TYPO3 RSS Feed with the News Extension: Setup and Auto-Posting

Short answer: The usual way to get a TYPO3 RSS feed is the News extension (EXT:news). It renders a normal news list with an XML template instead of HTML: you define a page type, usually 9818, with TypoScript, set format = xml, fill in the channel constants and map the page type to a clean URL such as feed.xml in the site configuration. After validating the feed, connect it to an auto-poster and every new news record is shared on social media automatically.

TYPO3 runs many corporate, university, government and association websites, and those sites usually publish news, press releases and events through the News extension. The feed is often the missing piece. It exists in the extension, but it has to be switched on and configured, and small mistakes, such as relative links or a missing absolute prefix, are easy to miss because nobody looks at the XML. This guide explains the TYPO3 RSS feed setup step by step, the details that matter for readers and auto-posters, and the most common problems. Configuration varies between TYPO3 and News versions, so compare each snippet with the documentation for your versions.

Does TYPO3 have an RSS feed by default?

TYPO3 core does not publish a feed of your pages. RSS is provided by extensions, and the most widely used one is News (georgringer/news). In the News extension, a feed is simply another view of a news list. The extension ships an RSS template at Resources/Private/Templates/News/List.xml, and the setting plugin.tx_news.settings.format = xml tells it to use that template instead of the HTML list. You can also choose Atom with format = atom.

That design has a useful consequence: all list options you already know, such as the storage folder, categories, limits and the detail page, work in the feed too. You do not learn a separate system.

Step 1: define the feed page type with TypoScript

The simplest approach is a separate PAGE object with its own type number. This is based on the example in the News documentation:

pageNewsRSS = PAGE
pageNewsRSS {
  typeNum = {$plugin.tx_news.rss.channel.typeNum}
  config {
    disableAllHeaderCode = 1
    xhtml_cleaning = none
    admPanel = 0
    debug = 0
    disablePrefixComment = 1
    metaCharset = utf-8
    additionalHeaders.10.header = Content-Type:application/rss+xml;charset=utf-8
    absRefPrefix = {$plugin.tx_news.rss.channel.link}
    linkVars >
  }
  10 < tt_content.news_pi1.20
  10 {
    settings < plugin.tx_news.settings
    settings {
      startingpoint = 24
      detailPid = 25
      limit = 20
      format = xml
    }
  }
}

Replace 24 with the uid of the folder that stores your news records and 25 with the uid of the page that shows a single news item. The type number defaults to 9818, so before routing is configured the feed answers at /?type=9818.

The important lines are disableAllHeaderCode, which stops TYPO3 from wrapping the output in an HTML page, and absRefPrefix, which makes links and image paths absolute. Without absolute links, the feed may look fine in a browser but every link breaks outside your site, a problem explained in relative URLs in RSS feeds.

Step 2: set the channel constants

The sample template reads its channel information from constants. Set them in your site package or template constants:

plugin.tx_news.rss.channel {
  title = Example Company News
  description = Press releases and news from Example Company
  link = https://www.example.com/
  language = en-gb
  copyright = Example Company
  generator = TYPO3 EXT:news
}

Use your real https domain in link, with a trailing slash, because it also feeds absRefPrefix. The title and description appear in feed readers and in some auto-posting tools, so write them for people, not as internal labels.

Step 3: give the feed a clean URL

A feed at /?type=9818 works, but a readable address is easier to share and less likely to change. Add the page type to the PageTypeSuffix route enhancer in your site configuration:

routeEnhancers:
  PageTypeSuffix:
    type: PageType
    default: '/'
    map:
      '/': 0
      feed.xml: 9818

The feed is then available as feed.xml under the page that holds the configuration, for example https://www.example.com/news/feed.xml. If your site already uses a PageTypeSuffix enhancer with .html, add the feed.xml line to the existing map instead of creating a second one. Choose the address once and keep it: every subscriber and every auto-posting connection depends on it.

Step 4: check the template fields

The sample RSS template is a starting point, and the News documentation itself says it will not fit every need. Copy it to your site package by adding a template root path, then review each field:

For dates, the Fluid date format r produces an RFC 822 style date, and the News documentation recommends an English locale so day and month names are correct. Wrong date formats are a classic source of trouble, described in RSS date format and RFC 822 errors.

For the GUID, a value based on the record uid, such as news-123 with isPermaLink="false", is the safest choice. It survives URL changes, slug edits and domain moves. If the GUID changes, auto-posters treat every old item as new and share it again; see why a feed auto-posts the same article twice.

Add images to feed items

Social posts with a picture perform much better than plain links. In your copied template, add an enclosure for the first preview image, generated with an absolute URL through the Fluid image URI view helper with absolute="1". Also make sure the detail page outputs Open Graph tags. Many networks build their preview from the page, not from the feed, so og:image, og:title dan og:description decide what followers see. TYPO3’s SEO features and extensions such as EXT:news_seo can help here. More on image selection is in how to control which image gets auto-posted.

