Sitemap showing couldn’t fetch

Hello,

We apologize for the issue you are facing with your sitemap showing a "Couldn’t fetch" error in Google Search Console. Here are some steps you can follow to troubleshoot and resolve this 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 it’s properly configured, you should see a success message.

2. Ensure the Sitemap is Located in the Root Folder

Make sure your sitemap is located in the root folder of your WordPress installation. The URL should look like this:
https://yourdomainname.com/sitemap_index.xml

3. Check Index Settings for Posts

Ensure that your posts are set to index. Go to Rank Math SEO → Titles & Meta and enable the Index checkbox in the Robots Meta settings.

4. Flush the Cache

If your sitemap appears outdated, you may need to flush the sitemap cache. Navigate to Rank Math SEO → Sitemap Settings, increase the value of Links Per Sitemap by one, and save your settings. Then, go to Settings → Permalinks and click Save Changes.

5. Add the Correct Sitemap to Google Search Console

Make sure you are adding the correct version of your sitemap in Google Search Console. Go to Indexing → Sitemaps and paste your sitemap URL in the Add a new sitemap field, then click SUBMIT.

6. Wait for Google to Fetch Your Sitemap

If you have followed all these steps and still encounter the error, it may be that Google has not yet fetched your sitemap. Sometimes, it takes time for Google to process it.

If you continue to experience issues after trying these steps, please reply to this ticket, and a human agent from the Rank Math Support team will assist you further. Thank you for raising this concern!

Sources:
Troubleshooting the “Couldn’t Fetch” Error in Google Search Console » Rank Math

Hello,

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

Please try to follow the steps below and see if that works for you.

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/

3. If the above steps don’t seem to work, kindly apply the following filter to your site.

add_filter( 'rank_math/sitemap/enable_caching', '__return_false');

Here’s how you can add filter/hook to your WordPress site:
https://rankmath.com/kb/wordpress-hooks-actions-filters/

Once done, please clear your website cache, remove all the submitted sitemaps, and resubmit only the main sitemap in the Search Console and see if that works for you.

Let us know how it goes. We look forward to hearing from you.

Thank you.

Hello,

Can you please try to remove all the submitted sitemaps from your Google Search Console and resubmit /?sitemap=1 and see if that works for you?

Also, please make sure you’re submitting the correct version of your sitemap on Google Search Console: https://gettherecipes.com/sitemap_index.xml

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

Thank you.