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PerplexityBot

Perplexity's search crawler. Perplexity says it isn't used to collect training data for foundation models.

Check if your site lets PerplexityBot in Run the full AI Visibility Check

Last verified: October 2026, against Perplexity's own documentation.

PerplexityBot at a glance.

Owner
Perplexity
Purpose
Search. Perplexity says PerplexityBot is designed to surface and link websites in Perplexity's search results, and that it isn't used to crawl content for AI foundation models.
robots.txt token
PerplexityBot
Full user agent
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; PerplexityBot/1.0; +https://perplexity.ai/perplexitybot)

Perplexity calls this an example string and says the version number may change.

IP ranges
www.perplexity.ai/perplexitybot.json

Perplexity recommends permitting requests from these ranges.

Respects robots.txt?
Respects robots.txt. Yes. Perplexity lists PerplexityBot as a robots.txt tag webmasters can use, and recommends allowing it in robots.txt to appear in its search results.

The robots.txt rules to copy.

Your robots.txt lives at the root of your domain, like yoursite.com/robots.txt. On Shopify you edit it by adding a robots.txt.liquid template to your theme. Shopify warns that a wrong edit can cost you all your traffic, so change one rule at a time.

Allow PerplexityBot

User-agent: PerplexityBot
Allow: /

A bot with no rule is already allowed. Add this only when a broader rule, such as User-agent: * with Disallow: /, would otherwise block it.

Block PerplexityBot

User-agent: PerplexityBot
Disallow: /

Robots.txt rules apply per host. Repeat them on each subdomain you want covered.

Should you block PerplexityBot on a local business site or a Shopify store?

A PerplexityBot block keeps you out of the index Perplexity uses for its search answers. Perplexity says the bot isn't used for model training, so blocking it doesn't buy you a training opt-out.

Allow it.

A rule you didn't write can block it too: an old robots.txt template, a security plugin or a CDN bot setting. The AI crawler checker reads your robots.txt for PerplexityBot and the other bots in this directory.

The 12 bots, sorted by job

  1. PerplexityBot is in this group

    Search and answers

    3 bots

    They build the index an AI assistant searches when it answers.

    If you block themPer their owners, blocking one can drop you from that assistant's search answers.

  2. Fetching a page when a user asks

    3 bots

    They fetch your page because a person asked the assistant about it.

    If you block themBlocked at your firewall, the assistant can't read your page for the person who asked. Two of the three may not follow a robots.txt block.

  3. Model training

    6 bots

    A block here tells the owner to keep your pages out of AI model training. CCBot is here because its open archive can be used that way.

    If you block themFor most, the owner says blocking doesn't remove you from its search features. Meta says its crawler also indexes content for its products.

Where PerplexityBot sits among the 12 AI bots in this directory, grouped by what each one does, with what blocking each group costs you.

Related crawlers.

Sources

Last verified: October 2026. Where the owner doesn't document something, this page says so instead of guessing.

  1. Perplexity, Perplexity Crawlers

Crawler access is the first thing I check in an AI answer audit. Most of what decides who gets named is what other sites say about you.

Check your robots.txt Or run the full AI Visibility Check