Lighthouse - Inbox Zero for RSS Feeds

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. It's an XML-based format, and you could think of it as a standardized, structured representation of a website's published content. Usually publishers, e.g. blogs and news sites, create them to distribute content and provide easy access to the latest posts in a machine-readable format.

How it works

At its core, an RSS feed is an XML file located at a specific URL. Software designed to process RSS feeds regularly visits the URL to get the latest version of the feed, and then compares it against a previously fetched version. If the the file has changed, it identifies which items are new or updated.

Specifically, the software looks for items that it hasn't seen before, usually by checking ids and publication dates. When a new item is identified, it can be processed further or presented directly to the user.

Example

Below is an example of an RSS file from the Astro blog. Usually it has a lot more items, but here only one is included so this article doesn’t get too long.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rss version="2.0">
  <channel>
    <title>The Astro Blog</title>
    <description>News and updates about Astro.</description>
    <link>https://astro.build/</link>
    <item>
      <title>Astro 5.5</title>
      <link>https://astro.build/blog/astro-550/</link>
      <guid isPermaLink="true">https://astro.build/blog/astro-550/</guid>
      <description>Astro 5.5 dives deep with better support for diagramming tools, improved Markdown compatibility, and type-safe sessions!</description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 13 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
    </item>
  </channel>
</rss>

RSS feed readers

The most common use-case for RSS are feed readers. With them users can subscribe to feeds, and whenever new items are added they’re displayed in the product. Since a user can subscribe to as many feeds as they like, feed readers act as a content aggregator for the user.

The above is a screenshot of the Lighthouse Subscribe page, where you can add new RSS feeds. It shows the feed URL, lets you assign a name and tags, and shows a preview of the latest posts.

Below is an example of the Inbox, where newly published content is listed.

Use cases of RSS feed readers

Following blogs and news

By far the most common use case for feed readers is following blogs and news sites. The benefit is efficiency, instead of manually checking a bunch of websites, all new content is in one place. This saves time and ensures you never miss updates, even from sites that publish infrequently.

Research and monitoring

Feed readers are great for people who need to stay on top of specific topics, for example researchers, journalists, or analysts. They can follow hundreds of sources without drowning in information.

Content curation

Content curators can use feed readers to get a stream of material to potentially share or repurpose. They can quickly scan headlines and summaries from numerous sources to find valuable content worth highlighting.

Distraction-free reading

Unlike social media, RSS feeds deliver content without algorithms, advertisements, or engagement metrics. You get exactly what you subscribed to, nothing more and nothing less, creating a more intentional reading experience.

How to find RSS feeds

RSS feeds aren't always easy to find because websites often don't visibly link to them. Fortunately, most sites that publish RSS feeds implement RSS autodiscovery.

Autodiscovery works by adding a special HTML link tag in the website's metadata:

<link rel="alternate"
      type="application/rss+xml"
      href="https://example.com/feed.xml"
      title="Example Website RSS Feed">

Almost all feed readers support autodiscovery. You simply enter the website's URL, and the reader automatically detects the RSS feed based on this metadata.

Unfortunately, autodiscovery doesn't always work. Some websites don't include the required metadata, or they only include it on specific pages. In these cases, tools like the Lighthouse Feed Finder can help. They go beyond autodiscovery by checking common feed URL patterns, exploring parent URLs, scanning sitemaps, and even guessing feed paths.

What is RSS?