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Let’s be honest, thinking about how to submit your website to Bing search engine probably isn't at the top of your to-do list. But what if I told you that by ignoring Bing, you’re leaving a huge, untapped audience—and potential revenue—on the table?
It’s true. Forgetting about Bing is a strategic mistake that limits your reach and cuts you off from some seriously valuable traffic.
While Google gets all the glory, savvy marketers know that writing off Bing is a rookie move. This tunnel vision ignores a massive, and often more engaged, user base that could be searching for exactly what you sell. If you want to expand your digital footprint, you have to look beyond the obvious. Bing represents a powerful, and often less crowded, channel for real growth.
Getting your site indexed on Bing isn’t just a box to check; it’s a smart business decision. Bing is baked into the entire Microsoft ecosystem, serving as the default search engine for Windows, the Cortana voice assistant, and even the Xbox gaming console. This puts your website right in front of millions of users who don’t even think about changing their search engine—they just use the one that’s there.
It’s not just about more traffic; it’s about attracting the right kind of traffic. The audience on Bing has some unique traits that make them incredibly valuable.
By focusing only on Google, you're essentially telling a large segment of the market that you don't exist. Submitting your website to Bing is one of the lowest-effort, highest-impact actions you can take to diversify your traffic sources.
While Bing's global market share might seem small at around 4%, its influence in specific markets is anything but.
Take the U.S. desktop search market, for example. Bing's share jumps to an impressive 28.85%. A huge chunk of that comes from its default status on Microsoft products, including the Xbox console, where it handles nearly 38.46% of all searches.
Even more interesting, data shows that 48% of Bing users in the U.S. are in the top quarter of household incomes. That's a demographic most businesses would kill for. If you want to dig into the numbers yourself, you can find more about Bing's market share and user demographics on meetanshi.com.
This isn't about ditching your Google SEO strategy. It’s about making it stronger by building a more resilient and diversified online presence.
Alright, let's get you set up. The first stop is Bing Webmaster Tools (BWT), and it's basically your direct line to the search engine. Think of it as the control panel for your website's life on Bing. This is where you'll see what's working, fix what's broken, and tell Bing about new content.
But before you can do any of that, you have to prove you actually own the site. It’s a quick security check to make sure nobody else can mess with your data.
Honestly, the fastest way to get verified is to just import your site from Google Search Console (GSC). If you're already set up over there, Bing can use that existing connection to verify you in a couple of clicks. I always recommend this route if you're already managing your site's SEO on Google.
Why is this the best method?
Just sign into BWT with the same Google account you use for Search Console. Bing will automatically spot your verified sites and ask which one you want to add. It’s a clean, simple process that just works.
Not using Google Search Console? No problem. Bing has a few other solid ways to get you verified manually. The two most common options you'll see are the HTML Meta Tag and the XML File.
The HTML Meta Tag method is super common. Bing gives you a unique line of code, and you just paste it into the <head> section of your website’s homepage. If you're using WordPress, most SEO plugins (like Yoast or Rank Math) have a specific field for this. It's a simple copy-and-paste job.
The XML File method is a bit different. Bing has you download a special verification file, which you then upload to the main (or "root") folder of your website. This is a great choice if you have FTP access to your server and would rather not touch your site's theme code directly.
After you've placed the tag or uploaded the file, just pop back over to Bing Webmaster Tools and hit the 'Verify' button. Bing will scan your site for the proof, and once it finds it, you’re in.
Getting this verification done is the essential first step before you can officially submit your website to Bing search engine and start getting some real visibility. And if you want to see how this fits into the bigger picture, our guide on how to submit a website to all major search engines offers some great context.
Alright, once you're verified in Bing Webmaster Tools, it's time for the main event: telling Bing which pages on your site actually matter. You have two primary ways to do this inside the dashboard—submitting a full sitemap or submitting individual URLs one by one.
Knowing which tool to grab for which job is what separates a reactive SEO from a proactive one.
Think of it this way: your sitemap is the complete architectural blueprint of your website. You hand it over so Bing’s crawlers can see the whole structure, understand how pages connect, and discover everything efficiently. An individual URL submission, on the other hand, is like sending a high-priority text message that says, "Hey, look at this specific page right now."
