Google's John Mueller said on Twitter that RSS feeds do not help your web site rank better in Google or Google News. He technically said "no" to the question for a "a news website, does RSS Feed help to rank better in Google?" The answer is the same for a non-news site.
No
— John ☆.o(≧▽≦)o.☆ (@JohnMu) April 10, 2018
I thought I covered this before, but seems only Jennifer Slegg did back in 2015 on her blog where she covered a video hangout where John Mueller said "if you are looking for a ranking boost by having an RSS feed, that’s not going to happen." He added "there’s no direct ranking boost for the website itself" for having an RSS feed. The answer is 5:27 in to the video:
It does help with URL discover, like Sitemaps do, but Sitemaps, like RSS feeds, do not guarantee indexing or help with rankings.
Forum discussion at Twitter.
