Podcast RSS feed validator.

What this checks

• XML well-formedness with line numbers: mismatched or unclosed tags, bare &, entities XML does not define (such as ’), unquoted attributes, undeclared prefixes.
• RSS 2.0: <rss version="2.0">, one <channel> with title, link and description; each enclosure has url, length and type.
• Apple Podcasts required tags: the itunes namespace, show title, description (4000 bytes maximum), itunes:image, language, itunes:category and itunes:explicit; per episode a title, enclosure and GUID; at least one episode.
• Uniqueness: each GUID (case-sensitive) and each enclosure URL may appear once. Apple ignores duplicate enclosure URLs.
• Dates: pubDate must be RFC 2822: day of week, day, month name, four-digit year, 24-hour time and a zone. A day name that does not match the date is flagged as a warning.
• Tag casing: <itunes:Image> or <pubdate> are reported, because XML is case-sensitive.

What it cannot check from pasted XML

Whether the feed URL is public, whether your host answers HTTP HEAD and byte-range requests, whether each enclosure really returns the file and matches its stated length, the artwork’s pixel size and colour space, the exact spelling of your category against Apple’s list, and whether the language is a real ISO 639 code (only its shape is tested). These are listed under the result as manual follow-ups. A clean result means the XML matches the rules above, not that Apple will accept the show: Apple also reviews content against its guidelines.

Sources

Checked 30 September 2026: Apple Podcasts for Creators: Podcast RSS feed requirements, Validate your podcast, A Podcaster’s Guide to RSS (required, recommended and situational tags), the RSS 2.0 specification and RFC 2822 section 3.3.