Problem with SiteMap

Hello,

We apologize for the issue you are facing with your sitemap. The "Couldn’t fetch" error in Google Search Console can be caused by several factors. Here are some steps you can take to troubleshoot and potentially resolve the issue:

1. Validate Your Sitemap

First, ensure that your sitemap is correctly configured. You can validate your sitemap using the Validate XML Sitemap tool. Enter your sitemap URL and click VALIDATE SITEMAP. If there are no issues, it should return a success message.

2. Check Sitemap Location

Make sure your sitemap is located in the root folder of your WordPress installation. The correct URL format should be:

https://img.youtube.com/vi/-QZro6QysCA/maxresdefault.jpg

3. Ensure Posts Are Set to Index

If all your posts are set to noindex, your sitemap will be empty. To check this, go to Rank Math SEO → Titles & Meta and ensure the Index checkbox is enabled for your posts.

4. Flush Permalinks

If you encounter a 404 error, try flushing permalinks by going to the Permalinks settings in your WordPress dashboard and clicking Save Changes without making any changes.

5. Check for Plugin Conflicts

Sometimes, other plugins can conflict with Rank Math. You can use the Health Check plugin to identify any conflicts.

6. Check robots.txt File

Ensure that your sitemap URL is not blocked by the robots.txt file. You can check this in Rank Math SEO → General Settings → robots.txt.

If you continue to experience issues after trying these steps, please reply to this ticket with your site URL so we can assist you further. A human agent from our support team will take over and provide more specific guidance.

Thank you for raising this concern! We’re here to help you resolve it.

Sources:
Troubleshooting the “Couldn’t Fetch” Error in Google Search Console » Rank Math
Rank Math Sitemap Issues and Their Fixes » Rank Math

Hello,

Thank you for your patience.

Please disregard step 2 from our bot’s reply as Rank Math’s sitemap is generated virtually.

It means that there’s no physical sitemap file being generated in your website’s directory.

Looking forward to helping you.

Hello,

Kindly share screenshots of the report from GSC.

You can share screenshots using this tool: imgur.com/upload

In the meantime follow the steps below for initial troubleshooting:

1. Flush the Sitemap cache by following this video screencast:
https://i.rankmath.com/pipRDp

2. Exclude the Sitemap files of the Rank Math plugin in your caching plugin. The cache could be via a plugin or from the server. For plugins or Cloudflare, please follow this article: https://rankmath.com/kb/exclude-sitemaps-from-caching/

After doing the above remove all submitted sitemaps and only submit the main sitemap again (/sitemap_index.xml) and wait for the last read column to update.

Let us know how it goes. Looking forward to helping you.

Thank you.

Hello,

We couldn’t find any screenshots in your post here. Can you please share your screenshots using this tool instead?

Looking forward to helping you.

Hello,

You can try disabling the transient cache for the sitemap. This will make sure that your XML sitemap always reflects the latest changes on your site. Kindly add this code snippet to your site:

/** 
 * Filter if XML sitemap transient cache is enabled.
 *
 * @param boolean $unsigned Enable cache or not, defaults to true
 */
add_filter( 'rank_math/sitemap/enable_caching', '__return_false');

If you’re not sure how to add this code, you can follow this guide: https://rankmath.com/kb/wordpress-hooks-actions-filters/.

We’ve noticed this issue with some other users, and it seems that the problem lies with Google rather than Rank Math. It appears that Google is labeling all sitemaps as “Couldn’t fetch” until they are actually read. Once the sitemap is read, the ‘Last read’ column will display the date it was last read. It usually takes a few hours or days for Google to read the submitted sitemap, so we kindly ask for your patience as you wait for the ‘Last read’ column to update.

We hope this helps. Please let us know if you have further questions or concerns.

Thank you.