• majorAlexa

        See all notifications

        Skip to content
        Moz logo Menu open Menu close
        • Products
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Pro Home
          • Moz Local
          • Moz Local Home
          • STAT
          • Moz API
          • Moz API Home
          • Compare SEO Products
          • Moz Data
        • Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Analysis
          • Keyword Explorer
          • Link Explorer
          • Competitive Research
          • MozBar
          • More Free SEO Tools
        • Learn SEO
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO
          • SEO Learning Center
          • Moz Academy
          • MozCon
          • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
        • Blog
        • Why Moz
          • Digital Marketers
          • Agency Solutions
          • Enterprise Solutions
          • Small Business Solutions
          • The Moz Story
          • New Releases
        • Log in
        • Log out
        • Products
          • Moz Pro

            Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

          • Moz Local

            Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

          • STAT

            SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

          • Moz API

            Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

          • Compare SEO Products

            See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

          • Moz Data

            Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

          Let your business shine with Listings AI
          Moz Local

          Let your business shine with Listings AI

          Learn more
        • Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Analysis

            Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

          • Keyword Explorer

            Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

          • Link Explorer

            Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

          • Competitive Research

            Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

          • MozBar

            See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

          • More Free SEO Tools

            Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

          NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
          Moz Pro

          NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

          Learn more
        • Learn SEO
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO

            The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

          • SEO Learning Center

            Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

          • On-Demand Webinars

            Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

          • How-To Guides

            Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

          • Moz Academy

            Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

          • MozCon

            Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

          Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
          Moz API

          Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

          Find your plan
        • Blog
        • Why Moz
          • Digital Marketers

            Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

          • Small Business Solutions

            Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

          • Agency Solutions

            Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

          • Enterprise Solutions

            Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

          • The Moz Story

            Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

          • New Releases

            Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

          Surface actionable competitive intel
          New Feature

          Surface actionable competitive intel

          Learn More
        • Log in
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Local
          • Moz Local Dashboard
          • Moz API
          • Moz API Dashboard
          • Moz Academy
        • Avatar
          • Moz Home
          • Notifications
          • Account & Billing
          • Manage Users
          • Community Profile
          • My Q&A
          • My Videos
          • Log Out

        The Moz Q&A Forum

        • Forum
        • Questions
        • My Q&A
        • Users
        • Ask the Community

        Welcome to the Q&A Forum

        Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

        1. Home
        2. SEO Tactics
        3. Technical SEO
        4. Google Search console says 'sitemap is blocked by robots?

        Moz Q&A is closed.

        After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

        Google Search console says 'sitemap is blocked by robots?

        Technical SEO
        4
        10
        3313
        Loading More Posts
        • Watching

          Notify me of new replies.
          Show question in unread.

        • Not Watching

          Do not notify me of new replies.
          Show question in unread if category is not ignored.

        • Ignoring

          Do not notify me of new replies.
          Do not show question in unread.

        • Oldest to Newest
        • Newest to Oldest
        • Most Votes
        Reply
        • Reply as question
        Locked
        This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
        • Extima-Christian
          Extima-Christian last edited by

          Google Search console is telling me "Sitemap contains URLs which are blocked by robots.txt."

          I don't understand why my sitemap is being blocked? My robots.txt look like this:

          User-Agent: *
          Disallow:

          Sitemap: http://www.website.com/sitemap_index.xml

          It's a WordPress site, with Yoast SEO installed. Is anyone else having this issue with Google Search console? Does anyone know how I can fix this issue?

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
          • BlueprintMarketing
            BlueprintMarketing @Extima-Christian last edited by

            Nice happy to hear that do you work with Greg Reindel? He is a good friend I looked at your IP that is why I ask?

            Tom

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • BlueprintMarketing
              BlueprintMarketing @davebuts last edited by

              I agree with David

              Hey is your dev Greg Reindel? If so you can call me for help PM me here for my info.

              Thomas Zickell

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • Extima-Christian
                Extima-Christian last edited by

                Hey guys, I ended up disabling the sitemap option from YoastSEO, then installed the 'Google (XML) sitemap' plug-in. I re-submitted the sitemap to Google last night, and it came back with no issues. I'm glad to finally have this sorted out.

                Thanks for all the help!

                BlueprintMarketing 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                • davebuts
                  davebuts last edited by

                  Hi Christian,

                  The current robots.txt shouldn't be blocking those URLs.

                  Did you or someone else recently change the robots.txt file? If so, give Google a few days to re-crawl your site.

                  Also, can you check what happens when you do a fetch and render on one of the blocked posts in Search Console? Do you have issues there?

                  Cheers,

                  David

                  BlueprintMarketing 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                  • BlueprintMarketing
                    BlueprintMarketing @Extima-Christian last edited by

                    I think you need to make an https robots.txt file if you are running https if running https

                    https://a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/blog/xml-sitemaps

                    `User-agent: *
                    Disallow: /wp-admin/
                    Allow: /wp-admin/admin-ajax.php`
                    
                    Sitemap: https://domain.com/index-sitemap.xml
                    
                    (that is a https site map)
                    

                    can you send the sitemap URL or run it though deepcrawl

                    Hope this helps?

