Sitemap cannot be read

#234715
  • Resolved Matt Behm

    3 years, 5 months ago

    Rank Math free

    I submitted our sitemap on Google Search Console, and received a message that the sitemap could not be read. I attempted to validate it, but received this message: Incorrect http header content-type: “” (expected: “application/xml”).

    Sorry, totally new to this, but how do I fix this? Thank you!

Viewing 8 replies - 1 through 8 (of 8 total)
  • Jeremy

    3 years, 5 months ago

    Hello,

    Thank you for contacting the support, and sorry for any inconvenience that might have been caused due to that.

    I tried validating your sitemap on my end and it is indeed having some issues.

    Can you please follow these steps?

    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/

    Let us know how it goes. We are looking forward to helping you.

    Matt Behm

    3 years, 5 months ago

    Rank Math free

    Thank you Jeremy. Unfortunately, the field “Links per Sitemap” does not appear in my version of Rank Math. The General tab only shows a toggle for Images in Sitemaps and for Include Featured Images.

    Jeremy

    3 years, 5 months ago

    Hello,

    Do note that some options are only available when you enable the Advanced Mode in Rank Math. If it’s not showing, you must have chosen to use the Easy Mode. Please follow the steps in this link to switch to Advanced Mode:
    https://rankmath.com/kb/advanced-mode/

    We are looking forward to helping you.

    Matt Behm

    3 years, 5 months ago

    Rank Math free

    Thanks Jeremy, advanced mode took care of that first part. However, I don’t believe that I have a caching plugin on my site currently. The initial web developer who created the site may have added one, but I reviewed my current plugins and do not see anything about caching.

    Jeremy

    3 years, 5 months ago

    Hello,

    In that case, could you please contact your hosting service and ensure that no server-level caching app such as Cloudflare is still caching your sitemap?

    Let us know how it goes. We are looking forward to helping you.

    Matt Behm

    3 years, 4 months ago

    Rank Math free

    Thanks Jeremy. I had them flush the cache, and now I am able to positively validate the sitemap, so I assume that I’m making progress. However, the Google Search Console still tells me that it couldn’t fetch the sitemap. Is it possible that it just needs some time, since it was just cached?

    Matt Behm

    3 years, 4 months ago

    Rank Math free

    And, success! Thank you for the help Jeremy, I really appreciate it!

    Jeremy

    3 years, 4 months ago

    Hello,

    I am glad that your issue has been resolved. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you need our assistance with anything else. It will be our pleasure to assist you again.

    Thank you.

Viewing 8 replies - 1 through 8 (of 8 total)

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