WordPress indexing plugins compared: IndexNow, Bing and Google options
A WordPress indexing plugin tells search engines when you publish, update or delete a page. As of October 2026 the main choices are Microsoft's IndexNow and Bing URL Submissions plugins, Rank Math's Instant Indexing for Google, and the IndexNow features inside Rank Math, Yoast SEO, All in One SEO and SEOPress. None of them can make Google index a page.
A page has to be indexed (in the search engine's index, the library it answers from) before it can show in search or in AI answers built on it, and a notice from your site can help Bing find changes sooner. This comparison covers what each plugin sends and to whom, wordpress.org figures checked on October 17, 2026, what each costs, the Google Indexing API problem, and how we chose.
How do the WordPress indexing plugins compare?
The table below compares seven plugins that submit URLs from WordPress, plus Site Kit by Google for context. Every figure comes from the wordpress.org plugin API, fetched on October 17, 2026. "wordpress.org rating" is the plugin's own star average on wordpress.org, not a score from us.
The current WordPress release is 7.1.3, according to the same API on October 17, 2026. The four SEO plugins and Site Kit are tested against it; Microsoft's two plugins are tested to 7.0.7, and Instant Indexing for Google to 6.6.10.
What each one costs for the submission feature, as of October 2026:
Plugin
Submission feature costs
Needs an account elsewhere?
IndexNow Plugin
Free
No
Bing URL Submissions
Free
Yes: a Bing Webmaster Tools API key
Instant Indexing for Google
Free plugin; Google's API has no fee
Yes: a Google Cloud service account
Rank Math SEO
Free
No
Yoast SEO
Premium, $118.80 a year excluding VAT
No
All in One SEO
Basic plan or higher
No
SEOPress
Free
No for IndexNow; Google credentials for the Indexing API
Which WordPress plugins send IndexNow?
Five plugins on this list send IndexNow: Microsoft's IndexNow Plugin and the IndexNow features in Rank Math, Yoast SEO, All in One SEO and SEOPress. Each notice is shared with every participating engine, so you need only one sender. Our guide to IndexNow on WordPress has setup steps, a feature table and a test procedure; below is who each one suits.
01
IndexNow Plugin (Microsoft)
What it does. Microsoft's plugin sends a URL to IndexNow when you publish, update or delete a post, with no Bing account: it "will automatically generate and host the API key on your site" (wordpress.org). Version 1.0.4 added noindex detection, which checks "the actual rendered HTML" for robots meta tags, plus X-Robots-Tag headers and WordPress's search engine visibility setting. It can exclude paths with wildcards and retry failed submissions.
Who it suits. Sites on Yoast SEO's free version or another SEO plugin without IndexNow, and anyone who wants IndexNow without an SEO suite.
Pricing. Free.
Limits. The WordPress dashboard shows only the last "20 successful and 20 failed" submissions. When we read version 1.0.4's code on October 17, 2026, we found that every save of a published post counts as an update and sends a ping. It's tested up to WordPress 7.0.7, and its wordpress.org rating is 3.2 from 47 ratings.
02
Rank Math SEO
What it does. Rank Math's free version includes IndexNow through its Instant Indexing module: "The IndexNow API submission is available in Rank Math Free out of the box" (Rank Math). You choose which post types to submit; it skips noindex URLs, sends deletions automatically, and keeps a History of response codes. Its readme says the module sends "a list of URLs, your site URL, and your IndexNow API key to api.indexnow.org each time content is published or updated (or manually triggered)."
Who it suits. Sites already on Rank Math. Turn the module on and don't add a second sender.
Pricing. IndexNow is free. Rank Math's paid plans add other SEO features.
Limits. Like any SEO-suite feature, it comes with the whole suite. Rank Math advises against running another SEO plugin alongside it.
03
Yoast SEO
What it does. Yoast SEO lists "IndexNow integration, so search engines hear about your updates the moment you publish" among its Premium highlights (wordpress.org). When it launched in 2022, Yoast said the feature was "activated by default" in Premium, with a single on/off setting (Yoast, June 28, 2022).
Who it suits. Sites that already pay for Yoast SEO Premium.
Pricing. Yoast's product page listed Premium at "$118.80 / year (ex VAT)" on October 17, 2026 (Yoast). On the free version, add Microsoft's plugin instead.
Limits. Yoast doesn't publish a submission log or noindex behavior for the feature that we could find.
04
All in One SEO
What it does. AIOSEO's IndexNow addon notifies participating engines when you publish or update content. You activate "the IndexNow addon in AIOSEO's Feature Manager", and AIOSEO generates and manages the key (AIOSEO).
Who it suits. Sites on a paid AIOSEO plan.
Pricing. AIOSEO says IndexNow "is available to all customers with a Basic plan or higher." Its pricing page showed Basic at "normally $99.00" a year, discounted to $49.50, on October 17, 2026.
Limits. Not in the free version. AIOSEO's suggested check is opening your key file URL; we found no published submission log.
05
SEOPress
What it does. SEOPress Free includes IndexNow under SEO → Instant Indexing, with automatic submission on publish or update and a manual form for up to 100 URLs. It serves the key through WordPress rather than a file on disk (SEOPress). The same screen can call Google's Indexing API.
Who it suits. Sites already on SEOPress.
Pricing. IndexNow is free. SEOPress PRO is listed "from $49/year for 1 site" on its wordpress.org page as of October 2026.
Limits. Deleted URLs are sent manually, per its guide. Its Google option carries the same scope limit as Instant Indexing for Google, below.
Which WordPress plugins use other submission APIs?
Two plugins on this list don't use IndexNow: Microsoft's Bing URL Submissions plugin, which calls Bing's own API, and Rank Math's Instant Indexing for Google, which calls Google's Indexing API.