                    Did you make a new robots.txt file?

                    ShhJY55.png

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • Extima-Christian
                      Extima-Christian @Alick300 last edited by

                      Thanks for the response. Do you think this is a robots.txt issue? Or could this be caused by the YoastSEO plugin?

                      Do you know if this plug-in works with YoastSEO together? Or will it cause issues?

                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • Extima-Christian
                        Extima-Christian @BlueprintMarketing last edited by

                        Thank you for the response.

                        I just scanned the site using 'Screaming frog'. Under Internal>Directives there were zero 'no index' links. I also check for '404 errors', server 505 errors, or anything 'blocked by robots.txt'.

                        Google search console is still showing me that there are URL's being blocked by my sitemap. (I added a screenshot of this). When I click through, it tells me that the 'post sitemap' has over +300 warnings.

                        I have just deleted the YoastSEO plugin, and I am now re-installing it. hopefully, this fixes the issue.

                        B7KE6nc ShhJY55

                        BlueprintMarketing 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • BlueprintMarketing
                          BlueprintMarketing last edited by

                          No, you do not need to change or plug-in what is happening is Webmaster tools is telling you that you have no index or no follow were robots xTag somewhere on your URLs inside your sitemap.

                          Run your site through Moz, screaming frog Seo spider or deepcrawl and look for no indexed URLs.

                          webmaster tools/search console is telling you that you have no index URLs inside of your XML sitemap not that you robots.txt is blocking it. This would be set in the Yoast plugin. one way to correct it is to look for noindex URLs &  filter them inside Yoast so they are not being presented to the crawlers.

                          If you would like you can turn off the sitemap on Yoast and turn it back on if that does not work I recommend completely removing the plug-in and reinstalling it

                          • https://kb.yoast.com/kb/how-can-i-uninstall-my-plugin/
                          • https://kinsta.com/blog/uninstall-wordpress-plugin/

                          Can you send a screenshot of what you're seeing?

                          When you see it in Google Webmaster tools are you talking about the XML sitemap itself mean no indexed because all XML sitemaps are no indexed.

                          Please add this to your robots.txt

                          `User-agent:*
                          Disallow:/wp-admin/
                          Allow:/wp-admin/admin-ajax.php` Sitemap: http://www.website.com/sitemap_index.xml
                          

                          I hope this is of help,

                          Tom

                          Extima-Christian 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                          • Alick300
                            Alick300 last edited by

                            Hi,

                            Use this plugin

                            https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-robots-txt/

                            it will remove previous robots.txt and set simple wordpress robots.txt and wait for a day

                            problem can be solved.

                            Also watch this video on the same @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZiyN07bbBM

                            Thanks

                            Extima-Christian 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • 1 / 1
                            • First post
                              Last post

                            Browse Questions

                            Explore more categories

                            • Moz Tools

                              Chat with the community about the Moz tools.

                            • SEO Tactics

                              Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers

                            • Community

                              Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!

                            • Digital Marketing

                              Chat about tactics outside of SEO

                            • Research & Trends

                              Dive into research and trends in the search industry.

                            • Support

                              Connect on product support and feature requests.

                            • See all categories

                            Related Questions

                            • HeroDesignStudio

                              Should a sub domain be a separate property in the Search Console?

                              We're launching a blog on a sub-domain of a corp site (blog.corpsite.com). We already have corpsite.com set up in the Search Console. Should I set up a separate property for this sub-domain in the Search Console (WMT) in order to manage it? Is it necessary? Thanks, JM

                              Technical SEO | | HeroDesignStudio
                              0
                            • hammadrafique

                              Blocked jquery in Robots.txt, Any SEO impact?

                              I've heard that Google is now indexing links and stuff available in javascript and jquery. My webmastertools is showing that some links are blocked in robots.txt of jquery. Sorry I'm not a developer or designer. I want to know is there any impact of this on my SEO? and also how can I unblock it for the robots? Check this screenshot: http://i.imgur.com/3VDWikC.png

                              Technical SEO | | hammadrafique
                              0
                            • zeepartner

                              Google indexing despite robots.txt block

                              Hi This subdomain has about 4'000 URLs indexed in Google, although it's blocked via robots.txt: https://www.google.com/search?safe=off&q=site%3Awww1.swisscom.ch&oq=site%3Awww1.swisscom.ch This has been the case for almost a year now, and it does not look like Google tends to respect the blocking in http://www1.swisscom.ch/robots.txt Any clues why this is or what I could do to resolve it? Thanks!

