Sitemap Delta Monitor | New & Changed URLs

Sitemap Delta Monitor | New & Changed URLs

Compare XML sitemap snapshots for new URLs, metadata edits and entries absent from the latest document. Keep persistent history, return the current inventory and deduplicatable change IDs, and distinguish URL sets from sitemap indexes.

How it works

Supply the URL of one XML sitemap document. A urlset returns page URLs; a sitemapindex returns child sitemap references. The Actor compares the complete supplied document with its previous successful snapshot. A changed lastmod, changefreq or priority is a metadata update, not proof that page content changed. An absent URL means it is missing from this document; it does not prove the page was deleted. The first run returns the current entries unless you select baseline. Index children are listed but are not downloaded automatically; submit each desired child document as a separate input URL.

Quick start

1. Enter one or more public URLs in the Input tab, beginning with the supplied example.
2. Set a maximum run charge. A completed check costs $0.01; checking 10 sources once costs $0.1.
3. Start the Actor and inspect the dataset. Download JSON, CSV or Excel, or consume results through the Apify API.
4. Inspect the OUTPUT run summary as well as the dataset: failed or unprocessed inputs appear there. Save the input as a task if you want to schedule future runs.

Pricing

$0.01 per completed check ($10 per 1,000), with platform usage included. There are no separate Actor-start or dataset-item fees. Empty and unchanged successful checks are charged. The maximum charge is checked before each source request and again before output. Failed network or format checks are free; see the specific HTTP-response cases below. Billing is per completed source check, not per nested array item, extracted URL, change or schema block.

Limits and interpretation

Each document is limited to 5,000 unique entries and 2 MB after HTTP decompression. These limits are smaller than the sitemap protocol maximum. Standalone .gz archives, RSS, text sitemaps and recursive index traversal are unsupported. HTTP Content-Encoding gzip is supported. Malformed XML, custom entities, repeated identifiers or incomplete oversized documents produce a free error and never replace history.

A run accepts 1-50 unique input URLs and requests them sequentially. Each check has an 18-second network deadline; new checks stop after 160 seconds. Use a 240-second run timeout and 512 MB memory. If the time or charge limit stops a batch, OUTPUT lists uncheckedUrls for a later run. No response exceeding the configured byte limit is accepted, and a complete record must fit within 6 MB. The Actor permits only public HTTP(S) destinations on standard ports, pins a validated DNS address per request, and refuses redirects into private networks or from HTTPS to HTTP.

The Actor uses direct HTTP requests, without a browser, residential proxy, login, CAPTCHA solving or access-control bypass. Rate limits and blocks may prevent checks. Avoid secret-bearing URLs. Results describe the source and network observed at check time.

Persistent history

Reuse the same monitorId, or omit it on a saved task to use the task ID. Use a new ID to reset the baseline. Run one copy of a given monitor at a time, at least five minutes apart. Dataset output is written and charged before the checkpoint is saved. A failure between those steps can replay a transition; deduplicate deterministic eventId values downstream. Overlapping runs are unsupported. Failed checks and rejected charges retain prior history. Current snapshots are stored in a named key-value store and incur platform storage costs covered by this Actor pricing; remove unused monitor stores through Apify when no longer needed.

Integrations and support

Connect the dataset and OUTPUT summary to your own n8n, Make, Zapier or API workflow. This Actor produces data; it does not automatically send email, Slack messages or webhooks to third parties. No external account credentials are needed for the supplied public examples. Report reproducible issues in the Actor Issues tab, including a non-sensitive input and run link. This is an independent utility and is not endorsed by the websites, standards bodies or services it reads.

Input example

{
  "urls": [
    "https://www.sitemaps.org/sitemap.xml"
  ],
  "monitorId": "sitemap-monitor",
  "firstRun": "emit"
}

See the Input tab for all supported fields. Results are available through the dataset API and can be downloaded as JSON, CSV or Excel.

Output fields

Field	Meaning
inputUrl	Normalized supplied URL.
checkedAt	Check time in ISO format.
sourceUrl	Final sitemap URL.
documentType	urlset contains page URLs; sitemapindex contains child sitemap references.
entryCount	Entries in this complete document.
items	Current entries: id, url, lastModified, changeFrequency and priority.
monitorId	Persistent history scope.
baselineCreated	True on the first complete observation.
changeCount	Changes relative to the last successful snapshot.
changes	eventId, type (new/updated/absent) and normalized item. Absence describes the source snapshot only.

Output example

Example from a public source check; live values vary. Long items, changes, groups and blocks arrays are shortened to two entries here for readability; the actual record contains the complete arrays within the documented limits.

{
  "inputUrl": "https://www.sitemaps.org/sitemap.xml",
  "checkedAt": "2026-09-07T21:05:11.579Z",
  "sourceUrl": "https://www.sitemaps.org/sitemap.xml",
  "documentType": "urlset",
  "entryCount": 84,
  "items": [
    {
      "id": "https://www.sitemaps.org/",
      "url": "https://www.sitemaps.org/",
      "lastModified": "2016-11-21",
      "changeFrequency": "",
      "priority": ""
    },
    {
      "id": "https://www.sitemaps.org/protocol.html",
      "url": "https://www.sitemaps.org/protocol.html",
      "lastModified": "2022-12-15",
      "changeFrequency": "",
      "priority": ""
    }
  ],
  "monitorId": "sitemap-monitor",
  "baselineCreated": true,
  "changeCount": 84,
  "changes": [
    {
      "eventId": "bfab8a67f4d5be0efc10402b909d611d047d696abca3be691c4e39ec51bc81d0",
      "type": "new",
      "item": {
        "id": "https://www.sitemaps.org/",
        "url": "https://www.sitemaps.org/",
        "lastModified": "2016-11-21",
        "changeFrequency": "",
        "priority": ""
      }
    },
    {
      "eventId": "25d2ba5b8e94ed32f6a83be1487df9fea874b8f51aa0998b43d943235ef02f16",
      "type": "new",
      "item": {
        "id": "https://www.sitemaps.org/protocol.html",
        "url": "https://www.sitemaps.org/protocol.html",
        "lastModified": "2022-12-15",
        "changeFrequency": "",
        "priority": ""
      }
    }
  ]
}