This flowchart breaks down the first few steps to get your site ready, showing you how to get the foundation right in Bing Webmaster Tools before you start pushing content.
As you can see, submitting an XML sitemap is a critical first step after verification. It really sets the stage for comprehensive, site-wide indexing.
If you're working with a brand new website or one that’s never been introduced to Bing, your first move should always be to submit an XML sitemap. This file is just a list of every important URL you want search engines to find, giving them a clear roadmap to your content.
Honestly, it’s the most efficient way to get your entire site on Bing's radar in one shot.
Most modern CMS platforms, like WordPress with a good SEO plugin, automatically generate and update this file for you. You can usually find it by adding /sitemap.xml to the end of your domain. Got the URL? The rest is easy.
Bing will queue it up for processing. This single action tells Bing to crawl all the pages you've listed—a huge advantage compared to just waiting for its bots to discover your site organically. It ensures every blog post, product page, and service page you care about is known.
A sitemap doesn’t just help with initial discovery. It also gives Bing metadata like when a page was last updated, which can influence how often it gets crawled in the future.
While the sitemap is your tool for broad coverage, the URL Submission tool is all about speed and precision. This feature lets you send a specific list of URLs directly to Bing for immediate crawling consideration. You get a quota of up to 10,000 URLs per day, which is more than enough for targeted, time-sensitive updates.
So, when would you use this instead of the sitemap?
This tool is your fast-pass for high-priority pages. Instead of waiting for Bing to get around to re-crawling your sitemap, you’re basically jumping to the front of the line. It's a key part of any active strategy to submit your website to Bing search engine and keep your content fresh in the index.
For a deeper dive into more advanced tactics, check out our guide on free website submission techniques.
Deciding between a sitemap and a single URL submission really comes down to what you're trying to achieve. One is for comprehensive coverage, the other for surgical speed. This table breaks down the key differences to help you choose the right tool for the job.
MethodBest ForFrequencyEffort LevelSitemap SubmissionNew websites, major site redesigns, and ensuring full site coverage.Once initially, then it updates automatically or you resubmit after major changes.LowIndividual URL SubmissionNew blog posts, updated key pages, time-sensitive content, and new product launches.As needed, up to 10,000 URLs per day.Medium
Ultimately, a smart SEO strategy uses both. You'll rely on your sitemap for baseline indexing and turn to the URL Submission tool for those high-priority moments when you can't afford to wait.
Manual submissions are powerful, but what if you could notify Bing the very second you publish or update a page? That’s the magic of IndexNow. It's a modern protocol that acts like a direct hotline to Bing, letting you ping the search engine instantly whenever your content changes.
This completely flips the script on traditional indexing. Instead of waiting for Bingbot to re-crawl your sitemap or stumble upon your new URL, you’re proactively pushing that information straight to them. The result? A massive reduction in the time it takes for your new content to show up in search results.
So, why is this such a big deal? The advantages go way beyond just speed. Adopting IndexNow has tangible benefits for both your SEO performance and your server's health.
This approach is perfect for websites with dynamic content. An e-commerce store with constantly changing inventory or a publisher releasing multiple articles a day can use IndexNow to make sure Bing always has the most current version of their pages.
Setting up IndexNow is a straightforward, one-time process. It all starts with generating a unique API key from inside your Bing Webmaster Tools account.
This key acts as your secure password, proving to Bing that any submission requests are legitimately coming from your website.
Here’s how to grab your key:
Bing will give you a unique alphanumeric key. You'll need to save this and host it in a text file at the root of your domain. This simple step verifies your ownership and authorizes your site to use the protocol.
Key Takeaway: The IndexNow API key is the bridge between your website and Bing's indexing system. Keep it secure and make sure the verification file is accessible on your server for the connection to work properly.
Once that's done, you can start sending URLs. Many modern SEO plugins for platforms like WordPress (such as Rank Math or All in One SEO) have built-in IndexNow integrations. You just paste your generated API key into the plugin's settings, and it handles the rest. Every time you publish or update a post, the plugin automatically pings Bing for you.
