Some Sitemap Extension Tags Are Going Away

Some of the image and video sitemap extensions will no longer be available on Google.

The company decided to turn off the use of these extensions after evaluating the tags and decided to sunset them on August 6, 2022. The documentation for the removed tags and attributes has already been deleted, according to Google.

To avoid confusion – image and video sitemaps will still be a part of the specs, but these specific tags won’t anymore.

Why Is Google Deprecating The Tags?

Because they’re declared to be outdated and can no longer be of use. Google determined that the value of the information passed through these tags and attributes no longer justifies using them.

However, the search engine mogul hasn’t offered any specifics as to why the value of tags was evaluated in the first place.

Upon evaluating the value of the Google sitemap extension tags, we decided to officially deprecate some tags and attributes, and remove them from our documentation. – stands in the official statement.

Gary Illyes from Google said they are removing the support for the tags so they can simplify sitemap extensions and help reduce the complexity of your codebases by making sitemaps “less cluttered in general.

Hoping that we can reduce clutter in sitemaps and code complexity in sitemap generators, we’re deprecating a handful of XML tags and attributes in Video and Image sitemaps. Read more: https://t.co/ziSBsQmuEo — Google Search Central (@googlesearchc) May 6, 2022

What Is Being Removed?

These are the discontinued tags and attributes within image sitemaps:

1. <image:caption>

2. <image:geo_location>

3. <image:title>

4. <image:license>

These are the deprecated sitemap video tags and attributes within video sitemaps:

1. <video:category>

2. <video:gallery_loc>

3. autoplay and allow_embed of the <video:player_loc> tag

4. <video:price> tag and its attributes

5. <video:tvshow> tag and its attributes

So, Now What?

There is no need for panic. Google said that you don’t need to rush and take immediate action. You can leave these tags and attributes in place, but in the future, Search Console might warn that support is no longer offered.

So, if you use these tags or attributes, just make sure to update and use Google’s best image and video practices.

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