RSS/Atom Feeds for AI

RSS and Atom feeds provide a structured, machine-readable way for AI systems to discover and track your content updates without crawling your entire site.

In this guide

Why feeds matter for AI discovery
RSS vs Atom format comparison
Feed optimization best practices
Full-content vs summary feeds

10 min read Prerequisite: Performance

Why Feeds Matter for AI

Feeds provide AI systems with several advantages over traditional crawling:

Efficient Updates

AI can check a single feed file instead of re-crawling hundreds of pages to find new content.

Structured Data

Feeds provide clean metadata (titles, dates, authors) that AI can parse reliably.

Chronological Order

Clear publication dates help AI understand content freshness and relevance.

RSS vs Atom

Feature	RSS 2.0	Atom
Adoption	More common	IETF standard
Required fields	Minimal	More structured
Content types	Text or HTML	Text, HTML, XHTML
Author info	Optional	Required per entry

Both formats work well for AI. RSS is simpler; Atom is more rigorous. Choose based on your tooling.

RSS 2.0 Example

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rss version="2.0">
  <channel>
    <title>Acme Corp Blog</title>
    <link>https://acme.com/blog</link>
    <description>Product updates and industry insights</description>
    <language>en-us</language>
    <lastBuildDate>Mon, 20 Jan 2025 14:00:00 GMT</lastBuildDate>

    <item>
      <title>Introducing CRM Automation</title>
      <link>https://acme.com/blog/crm-automation</link>
      <description>Full article content here...</description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 20 Jan 2025 14:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <guid>https://acme.com/blog/crm-automation</guid>
      <author>[email protected] (Jane Smith)</author>
      <category>Product</category>
    </item>
  </channel>
</rss>

Atom Example

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<feed xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom">
  <title>Acme Corp Blog</title>
  <link href="https://acme.com/blog" />
  <link href="https://acme.com/feed.xml" rel="self" />
  <id>https://acme.com/blog</id>
  <updated>2025-01-20T14:00:00Z</updated>

  <entry>
    <title>Introducing CRM Automation</title>
    <link href="https://acme.com/blog/crm-automation" />
    <id>https://acme.com/blog/crm-automation</id>
    <updated>2025-01-20T14:00:00Z</updated>
    <published>2025-01-20T14:00:00Z</published>
    <author>
      <name>Jane Smith</name>
    </author>
    <content type="html">
      <![CDATA[Full article content here...]]>
    </content>
  </entry>
</feed>

Best Practices

Include Full Content

For AI training and retrieval, full-content feeds are more valuable than summaries. AI can extract information directly from your feed without needing to crawl each page.

Use Accurate Timestamps

Always include pubDate (RSS) or published/updated (Atom) with accurate timestamps. This helps AI understand content freshness.

Include Author Information

Author details help AI understand content provenance and authority. Include names and optionally links to author profiles.

Link to Your Feed

Make your feed discoverable via HTML link tags:

<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="Blog Feed" href="/feed.xml" />

Multiple Feeds

Consider offering multiple feeds for different content types:

/feed.xml             # All content
/blog/feed.xml        # Blog posts only
/products/feed.xml    # Product updates
/changelog/feed.xml   # Release notes

Feed Size and Pagination

Guidelines

✓ Include 20-50 recent items in the main feed
✓ Provide archive feeds for historical content
✓ Use RFC 5005 for paginated feeds if needed
✓ Keep feed file size under 1MB for efficiency

Key Takeaway

Feeds are efficient content delivery for AI.

A well-structured RSS or Atom feed lets AI systems track your updates efficiently without constant crawling. Include full content and accurate metadata for maximum value.

Sources

RSS 2.0 Specification: Official RSS Advisory Board specification
RFC 4287: Atom Syndication Format: IETF Atom specification
RFC 5005: Feed Paging and Archiving: IETF specification for paginated feeds