Feedscout

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HTML Method ​

The HTML method extracts feed URLs from HTML content by scanning link elements and anchor tags.

Follows RSS Board Autodiscovery and WHATWG Feed Autodiscovery specs.

How It Works ​

The HTML method scans two types of elements:

Looks for <link> elements that advertise feeds:

html
<!-- rel="alternate" with feed MIME type -->
<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" href="/feed.xml" />

<!-- rel="feed" (WHATWG spec) -->
<link rel="feed" href="/feed" />

Anchor Elements ​

Scans <a> tags for feed links using two strategies:

  1. URI matching — Checks if href contains common feed paths like /feed, /rss.xml.
  2. Label matching — Checks if link text contains words like "RSS", "Feed", "Subscribe".
html
<!-- Matched by URI -->
<a href="/feed.xml">XML</a>

<!-- Matched by label -->
<a href="/subscribe">RSS Feed</a>

Configuration ​

Feedscout comes with reasonable defaults, but you can customize how HTML is parsed if needed.

Control which <link> elements are matched:

typescript
import { mimeTypes } from 'feedscout/feeds'

const feeds = await discoverFeeds(url, {
  methods: {
    html: {
      linkSelectors: [
        { rel: 'alternate', types: mimeTypes },
        { rel: 'feed' },
      ],
    },
  },
})

Anchor URIs ​

Specify URI patterns to match in anchor href attributes:

typescript
const feeds = await discoverFeeds(url, {
  methods: {
    html: {
      anchorUris: ['/feed', '/rss', '/atom', '/rss.xml', '/feed.xml'],
    },
  },
})

Anchor Labels ​

Specify text patterns to match in anchor content:

typescript
const feeds = await discoverFeeds(url, {
  methods: {
    html: {
      anchorLabels: ['rss', 'feed', 'atom', 'subscribe'],
    },
  },
})

Ignored URIs ​

Exclude certain URI patterns from anchor matching:

typescript
const feeds = await discoverFeeds(url, {
  methods: {
    html: {
      anchorIgnoredUris: ['wp-json/oembed/', 'wp-json/wp/'],
    },
  },
})

Default Values ​

You can import the default HTML options:

typescript
import { defaultHtmlOptions } from 'feedscout/feeds'

The defaults include comprehensive anchor URIs and common feed-related labels. You can also import individual pieces:

typescript
import {
  linkSelectors,
  anchorLabels,
  urisComprehensive,
  ignoredUris,
} from 'feedscout/feeds'

Using Directly ​

You can use the HTML discovery function directly to get URIs without validation:

typescript
import { discoverUrisFromHtml } from 'feedscout/methods'

const uris = discoverUrisFromHtml(htmlContent, {
  baseUrl: 'https://example.com',
  linkSelectors: [{ rel: 'alternate', types: ['application/rss+xml'] }],
  anchorUris: ['/feed'],
  anchorLabels: ['rss'],
  anchorIgnoredUris: [],
})

// [
//   'https://example.com/feed.xml',
//   'https://example.com/rss',
// ]