rejection reasons include publication date mismatch, title mismatch, or content policy violations. Articles submitted but not indexed show with a warning icon.

A rejected article typically fails because the page does not qualify as news. Opinion pieces, press releases, and stock analysis often get rejected. Review the article content against Google News guidelines. Moz discusses news sitemap troubleshooting at moz.com/blog/news-sitemap-troubleshooting.

Check that your news sitemap contains only articles published within the last 48 hours. Verify that publication dates match the actual article timestamp. Confirm article titles match visible page titles. Validate the namespace declaration and XML syntax.

Note the gap between articles submitted and articles indexed in Google News. A high rejection rate indicates content policy violations or metadata errors. Review each rejected article and correct the root cause before submitting again.

Audit quarterly.