Image Sitemap

An image sitemap is an XML sitemap extension that helps Google discover images associated with website pages, including some images that are difficult to find through ordinary crawling. An existing page sitemap may contain image entries, or a publisher may create a separate image sitemap. Google's supported format uses an 'image:image' element and a required 'image:loc' URL for each referenced image; a single page URL may contain up to 1,000 image entries. Image URLs may use another verified domain, such as a CDN. Older extension fields including 'image:caption', 'image:geo_location', 'image:title', and 'image:license' are deprecated and should not be treated as supported image sitemap metadata. Submitting an image sitemap does not guarantee indexing, rankings, or image-search traffic, and it does not replace useful alt text, crawlable images, or correct page context. Keep the sitemap accurate and follow Google's latest image sitemap documentation.