In this knowledge-base article, we’ll discuss why Google Search Console says “Indexed, Not Submitted in Sitemap”.
What is “Indexed, Not Submitted in Sitemap”?
The “Indexed, not submitted in sitemap” status indicates that Google’s indexed URLs aren’t included in your XML sitemap.
Here’s what this error looks like in Google Search Console’s Index Coverage report:
In most cases, this isn’t a big problem but it can be a useful pointer that you don’t have an XML sitemap, you’ve not yet submitted it to Google Search Console or that important pages are missing from your XML sitemap.
Why Do You Get “Indexed, Not Submitted in Sitemap” Error?
Here are some of the reasons for the “Indexed, Not Submitted in Sitemap” error:
1 Page Is Set to Noindex
If the post is set as noindex then this could be the reason that your URL is not indexed and is not included in the Sitemap. You can solve this issue by changing the robots meta for the particular page.
2 Custom Canonical
If you are adding a Custom Canonical to your page then it’s likely you will come across this error. By changing your canonical URL you can get your page indexed and submitted in Sitemap.
3 Excluded from Sitemap
If your post/page is excluded from the Sitemap Settings then it’s pretty obvious that your URL will not be included in the Sitemap.
4 The Sitemap is being Cached
If the Sitemap is being cached then you need to exclude Sitemaps from caching. You can go through our tutorial on how to exclude Sitemaps from caching and exclude the caches.
5 Submitted Sitemap is Incorrect
If at all you have not submitted the correct sitemap then you need to submit sitemap_index.xml and need to ensure that all the inner sitemaps like post-sitemap.xml etc. are showing up in your Google Search Console while clicking on sitemap_index.xml file.
6 Check the Last Crawl Date in Google Search Console
It’s always a good practice to check the last crawl date on the sitemap in the Google Search Console.
When you’ll click on the sitemap_index.xml you’ll find the last crawl date by Google.
If the last crawl is not after you’ve published the post – then Google might not have seen the updated Sitemap yet. You need to be patient and just wait for Google to crawl the post.
However, if you don’t choose to wait, you can also delete the Sitemap from the Google Search Console by clicking on the three dots on the top-right corner and then click on Remove Sitemaps.
Once you have removed the Sitemap, you can add it by entering the Sitemap URL.
Overall, prevention is better than cure. A good website architecture and robot handling will mostly lead to a clean and clear Google Search Console Index Coverage report. We hope that the reasons that are listed above along with its solutions will help you to solve the “Indexed, not submitted in Sitemap” error. However, if you still have any questions, please feel free to contact our support team who are available 24×7 and will help you out as soon as possible.