Bing Webmaster Tools
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Bing Webmaster Tools (BWT) is Microsoft’s equivalent of Google Search Console. It covers site verification, sitemap submission, crawl diagnostics, URL inspection, and search performance data for Bing. The case for setting it up extends beyond Bing’s own search share: the Bing index powers ChatGPT Search and Microsoft Copilot, and since February 2026, BWT includes a first-party AI citation measurement report, the first major search platform to offer one.1 Google followed in June 2026 with its own Search Generative AI Performance report, currently limited to UK sites and showing impressions data only.2
Access BWT at bing.com/webmasters and sign in with a Microsoft account.
Verification
Three verification methods are available:
XML meta tag: add a <meta name="msvalidate.01"> tag to the <head> of your homepage.
DNS record: add a CNAME record to your domain’s DNS configuration. Suitable for sites where modifying page markup is difficult.
Google Search Console import: if your site is already verified in GSC, BWT can import the verification automatically. This is the fastest path for sites already set up in Search Console and requires no code changes.
Once verified, all subdomains under the root domain are covered.
Sitemaps
Submit your sitemap through the Sitemaps section in BWT. Bing supports standard XML sitemaps and sitemap index files. Once submitted, BWT reports how many URLs it has discovered and indexed from the sitemap, and flags any URLs it could not access.
IndexNow
IndexNow is a protocol that lets you notify search engines immediately when a page is published or updated, rather than waiting for their crawlers to find it. A single call to api.indexnow.org propagates the URL to all participating engines simultaneously: Bing, Yandex, Naver, Seznam.cz, and Yep. Google has not adopted the protocol.3
To implement IndexNow, host a key file at /{your-key}.txt at the domain root, encoded in UTF-8, containing only the key value. Submissions return a 403 if the file is absent or does not match. Once the key is in place, you can submit URLs in two ways:
- Single URL: a GET request to
https://api.indexnow.org/indexnow?url={url}&key={key} - Bulk POST: up to 10,000 URLs per request, using a JSON body with
host,key,keyLocation, andurlListfields4
The BWT interface supports manual submission of up to 1,000 URLs per day. For high-volume sites or frequent updates, the API is the more practical route.
Plugins for Yoast, RankMath, and Cloudflare support IndexNow natively, handling key management and submission automatically.
IndexNow Insights: BWT includes a dedicated report showing which submitted URLs were indexed and how quickly, alongside an “Important URLs Missing” tab that surfaces newly discovered URLs receiving clicks but not yet submitted via IndexNow. This closes the feedback loop on whether submissions are working.5
IndexNow Insights showing "get started"?
If you are submitting to api.indexnow.org but the IndexNow tab in BWT still shows the "get started" prompt, try submitting directly to www.bing.com/indexnow instead. Submissions routed through the shared endpoint may not register in BWT immediately.
IndexNow is the most direct way to ensure new or updated content reaches the Bing index quickly, which matters for ChatGPT Search and Copilot citation as much as for Bing rankings.
URL Inspection
The URL Inspection tool shows the indexing status, HTTP response code, crawlability, and any blocked resources for a specific URL. It answers the core diagnostic question: does Bing see this page, and if not, why?
After updating a page and submitting it through URL Inspection, Bing typically recrawls it faster than through organic discovery. For high-priority pages, including the homepage, key landing pages, and recently updated reference content, requesting inspection after significant changes is worth the small effort.
Search Performance report
The Search Performance report shows impressions, clicks, click-through rate, and average position for Bing organic queries. Up to 16 months of historical data are available, which is useful for identifying seasonal patterns or tracking the impact of site changes over time.
The report filters by query, page, country, and device. A date-range comparison mode is also available, letting you measure the effect of a change by contrasting two periods directly. For Bing-specific diagnosis, such as identifying queries where Bing impressions are strong but rankings are lower than expected, this data is more useful than estimating from Google Search Console.
Crawl diagnostics
The Crawl Diagnostics section reports on pages Bing could not crawl or index, organised by error type. Common categories include DNS errors, connection timeouts, HTTP error codes, and robots.txt blocks. The report identifies which URLs are affected and the specific error preventing crawl.
BWT also includes a robots.txt tester, which confirms how your robots.txt configuration affects specific URLs. This is useful for verifying that important pages are not accidentally blocked before a change goes live.
