An open standard for publishing a structured, entity-first index of website knowledge for AI systems, retrieval pipelines, and language-model-based applications.
Where sitemap.xml tells crawlers what pages exist, entitymap.json tells AI systems what a site knows — which entities it covers, how they relate, and where the evidence is.
| Path | What it is |
|---|---|
spec/v1.0/index.md |
The normative v1.0 specification. |
spec/v1.0/predicates.md |
Per-predicate reference — all 23 standard predicates with definitions and examples. |
examples/acme-gardens.json |
A complete, realistic entitymap.json you can use as a starting template. |
prompts/generate-entitymap.md |
A detailed prompt for generating your first entitymap.json by hand with help from Claude, ChatGPT, or another LLM. |
CHANGELOG.md |
Spec version history. |
CONTRIBUTING.md |
How to participate — Discussions for ideas, Issues for spec bugs. |
Publish two files at the root of your domain:
https://yourdomain.com/entitymap.json # machine-readable
https://yourdomain.com/entitymap.html # crawler- and human-readable
Declare them in three places — robots.txt, the page <head>, and a sitewide footer link:
# robots.txt
EntityMap: https://yourdomain.com/entitymap.json
<!-- <head> on every page -->
<link rel="entitymap" type="application/json"
href="https://yourdomain.com/entitymap.json" />
<!-- sitewide footer — the most reliable discovery mechanism -->
<footer><a href="https://yourdomain.com/entitymap.html">EntityMap</a></footer>The minimum valid file is three things: a root object, at least one entity, and at least one chunk per entity. The full conformance floor is in §3 of the spec.
- Read the spec —
spec/v1.0/index.mdis the authoritative source. It's deliberately short. - Look at the example —
examples/acme-gardens.jsonshows three linked entities with relations and chunks. - Generate your first file —
prompts/generate-entitymap.mdis a structured prompt you can paste into Claude or ChatGPT alongside your site content. - Publish at the root of your domain and declare discovery (see above).
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Current version | 1.0 — stable |
| Released | 2026-04-07 |
| Editors | Fred Laurent · Dixon Jones |
| License | CC BY 4.0 |
| Site | entitymap.org |
| Reference generator | waikay.io/entitymap — NLP + LLM-assisted pipeline |
EntityMap follows the pattern Schema.org uses: an open vocabulary that improves through adoption and discussion.
- Ideas, questions, use-case discussions → GitHub Discussions
- Spec bugs, ambiguities, typos → GitHub Issues
- Proposing a new predicate or extension profile → start in Discussions; if there's consensus to formalise, it moves to a PR.
See CONTRIBUTING.md for the (short) details.
A JSON Schema, a CLI validator, a static viewer, and an HTML companion generator exist but ship separately so this repo stays focused on the standard. They'll be folded in once the early-adopter feedback has stabilised the rules around warnings and certification.
For the moment, the reference implementation at waikay.io/entitymap generates conforming files end-to-end. The validator at entitymap.org/validate checks them.
CC BY 4.0 — see LICENSE. You may use, redistribute, and adapt the specification with attribution.
Suggested attribution: "EntityMap v1.0 specification by Fred Laurent and Dixon Jones, licensed under CC BY 4.0. https://entitymap.org/spec/v1.0"