Generate RSS and Atom feeds

Leadtype can generate RSS and Atom feeds from any URL-prefixed set of generated pages by adding feeds to your docs config. Use this for changelogs, blogs, release notes, news, or any mounted content that should be syndicated.

How do I generate a changelog feed?

Add a mount for the changelog route, then add a feed whose source.urlPrefix points at that mounted URL. Leadtype reads the generated markdown mirror, filters pages by URL, and writes the feed files into the same public output directory as the rest of leadtype generate.

import { defineDocsConfig } from "leadtype";

export default defineDocsConfig({
  product: {
    name: "My product",
    tagline: "Developer tools for modern apps.",
  },
  navigation: [
    "index",
    { title: "Changelog", base: "changelog", pages: [{ include: "*" }] },
  ],
  mounts: [{ pathPrefix: "changelog", urlPrefix: "/changelog" }],
  feeds: [
    {
      id: "changelog",
      title: "My product changelog",
      description: "Release notes and product updates for My product.",
      source: { urlPrefix: "/changelog" },
      formats: ["rss", "atom"],
      output: {
        rss: "/changelog/rss.xml",
        atom: "/changelog/atom.xml",
      },
    },
  ],
});

Run site-mode generation with a base URL:

leadtype generate --src . --out public --base-url https://docs.example.com

That writes public/changelog/rss.xml and public/changelog/atom.xml. The JSON output includes the generated paths under files.feeds.<id>.

What date should feed entries use?

Changelog entries should use a fixed release date in frontmatter because the published release date is part of the content. Git-derived lastModified is useful for blogs or docs pages where "updated at" is the right feed date, but a changelog should not change publication date when someone fixes a typo later.

---
title: "Version 1"
description: "First stable release."
date: 2026-06-03
---

Every page selected by a feed must have either date or lastModified-style frontmatter. Add date by hand for release notes and changelogs. For pages where the feed should track source edits, default git enrichment writes lastModified from git history before the feed is rendered. If git metadata is unavailable, enrichment is skipped and those pages still need authored dates.

Leadtype fails generation when a selected feed page has no stable date. It does not use generated file mtimes because CI rewrites generated markdown on every build, which would reshuffle the feed even when the source content did not change.

Which pages become feed entries?

source.urlPrefix selects generated pages by canonical URL. A prefix of /changelog selects /changelog, /changelog/v1, /changelog/v2, and other child pages. Use page frontmatter, source filters, or a deeper prefix if the section listing page should not become a feed entry. A prefix of / selects every generated page.

Pages with draft: true are excluded. Entries are sorted newest first and capped at limit when set; otherwise Leadtype includes the latest 20 entries.

What output paths are allowed?

Feed output paths must start with /, end with .xml, resolve inside the configured --out directory, and be unique across all feeds. This prevents a feed from overwriting generated markdown mirrors, sitemap files, or another feed.

feeds: [
  {
    id: "blog",
    title: "Product blog",
    source: { urlPrefix: "/blog" },
    formats: ["rss"],
    output: { rss: "/blog/rss.xml" },
  },
];

How do I verify the feed?

After generation, check the files directly or through the example app that serves the public directory:

test -f public/changelog/rss.xml
test -f public/changelog/atom.xml

The Leadtype example apps dogfood this through the real Leadtype changelog. Their build pipelines run leadtype generate, then the smoke tests request /changelog/rss.xml and /changelog/atom.xml from the served app.