IndexNow: The Complete Guide to Instant Indexing for Bing and AI Search (2026)
For most of the web’s history, a search engine found out about a new or changed page when it next happened to crawl it. That could be hours or weeks. IndexNow flips that: your site tells participating search engines the moment a URL changes, with one HTTP request. It was launched in October 2021 by Microsoft Bing and Yandex, and a single ping is shared with every participating engine. Because Bing’s index feeds a number of AI search features, IndexNow has become one of the cheapest things you can do for AI visibility. This guide covers how it works, how to set it up, the limits, and what happened when we sent more than 200,000 submissions from our own site.
Key facts
- 2021 — IndexNow launched by Microsoft Bing and Yandex
- 10,000 — Maximum URLs per batch submission
- 1 ping — Shared with all participating engines
- 209,600 — Submissions in our own experiment
How IndexNow works
- You generate a key: a string of 8 to 128 characters (letters, numbers and dashes).
- You host the key in a text file on your site, normally at
https://example.com/<key>.txt, containing the key itself. This proves you control the domain. - When a URL is added, updated or deleted, you send it to an IndexNow endpoint along with the key.
- The receiving engine verifies the key file and shares the submission with the other participating engines.
That is the whole protocol. There is no account to create and no dashboard required, although Bing Webmaster Tools shows IndexNow submissions if you have verified the site there.
Which search engines participate
Participating engines include Microsoft Bing, Yandex, Seznam.cz, Naver and Yep; the current list is published at indexnow.org. Google does not participate. Google said in 2021 that it would test the protocol, but it has not adopted it; for Google, keep using sitemaps and Search Console.
Submitting to any one participating endpoint is enough, because submissions are shared. The neutral endpoint is https://api.indexnow.org/indexnow.
Submitting one URL
The simplest form is a GET request:
https://api.indexnow.org/indexnow?url=https://example.com/new-page/&key=YOUR_KEYA 200 or 202 response means it was received. 202 means the key is still being validated.
Submitting in bulk
For more than a handful of URLs, POST JSON (up to 10,000 URLs per request, all on the same host):
POST /indexnow HTTP/1.1
Host: api.indexnow.org
Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
{
"host": "example.com",
"key": "YOUR_KEY",
"keyLocation": "https://example.com/YOUR_KEY.txt",
"urlList": [
"https://example.com/page-1/",
"https://example.com/page-2/"
]
}Common responses: 400 bad request, 403 key not valid (file missing or mismatched), 422 URLs do not belong to the host, 429 too many requests.
Setting it up
- WordPress: several SEO plugins and Microsoft’s own IndexNow plugin submit automatically on publish and update.
- Cloudflare: Crawler Hints can send IndexNow signals for cached content changes. Check what it is actually sending; in our experiment we found it worth verifying rather than assuming.
- Custom PHP: write the key file once, then call the endpoint from whatever code saves a page. Batch sitewide changes into POSTs of up to 10,000.
- Built for you: every site on AIWebBuilding pings IndexNow automatically when the owner publishes a change.
Rules that keep you out of trouble
- Submit only changed URLs. Re-submitting your whole sitemap daily is the fastest way to have submissions ignored.
- Submit only URLs that return 200 and are indexable (or 404/410 when you deleted them).
- Keep the key file in place forever. Engines re-check it.
- Respect 429s and back off.
- Do not expect it to override quality. IndexNow gets a URL looked at sooner; it does not decide whether the URL is indexed.
What 209,600 submissions taught us
We submitted aggressively during our own agent-readiness push: 209,600 IndexNow submissions against a sitemap of 28,685 URLs. Bing indexed 1,319 pages over the same period. The submissions were accepted; the indexing was rationed. With 16 referring domains at the time, the constraint was authority and page quality, not discovery. The full write-up is in the agent-readiness experiment.
The practical takeaway: IndexNow is the right tool for getting new and changed pages seen quickly. It is the wrong tool for forcing thin pages into an index. Fewer, stronger pages plus real links beat volume.
IndexNow and AI search
Microsoft Copilot is built on Bing, and Bing results have fed other assistants’ search features. So getting a changed page re-crawled by Bing quickly is a direct way to shorten the time before AI search sees the change. Pair it with the rest of the agent-readiness checklist, and use our sitemap guide for the engines that do not use IndexNow.
Related reading
Frequently asked questions
What is IndexNow?
IndexNow is an open protocol, launched in 2021 by Microsoft Bing and Yandex, that lets a website notify participating search engines immediately when a URL is added, updated or deleted.
Does Google support IndexNow?
No. Google has not adopted IndexNow. Use XML sitemaps and Google Search Console for Google.
Which search engines use IndexNow?
Participating engines include Microsoft Bing, Yandex, Seznam.cz, Naver and Yep. Submissions to one are shared with the others.
How many URLs can I submit at once?
Up to 10,000 URLs per POST request, all from the same host.
Does IndexNow guarantee indexing?
No. It tells engines a URL changed so they can crawl it sooner. Whether the page is indexed still depends on quality and authority.
Where does the IndexNow key file go?
Usually at the root of your site as
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