Sometime back i wrote about How to reduce WordPress server load on Shared Hosting and there i talked about Google XML sitemap Generator plugin can be one of the main culprits behind your High server/ CPU load on your shared hosting. In this post i will talk about few things about the same plugin and how to configure some of its settings so that it uses less CPU or memory on shared hosting.
I am assuming here that you already have installed the plugin and have some issues with your CPU/Server load on shared hosting. You should change the default options only when you know what you are doing. Some of the configuration changes as described below surely will help you reduce your server load and run your blog smoothly.
1. BASIC OPTIONS CONFIGURATION
Under Basic options, you can untick the option of ” Rebuild sitemap if you change the content of the blog “. This small change in setting will help you reduce server load as the sitemap wont be generated everytime you write a new post. You can generate sitemap manually if you have issues with your server.
2. ADVANCE OPTIONS SETTINGS
You can limit the number of posts to be included in sitemap to 5 or 10. It will help you reduce server load with no problems with your sitemap as it will be uptodate.
The reason as talked about in the plugin FAQ too :
If you have problems with the maximum execution time or memory limit you can limit the number of posts which will be included in the sitemap. Newer posts are included first so your sitemap will stay up-to-date.
3. BUILD SITEMAP IN BACKGROUND.
Make sure that the option of ” build sitemap in background” is ticked ON. Its a must if you are on a shared server.
Hope these settings will help you reduce the server load and make your blog run smooth. If you applied all the settings as described above, then may be you will need to build sitemaps manually each time by navigating to Plugin settings page but i don’t think that’s a big issue.
{ 11 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Avinash,
Thanks so much for this guide – I'll make some changes to my configuration now.
I guess I will NOT use tip 1 because then I'd have to manually update the sitemap regularly.
Tip 2 sounds very useful – as only 1 post is added each day (or less), I will limit the posts to 2, and that should mean that the new post is included, but the whole sitemap isn't rebuilt.
*mang.
Welcome mate. Glad I could help you.
Wow! Thanks for the tips. Just so happens I was doing some “plugin cleanup” today and was wondering what to do with this one. Have been getting some CPU throttling alerts, so I will see how it turns out. Thanks again!
Cool thanks
Hi avinash,
my blog is facing lot of server issues even after installing wp super cache ..
just saw xml site map plugin & it was taking 16mb+ load on memory ..applied setting show here
Thanks Avinash .. for this post ..
Thanks for this. I’m applying your suggestions now and until I can afford a dedicated server for my site, I hope this will keep my shared hosting company happy
Thanks I’ll give these tips a try. I also like to use a Plug-in called WP-Memory Usage to monitor my memory usage on Wordpress.
Great tips for this, I can see the pages run a little faster already!
@Charles, Glad it helped you.
Bạn ơi ! cho mình hỏi điều này với ! sitemap của mình hiện giờ đã hơn 50000 url nên google thông báo là quá tải nên báo lỗi trông Webmaster tool. mình đang dùng wp ko biết có cách nào có thể giải quyết nó không nhỉ ! cảm ơn
Translated
My friend! I asked for this to! my sitemap now has more than 50,000 notices url so google is overloaded so the error looks Webmaster tool. I’m using wp not know how can solve it baby! thanks
Wanted to add you don’t need to Write a normal XML file (your filename) if you don’t use it in your site, meaning users can click on the sitemap link to see it.
What’s the difference between the “sitemap.xml” and “sitemap.xml.gz” files?
The “sitemap.xml.gz” is a compressed version of the “sitemap.xml” file. It has the same content, but is significantly smaller than the other one. This helps you and the search engines to save a lot of traffic. Since all search engines support compressed sitemaps, you actually don’t need the “sitemap.xml”, but maybe you or your visitors want to view them from time to time so keeping it doesn’t hurt.
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