Hello,
We apologize for the issue you are facing with uploading your sitemap to Google Search Console. The "Sitemap could not be read" error can occur due to several reasons. Here are some steps you can take to troubleshoot and resolve this issue:
1. Validate Your Sitemap
Make sure your sitemap is correctly configured. You can use the Validate XML Sitemap tool to check for any issues. If your sitemap is valid, it should return a success message.
2. Ensure the Sitemap is Located in the Root Folder
If you manually created the sitemap, ensure it is installed in the root folder of your WordPress installation. The URL should look like this:
https://yourdomainname.com/sitemap_index.xml
3. Check for Indexing Settings
Ensure that your posts are set to index. If all your posts are set to noindex, your sitemap will be empty. You can check this in Rank Math SEO → Titles & Meta and make sure the Index checkbox is enabled.
4. Rename the Sitemap File
Sometimes, renaming the sitemap file can help. In Google Search Console, go to Indexing → Sitemaps and try submitting a new sitemap URL like:
https://yourdomain.com/?sitemap=1
5. Check for Server Issues
Ensure that there are no server issues preventing Google from accessing your sitemap. You can check your server logs for any errors related to sitemap access.
If you’ve tried all these steps and are still encountering issues, please reply to this ticket with your website URL so we can assist you further. A human agent from our support team will take over and provide more specific help.
Thank you for raising this concern, and we’re here to help you resolve it as soon as possible!
Sources:
Troubleshooting the “Couldn’t Fetch” Error in Google Search Console » Rank Math
How to Configure Sitemaps in Rank Math – Best Settings and Tips
This is an automated reply from Rank Math Support Bot. Your ticket has been assigned to a human agent and we will get back to you shortly.
Hello,
Thank you for your query and we are so sorry about the trouble this must have caused.
Your sitemap seems to be working just fine.
Please follow the steps below:
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. Apply the following filter code to your site.
add_filter( 'rank_math/sitemap/enable_caching', '__return_false');
Here’s how you can add filter to your WordPress site:https://rankmath.com/kb/wordpress-hooks-actions-filters/
4. Remove all your sitemaps from your Google Search Console and re-submit only the index sitemap (https://website.com/sitemap_index.xml).
Let us know how that goes. Looking forward to helping you.
Still showing “Sitemap could not be read”. What type of services you are providing. I’ll raise the complaint to higher authorities and social media about your worst services.
Hello,
We checked your sitemap again, and we can see it is working properly without any issues. Please check the screenshot in the sensitive data section for reference.
In case you’re still facing the issue, please try to remove all the submitted sitemaps from your Google Search Console and resubmit /?sitemap=1 and see if that works for you.
For more details, you can check this URL: https://rankmath.com/kb/couldnt-fetch-error-google-search-console/#rename-the-sitemap
If the issue persists, please share a screenshot of the error from Google Search Console so that we can check this further for you. You can use any image-sharing tool like https://imgur.com/upload to share the screenshot with us.
Let us know how it goes. Looking forward to helping you.
Thank you.
Hello,
It seems that you have forgotten to add the screenshot of your Google Search Console sitemap section.
You can upload screenshots using this tool and add the link here so we can check it.
Looking forward to helping you.
Here the screenshot
Image url : https://imgur.com/a/RDG1AFJ
Hello,
We deeply apologize for the unexpected delay in response.
From the screenshot, it looks like Google has not fetched your sitemap yet.
However, we checked your sitemap again but couldn’t find any specific issue that may prevent Google from fetching your sitemap.
In this case, can you please confirm if you’ve already submitted the /?sitemap=1 in your GSC account? If so, please allow Google some time to recrawl your sitemaps. You can monitor the “Last read/crawl date” column in the sitemap index, as it will update the date when Google crawls your sitemap.
Let us know how it goes. Looking forward to helping you.
Thank you.
still not working from ?sitemap=1
imag url : https://imgur.com/a/zTrJmip
Hello,
It looks like the sitemap index is working except for the page-sitemap.
It indicates from your screenshot that the sitemap has not been read by Google still. As we mentioned in our guide here, if the error continues, it likely means that Google hasn’t fetched the sitemap yet. In this case, there’s nothing you need to do but wait. This could be intentional on Google’s part, as it’s capable of discovering and indexing your URLs even without a sitemap.
Don’t hesitate to get in touch with us if you have any other questions.
I have already done what was in guide. It’s being 15 days but still not index my sitemaps
Hello,
Google has not yet read your sitemap. You can also see from the sitemap that the “Last read” data is showing N/A and empty.
You should give it some time for Google to recrawl the sitemaps.
Also, please note that Google considers various factors while indexing. Your frequency of posting and your site’s domain authority are just two of the many factors Google considers when indexing new web pages.
Google assigns a crawl budget to your website depending on these factors (especially these two), and that has a direct effect on how soon (i.e. how efficiently) your content can be indexed.
Looking forward to helping you.