SEO reports
BWT generates automated SEO audit reports roughly every two weeks, flagging issues at high, moderate, and low severity against SEO best practices. These are distinct from Crawl Diagnostics: where Crawl Diagnostics surfaces crawl and access errors, SEO Reports cover on-page and structural issues such as missing metadata, duplicate titles, or thin content.5
The Top Insights panel at the top of the BWT interface surfaces the highest-priority findings from these reports as a curated, prioritised list. It is the first thing visible on opening BWT and gives a quick view of the issues most likely to affect performance.
Site Explorer
Site Explorer shows your site’s structure as Bingbot sees it, browsable by subfolder and individual page. Each view shows a breakdown of indexed, erroring, warned, and excluded URLs, alongside six months of clicks and impressions and backlink counts for that section. It is the most practical tool in BWT for identifying crawl gaps at a folder level rather than diagnosing individual URLs one at a time.
Backlinks
The Backlinks report shows referring domains, referring pages, and anchor text for inbound links to your site. Unlike Google Search Console’s links report, BWT lets you query backlink data for any domain, not just your verified property, which makes it useful for competitive link research alongside your own site’s data.
Keyword research
BWT includes a built-in keyword research tool showing search volumes, related queries, and query trends specific to Bing. The data is Bing-native, reflecting Bing’s own query patterns rather than extrapolations from Google.
One practical use: Bing’s keyword data can surface query opportunities that are underserved on Google but have meaningful Bing-specific volume. Bing’s query distribution differs from Google’s: long-tail queries with low Google volume can have meaningful Bing-specific search volume, which the tool surfaces directly.
AI Performance report
Launched in February 2026 and currently in public preview, the AI Performance report tracks how your content is cited in AI-generated responses across Microsoft Copilot and Bing AI summaries.1
Total citations: the number of times your site was cited as a source in AI-generated answers during the selected period. This is the closest available equivalent to an AI visibility score.
Grounding queries: the internal queries that Copilot and Bing’s AI systems generated when retrieving your content. These are the reformulated search terms the AI used behind the scenes, not the user’s original question. They reveal which topics and framings your content is being used to answer.
Cited pages: which specific URLs are being cited and how citation activity changes over time.
Visibility trend: a timeline chart showing how citation volume has moved across the selected period.
Click-through data from AI citations is not yet included in the report. The AI Performance data is also not yet accessible via the BWT API; Microsoft has indicated both are on the development roadmap.
Access the AI Performance report via the left navigation in BWT. Data covers the last 30 days by default, with the option to adjust the date range.
Copilot assistant
BWT includes a built-in Copilot assistant for troubleshooting. It can explain crawl errors, surface indexing issues, suggest fixes, and help navigate the platform. For diagnosing why a specific page is not indexed or why crawl errors are persisting, the assistant provides useful starting points without requiring manual cross-referencing of documentation.
What’s coming
Microsoft previewed four additions to the AI Performance report at SEO Week in New York in April 2026. None have a confirmed release date.6
Citation Share: shows the percentage of AI citations your site captures for a specific grounding query, sitting alongside the raw citation counts already in the report. No equivalent metric exists in Google’s tools.
Grounding Query Intent: applies 15 predefined intent labels to grounding queries, making it easier to see what kind of question your content is answering in AI responses.
Grounding Query Topic labels: topic classification for grounding queries, complementing the intent labels.
GEO recommendations: actionable suggestions for improving AI citation visibility, with a focus on crawlability, indexing, canonicalisation, and structured data.
Setup checklist
- Sign in at bing.com/webmasters with a Microsoft account
- Add your site and verify ownership (use GSC import if available)
- Submit your XML sitemap
- Set up IndexNow and confirm submissions via the IndexNow Insights report
- Use URL Inspection to confirm priority pages are indexed
- Review Crawl Diagnostics for any blocked or erroring URLs
- Review Site Explorer to identify crawl gaps by subfolder
- Check the AI Performance report to establish a citation baseline
Footnotes
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Introducing AI Performance in Bing Webmaster Tools — Microsoft ↩ ↩2
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Search Generative AI Performance reports in Search Console — Google Search Central ↩
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Bing Webmaster Tools gains new IndexNow Insights and top SEO insights report — Search Engine Land ↩ ↩2
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Bing Webmaster Tools teases new AI reporting updates — Search Engine Land ↩