| XML sitemap | HTML sitemap |
| XML sitemaps are for search engines | HTML sitemaps are for humans |
| A structured text file containing URLs of pages of a website for web crawlers | Webpage containing links facilitating user navigation on a website |
| Never displayed to users | Displayed in webbrowser |
| Read by webcrawlers only | Visited by users and web crawlers |
| Used for faster page indexing and avoiding content duplication | Used for better website navigation, interlinking opportunities and improved crawling |
Google prefers XML sitemaps