Sitemap Checker.
Sitemap Checker watches any XML sitemap you point it at, whether it's a competitor's blog, a resource hub, or a product catalog, and flags every genuinely new page on the schedule you set, as tight as hourly. It runs entirely inside a Google Sheet on Google Apps Script, free to run and nothing to install.
Get the Google Sheet →Why it's useful
Know when competitors publish, not when you happen to check
Instead of manually revisiting a competitor's blog or resource section to see what's new, the sheet checks their sitemap on the schedule you set and flags a new URL at the next check, rather than whenever you happen to remember to look.
Only brand-new URLs, never noise
A page that gets edited, re-optimized or re-published doesn't trigger anything. The log only grows when a URL the sitemap has never listed before shows up, so you're never chasing updates to pages you've already seen, only genuinely new content.
Runs on Apps Script, nothing to buy
No API key, no third-party crawler subscription, no server to maintain. The whole tool lives inside a Google Sheet and runs on Apps Script's own built-in services, not a paid Google API. It's free on any Google account, personal or Workspace.
Also works pointed at your own site
It isn't only for watching competitors. If you run marketing for a company, or manage several client sites as a freelancer, point it at your own sitemap or a client's and get the same alert when your team publishes. No more finding out a week later that an article went live or a campaign already started without you.
How it works
- On the Dashboard tab, list the sitemap URLs you want watched and the email addresses that should get alerted.
- Run the one-time setup from the sheet's menu to authorize the script and start its recurring check (every 24 hours by default, adjustable down to hourly).
- On each run, it walks every sitemap, following nested sitemap index files where they exist, and compares every URL against everything it has seen before.
- Any URL it hasn't seen before gets logged to a dedicated "New URLs" tab with a timestamp and the sitemap it came from, and a personalized email goes out to every recipient listing just what's new, with a link straight back to the sheet.
The first run only builds its baseline of what already exists, so it won't flood your inbox by treating a competitor's entire back catalog as "new." Alerts start from the second check onward, once there's something to actually compare against.
What's inside the sheet
| Tab | What it's for |
|---|---|
| Dashboard | Your sitemap list, your recipient list, the check interval, plus a live status readout: last run time and total known URL count. |
| New URLs | An append-only log: date, sitemap it came from, and the new URL itself. |
| How to Use | Setup steps, written directly into the sheet. |
| (hidden) Data storage | Keeps track of every URL and sitemap already seen, so the comparison on each run is against everything you've ever checked, not just the last one. |
Setup
- Get the sheet and make your own copy of it in Google Sheets.
- Replace the example sitemap URL and email address with your own.
- Set your check interval, then run the setup menu item once to authorize and start it.
- Leave it running: new URLs land in the sheet and your inbox on their own from here.
Privacy & security
The script is scoped to the sheet it's copied into and asks for nothing beyond that. It fetches the sitemap URLs you give it and sends email through Apps Script's own built-in services, not a separate Google API. There's no external server in between, nothing routes through a third party, and nothing leaves Google's infrastructure. It's free on any Google account, though the daily limit on how much it can fetch and send is lower on a personal Gmail account than on a paid Google Workspace one, worth knowing if you're watching many sitemaps or alerting a large team.