Several feeds: categories, departments and languages

Larger TYPO3 sites rarely have one audience. A university has faculties, a company has press releases and careers, an association has members’ news and public events. Separate feeds let you route each one to the right channel:

• Category feeds. Create another page object with a different typeNum and set categories dan categoryConjunction in its settings. Map each type number to its own URL in the route enhancer.
• Plugin-based feeds. The News documentation also describes feeds built from a normal plugin on a dedicated page, configured in the backend without editing TypoScript for each feed.
• Language feeds. On multilingual sites, the same feed is available under each site language base, such as /de/news/feed.xml. Each language can go to its own social accounts.

Routing topics to accounts is explained in category filtering for auto-posting, and multilingual distribution in how to automate multi-language content across social media.

Advertise the feed

Add an autodiscovery link to the page head, so browsers, feed readers and auto-posting tools can find the feed from your news pages. The News documentation shows how to do it in the list template with the n:headerData view helper, and a simple alternative is a page.headerData entry with a link tag of type application/rss+xml that points to your feed URL. A visible RSS link near the news list helps human readers too. The reasons are covered in Autodiscovery feed RSS.

Caching and fresh content

TYPO3 caches pages aggressively, and the feed page type is cached too. That is good for performance, but the feed must refresh when editors publish news. The News extension tags cached pages so they can be cleared when records change; the documentation has a section on cache clearing. A common addition is Page TSconfig on the news storage folder, such as TCEMAIN.clearCacheCmd with the uids of the list and feed pages, so saving a news record clears them.

Also watch scheduled news. A record with a future start time appears only after the cache is cleared or expires, so the cache lifetime of the feed page decides how quickly it becomes visible. A long lifetime delays every automated post by the same amount, as explained in why auto-posts are delayed by caching.

Test the feed before you connect it

Editors rarely look at XML, so a broken feed can go unnoticed for weeks. Before connecting any service, run through a short checklist:

1. Open the feed URL in a private browser window, logged out of the backend, so no editing wrappers appear in the output.
2. Check the response header with your browser tools or curl -I; it should be an XML or RSS content type.
3. Confirm that links, GUIDs and image URLs start with your https domain.
4. Publish a test news record with an ampersand and quotation marks in the title, and check that the feed still parses.
5. Look at the time of the newest item and compare it with the record in the backend, to catch time zone errors.

Repeat the test after TYPO3 or News upgrades, because major versions sometimes change template paths, plugin names and TypoScript conditions.

Common TYPO3 feed problems

• HTML in the feed. Content wrappers from fluid_styled_content or the page layout are added to the output. Check disableAllHeaderCode and remove wraps for the feed type.
• Entity nbsp not defined. A non-breaking space entity in a teaser breaks the XML. The News documentation has a troubleshooting note for this error.
• Relative links. absRefPrefix atau channel.link is missing or wrong.
• Feed not found at feed.xml. The page type is not mapped in the route enhancer, or the site configuration was not reloaded.
• New items appear late. Page cache was not cleared after saving news.

The full reference is the RSS feed chapter of the News documentation. After each change, test your feed with the W3C Feed Validation Service.

How PostRSS works with a TYPO3 site

PostRSS has been publishing RSS and Atom feeds to social networks since 2014. Paste the address of your TYPO3 news feed, or several category and language feeds, connect your accounts and choose the post format. PostRSS checks the feeds as often as every minute and shares each new news item, with its image and link, to the networks you choose among 66 supported networks, messengers, team chats and blogs, including Facebook Pages, LinkedIn company pages, Mastodon, Bluesky, Telegram and Microsoft Teams through webhooks. Keyword filters, UTM parameters, hashtags from categories and posting windows let you tailor each channel, and larger organisations can automate set-up through the REST API. See the PostRSS features page and the plan limits on the pricing page. More developer guides are under the Technical Guide tag.

Related reading

• Drupal RSS feed: how to find it and auto-post site updates
• How to find your Joomla website RSS feed link
• Craft CMS RSS feed and auto-posting

The bottom line

A TYPO3 RSS feed is a news list with an XML template. Define the feed page type, set the channel constants, map the type to a clean feed.xml address and review the template for absolute links, correct dates, stable GUIDs and images. Clear the cache when news is saved, validate the result, and the feed is ready to share every press release and news item on social media automatically.

FAQ

Does TYPO3 core include an RSS feed?

No. TYPO3 core does not publish a page feed. The News extension provides RSS and Atom output for news records through a special page type and an XML template.

What is page type 9818 in TYPO3?

It is the default type number the News extension uses for its RSS feed. Before routing is configured the feed answers at the question mark type parameter, and a route enhancer can map it to feed.xml.

Why are the links in my TYPO3 feed relative?

The feed page needs an absolute prefix. Set absRefPrefix to your real domain, usually through the channel link constant, so links and images work outside your site.

Can I have one feed per category or language?

Yes. Create additional page types with different category settings, or use the language bases of your site, and map each feed to its own URL. Each feed can then go to different social accounts.

Why do new news items appear late in the feed?

The feed page is cached. Make sure saving a news record clears the cache of the list and feed pages, and keep the cache lifetime short for scheduled news.