diff --git a/docs/data-sources/overview.mdx b/docs/data-sources/overview.mdx
index 8bff8bce..8488ce40 100644
--- a/docs/data-sources/overview.mdx
+++ b/docs/data-sources/overview.mdx
@@ -27,6 +27,7 @@ Embedchain comes with built-in support for various data sources. We handle the c
   <Card title="💬 Discord" href="/data-sources/discord"></Card>
   <Card title="📝 Github" href="/data-sources/github"></Card>
   <Card title="⚙️ Custom" href="/data-sources/custom"></Card>
+  <Card title="📝 Substack" href="/data-sources/substack"></Card>
   <Card title="🐝 Beehiiv" href="/data-sources/beehiiv"></Card>
 </CardGroup>
 
diff --git a/docs/data-sources/substack.mdx b/docs/data-sources/substack.mdx
index 2a5f9d8a..41aba375 100644
--- a/docs/data-sources/substack.mdx
+++ b/docs/data-sources/substack.mdx
@@ -2,15 +2,15 @@
 title: "📝 Substack"
 ---
 
-To add any Substack data sources to your app, just add the sitemap.xml of that url as the source and set the data_type to `substack`.
+To add any Substack data sources to your app, just add the main base url as the source and set the data_type to `substack`.
 
 ```python
 from embedchain import Pipeline as App
 
 app = App()
 
-# source: for any substack just add the sitemap.xml url
-app.add('https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/sitemap.xml', data_type='substack')
+# source: for any substack just add the root URL
+app.add('https://www.lennysnewsletter.com', data_type='substack')
 app.query("Who is Brian Chesky?")
 # Answer: Brian Chesky is the co-founder and CEO of Airbnb.
 ```
diff --git a/embedchain/loaders/substack.py b/embedchain/loaders/substack.py
index 350ab3c2..a5fd0b6f 100644
--- a/embedchain/loaders/substack.py
+++ b/embedchain/loaders/substack.py
@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@ import logging
 import time
 
 import requests
-
+from xml.etree import ElementTree
 from embedchain.helpers.json_serializable import register_deserializable
 from embedchain.loaders.base_loader import BaseLoader
 from embedchain.utils import is_readable
@@ -24,9 +24,29 @@ class SubstackLoader(BaseLoader):
                 'Substack requires extra dependencies. Install with `pip install --upgrade "embedchain[dataloaders]"`'
             ) from None
 
+        if not url.endswith("sitemap.xml"):
+            url = url + "/sitemap.xml"
+
         output = []
         response = requests.get(url)
-        response.raise_for_status()
+
+        try:
+            response.raise_for_status()
+        except requests.exceptions.HTTPError as e:
+            raise ValueError(
+                f"""
+                Failed to load {url}: {e}. Please use the root substack URL. For example, https://example.substack.com
+                """
+            )
+
+        try:
+            ElementTree.fromstring(response.content)
+        except ElementTree.ParseError:
+            raise ValueError(
+                f"""
+                Failed to parse {url}. Please use the root substack URL. For example, https://example.substack.com
+                """
+            )
 
         soup = BeautifulSoup(response.text, "xml")
         links = [link.text for link in soup.find_all("loc") if link.parent.name == "url" and "/p/" in link.text]