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RSS feeds

RSS feeds let visitors subscribe to your content in their preferred reader (Feedly, Inoreader, NetNewsWire, etc.) and get notified of new posts without visiting the site. The flexweg-rss plugin generates them automatically.

This page covers the visitor-facing aspect. For configuration, see the flexweg-rss plugin reference.

What gets published​

When the plugin is enabled with default settings:

  • /rss.xml — site-wide feed: 20 most recent online posts across all categories
  • /<category-slug>/<category-slug>.xml — per-category feed: 20 most recent online posts in that category (one file per configured category)

Per-category feeds use a doubled slug (/news/news.xml, not /news/index.xml) so the file doesn't collide with the category archive page at /news/index.html.

What an RSS feed looks like​

rss.xml:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" href="https://example.com/rss.xml.xsl"?>
<rss version="2.0">
  <channel>
    <title>Example Site</title>
    <link>https://example.com</link>
    <description>The site description.</description>
    <language>en</language>
    <lastBuildDate>Wed, 15 Apr 2026 08:30:00 GMT</lastBuildDate>

    <item>
      <title>Launch announcement</title>
      <link>https://example.com/news/launch-announcement.html</link>
      <guid isPermaLink="true">https://example.com/news/launch-announcement.html</guid>
      <description>The first 300 characters of the post, plain text…</description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 15 Apr 2026 08:30:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <author>[email protected] (Jane Smith)</author>
      <enclosure url="https://example.com/media/2026/04/launch-1a2b3c/large.webp"
                 type="image/webp" length="0" />
    </item>
    …
  </channel>
</rss>

The <?xml-stylesheet?> PI transforms the feed into a styled HTML table when opened directly in a browser. Try it: https://your-site.com/rss.xml in any browser.

How visitors discover feeds​

Most browsers no longer auto-discover RSS feeds — Chrome and Firefox dropped the orange RSS button years ago. So visitors usually need a visible link.

The flexweg-rss plugin can append an RSS entry to your footer menu automatically. In the plugin settings, toggle Add to footer on for each feed you want surfaced. The footer of every published page then shows:

… Privacy · Terms · RSS

Or for category feeds:

… RSS — Tech · RSS — News

For more visible placement (e.g. an RSS icon in the header), edit your theme template directly — feed URLs are predictable so you can hard-code them.

Feedly​

  1. Click the + button in Feedly
  2. Paste https://your-site.com/rss.xml (or a category-specific feed URL)
  3. Click Follow

Inoreader / NetNewsWire / The Old Reader​

Same flow — paste the feed URL into the "Add subscription" box.

Email digests​

Services like Blogtrottr or Kill the Newsletter convert RSS feeds into email — useful for visitors who don't use a reader.

Items sort order​

Items in feeds are sorted newest first by publishedAt, with updatedAt and createdAt as fallbacks. So a republished post (e.g. status changed from draft → online) bumps to the top of the feed at its publishedAt.

Image enclosures​

When a post has a heroImage, the feed includes an <enclosure> element pointing at the large variant of the image. Most readers display this as a thumbnail next to the post title.

Read counts​

RSS doesn't include analytics. Tools like FeedPress or Feedburner can proxy your feed and provide subscriber counts — but they require redirecting your feed URL through their service, which adds operational complexity. For most static-site setups, just don't bother.

Continue​