For those who want to get into the weeds of this tech, our comprehensive guide on everything you need to know about IndexNow breaks down the protocol and its benefits even further. Implementing IndexNow is a forward-thinking way to submit your website to Bing search engine, giving you a distinct competitive edge.
So you’ve followed all the steps. You’ve submitted your site to Bing, maybe even pinged a few URLs with IndexNow, and you come back a week later to… nothing. Your most important pages are still invisible in the search results.
It's a frustrating but common scenario, and thankfully, it's almost always fixable.
More often than not, the problem isn't some deep, complex SEO mystery. It’s usually a simple misconfiguration or a technical detail hiding in plain sight. Before you start pulling your hair out, let's run through the usual suspects.
One of the first places things can go wrong is verification. If Bing can't confirm you actually own the website, it won't even look at your sitemap, let alone index your pages. This often happens when the verification meta tag gets stuck in the wrong part of your HTML code. Another classic cause is a caching plugin serving an old, pre-verification version of your homepage to Bing’s crawler.
Then there are the sitemap headaches. You might see its status stuck on "Processing" forever or, worse, flagged with errors. This almost always boils down to one of two things:
robots.txt file and make sure you don’t have a Disallow rule pointing at your sitemap.xml file.Your best friends for troubleshooting are right inside Bing Webmaster Tools. Use the URL Inspection tool to see exactly why a specific page isn't being indexed. For a broader view, the Site Scan tool gives you a high-level audit that flags common SEO issues across your entire site.
Okay, so your site is verified and your sitemap is clean, but your brand-new blog post is still a ghost. Time to put on your detective hat. The culprit is almost always a sneaky directive telling search engines to stay away.
First, check the page's HTML <head> section for a noindex tag. This is a direct command telling search engines not to add the page to their index. It's incredibly easy to add one by mistake, especially if you're using a CMS where it's just a checkbox in the page settings.
If there’s no noindex tag, the next place to look is the canonical tag. A misconfigured canonical might be pointing to a completely different URL, which tells Bing that another page is the "master" version and this one is just a duplicate that should be ignored.
For a deeper dive into these kinds of frustrating roadblocks, our guide on fixing common website indexing issues can help you pinpoint the exact problem.
Let's dig into some of the most common questions that come up when people start thinking about how to submit your website to Bing search engine. Getting these sorted out clears up the confusion and helps you move forward without second-guessing your strategy.
This is the big one, and the honest answer is: it really depends on the method you choose.
If you just sit back and wait for Bing to find your site on its own, you could be waiting for weeks. But if you take a few minutes to proactively submit a sitemap in Bing Webmaster Tools, you'll often see your pages indexed within a few hours to a couple of days.
For the absolute fastest results, though, IndexNow is the hands-down winner. Using its API can get a brand new or updated page into Bing's index in a matter of minutes.
I strongly recommend against just waiting for the crawlers to show up. Manual submission gives you control, access to Bing’s fantastic tools, and a much quicker path to visibility. Don't leave your traffic to chance.
Yes, you absolutely do. While it's true that Bing might eventually stumble upon your site through backlinks from other sites it has already indexed, there's simply no guarantee when—or even if—that will happen.
Submitting your site directly is the only reliable way to let Bing know you exist and to dramatically speed up the indexing process.
Beyond that, creating a Bing Webmaster Tools account unlocks a goldmine of specific data and diagnostic tools you can't get anywhere else. This information is completely different from what you see in Google Search Console and offers unique insights into how your site performs for the Bing audience.
Definitely. This is where modern SEO tools really shine and can save you a ton of time.
The best way to automate this process is by using the IndexNow API. Most popular SEO plugins for platforms like WordPress already have built-in integrations for it.
Once you’ve configured the plugin with your unique API key, it will automatically ping Bing every time you publish new content or update an old page. It’s a true "set it and forget it" solution that takes all the manual work off your plate.
After you have everything indexed, the next step is to track your performance. You can learn more about how to do that by checking out our guide on finding the right Bing rank checker for your needs.
Ready to stop manually submitting URLs and automate your entire indexing workflow? IndexPilot combines AI content creation with automated indexing to get your pages discovered and ranked in hours, not weeks. Get started with IndexPilot today.