In short. Use URL Inspection's Markup card in Bing Webmaster Tools to open issue details for each recognized markup format.
Definition: Structured data is page annotation that gives Bing information about the type of content hosted on a site. In Bing Webmaster Tools, inspect a URL and open its Markup card to review the supported markup formats found in the page source and the issue details for each format.
Key facts
- Bing's URL Inspection documentation places markup review in the Markup card, alongside the Index card and SEO card.
- The inspection page lets you submit a URL from an added domain or choose one from the last 10 inspected URLs.
- The Markup card shows special markup applied in the page source. Selecting a markup type opens its issue details.
- The card lists HTML Microdata, Microformats, Open Graph and JSON-LD as the formats recognized by this tool.
- Bing says the card checks those formats only and does not validate regular HTML.
Where is the Markup card?
Open Bing Webmaster Tools, select the website that contains the URL, and go to URL Inspection. Bing's documentation says that the inspection result contains an Index card, an SEO card and a Markup card. The same result offers a Live URL tab that shows what Bingbot sees while downloading the page.
Bing Webmaster Tools
URL Inspection
Markup card
The URL Inspection launch article says that the workflow starts when a webmaster enters a URL. Bing then crawls and inspects the page and returns details, messages and action items. The current help page also describes the URL as belonging to a domain already added to the account.
How are per-format issues opened?
The Markup card describes whether a selected structured markup language is implemented in a way that lets Bing read and understand the content. It also lets the user view the special markup applied in the page source. Click a markup type shown in the card to open the issue details for that type.
The card presents each found format as a separate markup type. The documentation names the entries as follows:
- HTML Microdata
- Microformats
- Open Graph
- JSON-LD
The four names describe the formats that this card recognizes. They are separate from the regular HTML of the page, which the documentation excludes from this check.
What does the result tell you about the page?
Bing's structured data overview says that annotations give Bing information about the type of content hosted on a site. It also says that annotating data does not change the visible content. This makes the Markup card a source-level inspection of annotations, while the page's visible copy remains a separate part of the URL.
The same overview says that Bing crawlers validate annotated data against the schema and data types specified by the chosen format. It gives a price marked as a date as an example of data that crawlers ignore. A format entry in the Markup card can therefore be read together with the page source and the format's own data rules.
The older Bing announcement describes a separate Markup Validator that supported six markup languages, including Schema.org and RDFa. That announcement concerns the validator and predates the current URL Inspection documentation, whose Markup card lists four formats.
FAQ
Does the Markup card validate all HTML?
No. Bing documents the card as checking the four named markup formats only. Regular HTML is outside the check.
Can you inspect a page before requesting indexing?
Yes. The Live URL tab sends a request to Bingbot and reports what it sees while downloading the page. The documentation says that this request can take a few seconds.
What should you open when a format has an issue?
Open the format shown in the Markup card. Bing's documentation says that clicking a markup type opens details of the issue.
Related terms
Sources
- Bing Webmaster Tools, "URL Inspection", undated
- Bing Webmaster Tools, "Marking up your site: Overview", undated
- Microsoft Bing Blog, "Introducing the Bing Webmaster Tools URL Inspection Tool", 10 September 2020
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