Glossary
What is IndexNow?
IndexNow is an open protocol that lets a website notify participating search engines, such as Bing and Yandex, the moment a URL is added, updated or deleted, instead of waiting for them to crawl the site.
How it works
Microsoft Bing and Yandex launched IndexNow in October 2021. A site generates a key, places it in a text file at its root to prove ownership, and then sends a simple request listing changed URLs. A notice sent to one participating search engine is shared with the others.
Search engines that support it include Bing, Yandex, Seznam, Naver and Yep. Google does not use IndexNow; for Google, the sitemap with accurate last-modified dates and Search Console remain the way to signal changes.
Why it matters for B2B websites
Bing matters beyond its own search results. Microsoft Copilot is grounded in Bing’s index, and other AI search products have used Bing’s data. Getting new and changed pages into Bing quickly helps them show up in those answers sooner.
It is most useful after launches, migrations and content updates, when many URLs change at once and waiting for a crawler can take days or weeks.
Good practice
- Send only URLs that actually changed, not the whole site every day
- Include deleted and redirected URLs, so they are dropped faster
- Keep the key file in place permanently
- Automate it in the publishing or deployment step
- Keep the XML sitemap accurate for search engines that do not use IndexNow
Example
After a site migration, the new URLs and the old redirected ones are submitted through IndexNow in one batch. Bing and the other participating engines can pick up the change without waiting for their next scheduled crawl.
How we handle it
pentaclay.com hosts an IndexNow key and submits changed pages after production deploys. We set up the same for client sites where the platform allows it, as part of migrations and AI search optimization.
Last updated 15 November 2026