                              Technical SEO | | zeepartner
                              0
                            • Mark_Ginsberg

                              Blocking Affiliate Links via robots.txt

                              Hi, I work with a client who has a large affiliate network pointing to their domain which is a large part of their inbound marketing strategy. All of these links point to a subdomain of affiliates.example.com, which then redirects the links through a 301 redirect to the relevant target page for the link. These links have been showing up in Webmaster Tools as top linking domains and also in the latest downloaded links reports. To follow guidelines and ensure that these links aren't counted by Google for either positive or negative impact on the site, we have added a block on the robots.txt of the affiliates.example.com subdomain, blocking search engines from crawling the full subddomain. The robots.txt file is the following code: User-agent: * Disallow: / We have authenticated the subdomain with Google Webmaster Tools and made certain that Google can reach and read the robots.txt file. We know they are being blocked from reading the affiliates subdomain. However, we added this affiliates subdomain block a few weeks ago to the robots.txt, but links are still showing up in the latest downloads report as first being discovered after we added the block. It's been a few weeks already, and we want to make sure that the block was implemented properly and that these links aren't being used to negatively impact the site. Any suggestions or clarification would be helpful - if the subdomain is being blocked for the search engines, why are the search engines following the links and reporting them in the www.example.com subdomain GWMT account as latest links. And if the block is implemented properly, will the total number of links pointing to our site  as reported in the links to your site section be reduced, or does this not have an impact on that figure?From a development standpoint, it's a much easier fix for us to adjust the robots.txt file than to change the affiliate linking connection from a 301 to a 302, which is why we decided to go with this option.Any help you can offer will be greatly appreciated.Thanks,Mark

                              Technical SEO | | Mark_Ginsberg
                              0
                            • KCBackofen

                              Will an XML sitemap override a robots.txt

                              I have a client that has a robots.txt file that is blocking an entire subdomain, entirely by accident. Their original solution, not realizing the robots.txt error, was to submit an xml sitemap to get their pages indexed. I did not think this tactic would work, as the robots.txt would take precedent over the xmls sitemap. But it worked... I have no explanation as to how or why. Does anyone have an answer to this? or any experience with a website that has had a clear Disallow: / for months , that somehow has pages in the index?

                              Technical SEO | | KCBackofen
                              0
                            • sparts

                              Why is my site jumping around in google search ?

                              Hi I've been trying to get my page up in google results and I was wondering why the constant fluctuation. For example, on one day the pages is nr. 26, the next day it's nr. 65 then jumps back on say 30 and then in a few more days it's going back to 50. What's the logic behind that ? Thanks Cezar

                              Technical SEO | | sparts
                              1
                            • Romana

                              Why are Google search results different if you are log'd into Google or not?

                              I get different results when I'm log'd into my Google account associated with my website than if I'm not.  The same country is occurring. So how can I rely on the google results I'm seeing? For instance my site is page 1 with the improvements I made based on SEOMOZ if I'm log'd in.  Yet I'm not on the first 25 pages if I'm not logged in.

                              Technical SEO | | Romana
                              0
                            • askotzko

                              Do we need to manually submit a sitemap every time, or can we host it on our site as /sitemap and Google will see & crawl it?

                              I realized we don't have a sitemap in place, so we're going to get one built. Once we do, I'll submit it manually to Google via Webmaster tools. However, we have a very dynamic site with content constantly being added. Will I need to keep manually re-submitting the sitemap to Google? Or could we have the continually updating sitemap live on our site at /sitemap and the crawlers will just pick it up from there? I noticed this is what SEOmoz does at http://www.seomoz.org/sitemap.

                              Technical SEO | | askotzko
                              0

                            Get started with Moz Pro!

                            Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                            Start my free trial
                            Products
                            • Moz Pro
                            • Moz Local
                            • Moz API
                            • Moz Data
                            • STAT
                            • Product Updates
                            Moz Solutions
                            • SMB Solutions
                            • Agency Solutions
                            • Enterprise Solutions
                            • Digital Marketers
                            Free SEO Tools
                            • Domain Authority Checker
                            • Link Explorer
                            • Keyword Explorer
                            • Competitive Research
                            • Brand Authority Checker
                            • Local Citation Checker
                            • MozBar Extension
                            • MozCast
                            Resources
                            • Blog
                            • SEO Learning Center
                            • Help Hub
                            • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                            • How-to Guides
                            • Moz Academy
                            • API Docs
                            About Moz
                            • About
                            • Team
                            • Careers
                            • Contact
                            Why Moz
                            • Case Studies
                            • Testimonials
                            Get Involved
                            • Become an Affiliate
                            • MozCon
                            • Webinars
                            • Practical Marketer Series
                            • MozPod
                            Connect with us

                            Contact the Help team

                            Join our newsletter
                            Moz logo
                            © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                            • Accessibility
                            • Terms of Use
                            • Privacy

                            Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.