Sitemap limits come from the Sitemaps.org protocol, not Google specifically — Google, Bing, and every other search engine that supports sitemaps follows the same rules. Here's every limit that matters, in one reference.
Per-File Limits
| Limit | Value | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| URLs per sitemap | 50,000 | Hard cap on <url> entries in a single file |
| File size | 50 MB uncompressed | Measured before gzip — a gzipped file still counts by its uncompressed size |
| Images per URL entry | 1,000 | Sitemaps.org image extension limit |
| Sitemaps per index file | 50,000 | A sitemap index can reference up to this many child sitemaps |
Gzip Compression Doesn't Change the Size Limit
You can serve a sitemap as a .xml.gz file to reduce transfer size, but the 50 MB limit applies to the file's uncompressed size. Compressing a 60 MB sitemap down to 10 MB on disk doesn't make it valid — it still needs to be split.
What Happens When You Exceed a Limit
- Over 50,000 URLs or 50 MB: the entire file is typically rejected — not just the excess entries. You'll see a parse or fetch error in Search Console.
- Malformed XML: also causes full rejection, regardless of size. See our guide on how to validate a sitemap for the specific errors to check.
- Too many URLs across your whole site: there's no limit on how many total URLs your site can have indexed — only on how many can live in a single sitemap file. Use a sitemap index (see below) to scale beyond 50,000.
Scaling Past the Limits with a Sitemap Index
For sites with more than 50,000 URLs, the standard solution is a sitemap index — a file that lists multiple child sitemaps, each staying under the per-file limits. You submit the index once, and search engines follow the links to every child file. All child sitemaps must be hosted on the same domain as the index.
Limits That Aren't Officially Fixed
A few things are sometimes mistaken for hard limits but aren't formally documented with a specific number by Google:
- How many sitemaps you can submit per property in Search Console — there's no small fixed cap, but keeping your sitemap structure organized (one index, logically split children) is good practice regardless.
- How often you can resubmit a sitemap — no published rate limit, but resubmitting doesn't speed up crawling (see our guide on how often a sitemap should be updated), so there's little reason to do it excessively.
- Video sitemap entries per URL — the protocol supports multiple
<video:video>tags per page without a small documented cap, though in practice a page rarely needs more than a handful.
Quick Reference
If you remember one number, make it 50,000 — it governs URLs per sitemap and sitemaps per index. Pair it with the 50 MB uncompressed file size cap, and you've covered the limits that actually cause rejections in practice.