06
Bing URL Submissions Plugin (Microsoft)
What it does. It submits new and updated URLs to Bing only, through Bing's URL Submission API. You need a site verified in Bing Webmaster Tools and an API key from "Settings > API Access > API Key" there (wordpress.org).
Who it suits. Few new sites. Its own listing recommends IndexNow too, and Bing's help says URL and Content Submission "may be deprecated in the future as IndexNow adoption expands" (Bing Webmaster Tools help). Bing's API allows "up to 10,000 URLs per domain per day."
Pricing. Free.
Limits. Bing only, no multisite support ("This plugin currently does not support WordPress multisite feature"), and a wordpress.org rating of 3.3 from 21 ratings.
07
Instant Indexing for Google (Rank Math)
What it does. It sends a crawl request to Google's Indexing API when you publish or update, with bulk submission of up to 100 URLs. Its changelog for version 1.1.22 also lists a fix for "the API Key in the IndexNow settings."
The scope problem. Google says the Indexing API "can only be used to crawl pages with either JobPosting or BroadcastEvent embedded in a VideoObject" (Google Search Central). The plugin's own listing agrees: "Google recommends that you use the Indexing API ONLY for Job Posting and Live Streaming websites" (wordpress.org). Google also warns that "Any attempts to abuse the Indexing API, including the use of multiple accounts or other means to exceed usage quotas, may result in access being revoked." Our Google Indexing API guide explains the rules.
Who it suits. Job boards and sites publishing livestream pages.
Pricing. Free. Google's default quota is 200 publish requests a day per project (Google).
Is there a WordPress plugin that submits pages to Google?
No WordPress plugin can submit ordinary pages to Google's index. Google lists two routes: the URL Inspection tool for "just a few URLs", and a sitemap for "many URLs at once" (Google Search Central). Our guide to submitting a URL to Google covers both, and our WordPress sitemap guide shows which sitemap URL your site serves.
Site Kit by Google is the closest thing to a Google plugin, but it doesn't submit URLs. Google's verification help says "Site Kit for WordPress can handle verification for you" and that it "is the only plugin that is officially sponsored by Google" (Search Console Help). It then shows Search Console data inside WordPress.
Choose based on the SEO plugin you already run, and use only one IndexNow sender:
Your setup
A sensible choice
Rank Math or SEOPress
Turn on its built-in IndexNow
Yoast SEO Premium or a paid AIOSEO plan
Use the built-in IndexNow
Yoast SEO free, AIOSEO's free version or no SEO plugin
Microsoft's IndexNow Plugin
Site on Cloudflare
Cloudflare Crawler Hints, or one plugin, not both
Job board or livestream site
Google's Indexing API, through Instant Indexing for Google or SEOPress
You want Google to find pages sooner
A working sitemap in Search Console; plugins can't do this part
For the full set of WordPress settings, sitemaps and Search Console steps, start at our WordPress indexing hub.
How we chose these plugins
We included plugins on wordpress.org that send URLs from WordPress to a search engine's submission endpoint (IndexNow, Bing's URL Submission API or Google's Indexing API), plus Site Kit because readers often expect it to do this. We pulled installs, ratings, tested-up-to versions and update dates from the wordpress.org plugin API on October 17, 2026, with this command for each slug:
The API reports ratings out of 100; we divided by 20 to match the star average wordpress.org shows. Feature and pricing facts come from each vendor's own pages, linked above.
What we left out:
Our own plugin, because it isn't released.
Smaller IndexNow plugins on wordpress.org, which we haven't reviewed yet.
SEO plugins whose listings don't mention URL submission.
We don't rate plugins ourselves, and nothing here is ranked. Microsoft's IndexNow plugin is compared with FreshlyCited on its own page: FreshlyCited vs the IndexNow plugin.
Where FreshlyCited fits
FreshlyCited is a web app, not a WordPress plugin. It checks whether Google has indexed each URL ("Seen by Google" or "Invisible") and pushes only the invisible ones. It re-checks each pushed link on days 1, 3 and 7, and an index credit you reserved comes back automatically if the link still isn't indexed after the day-7 re-check (exclusions apply, such as pages that return an error or carry noindex). For sites you verify with an IndexNow key, pushes also go out through IndexNow ("Sent to Bing"), free, with a per-site off switch, so you can leave IndexNow to your WordPress plugin if you prefer. Nobody can guarantee Google indexes a page.
Using one of these plugins already? Check your WordPress pages free: 10 free links to try, then 100 free checks a month, no card needed.
Rakesh Patel founded Space-O Technologies in 2010 and leads it as CEO, with 25 years of leadership experience; he has overseen the delivery of more than 3,000 mobile app projects. He is also the founder of TextBolt, a business email-to-SMS service, and the author of "Enterprise Mobility Strategy and Solutions" and "A Guide to Open311". Space-O built FreshlyCited to solve the "shipped but not seen" problem on its own and its clients' sites: pages and links that are live but that Google hasn't looked at yet.
Founded Space-O Technologies in 2010 · 25 years of leadership experience · author of 'Enterprise Mobility Strategy and Solutions' and 'A Guide to Open311'
Written for FreshlyCited, which helps Google and Bing find new and updated pages sooner. About FreshlyCited
Is there a WordPress plugin that gets pages indexed by Google instantly?
No. Google doesn't use IndexNow, and its Indexing API is limited to job and livestream pages. For Google, use your sitemap, internal links and Search Console.
Do I need a separate IndexNow plugin if I use Rank Math or SEOPress?
No. Both include IndexNow in their free versions. Adding Microsoft's plugin as well would send every URL twice.
Which plugin has the most active installs?
Of the plugins listed, Yoast SEO reports 10,000,000+ active installs on wordpress.org as of October 2026, but its IndexNow integration is a Premium feature.
