AI search index · Google
Googlebot
Google's search crawler. It is listed here because AI Overviews and AI Mode are built from the Search index: blocking Googlebot is the only crawler-level way to leave them, and it also removes you from Google Search.
- Operator
- Purpose
- AI search index
- Used for
- Google Search, AI Overviews, AI Mode
- Obeys robots.txt
- Yes
- robots.txt token
Googlebot- User-agent string
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; Googlebot/2.1; +http://www.google.com/bot.html)- IP list
- developers.google.com/static/search/apis/ipranges/googlebot.json
- Official docs
- developers.google.com
- Feeds
- Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode, Gemini
Block Googlebot in robots.txt
User-agent: Googlebot
Disallow: /Blocking a search or user-triggered bot removes your pages from that assistant's answers. To opt out of model training only, block the operator's training crawler instead.
Other Google bots
Google-Extended (model training) · GoogleOther (mixed / general) · Google-CloudVertexBot (ai agent) · Google-Agent (ai agent)
Questions
What is Googlebot?
Googlebot is a ai search index bot operated by Google, used for Google Search, AI Overviews, AI Mode. Google's search crawler. It is listed here because AI Overviews and AI Mode are built from the Search index: blocking Googlebot is the only crawler-level way to leave them, and it also removes you from Google Search.
How do I block Googlebot?
Add "User-agent: Googlebot" followed by "Disallow: /" to the robots.txt file at the root of each host you want to protect.
Does Googlebot respect robots.txt?
Yes. Google documents that Googlebot honours robots.txt directives.
How many websites block Googlebot?
In a Oct 29, 2026 analysis of the top 10,000 websites by Kuldeep Paul, 2.4% of sites with a robots.txt file fully disallowed Googlebot.
Analysis using this data
- Who blocks AI crawlers? What 10,000 robots.txt files revealPublishers block training, not answers; half of all blocklists leak; Cloudflare writes the most common AI policy.
- The opt-out asymmetry: you can block the small AI engines, not the big oneThe AI surfaces with the most users are the ones publishers can't refuse and can't measure.
How to cite this data
This dataset is free to use, including commercially, under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. The one rule is attribution:
- Credit the source as “Kuldeep Paul, kuldeep.cc” wherever you use a figure, chart or table from it.
- Link to this page (https://kuldeep.cc/data/ai-search/crawlers/googlebot), not to the download file, so readers can check the source of every number.
- Include the date. These figures change; say “as of Oct 29, 2026” or link to the version you used.
- Mark changes. If you filter, recalculate or chart the data yourself, say so (“analysis based on data from…”).
- Cite the original source for single figures when you quote one reported number; it is linked in every row.
In running text: according to Kuldeep Paul's Googlebot — AI crawler directory (kuldeep.cc). More in the methodology.
Paul, K. (2026). Googlebot — AI crawler directory [Data set]. kuldeep.cc. https://kuldeep.cc/data/ai-search/crawlers/googlebot
Paul, Kuldeep. "Googlebot — AI crawler directory." kuldeep.cc, 29 October 2026, https://kuldeep.cc/data/ai-search/crawlers/googlebot.
Paul, Kuldeep. 2026. "Googlebot — AI crawler directory." Dataset. kuldeep.cc. Updated Oct 29, 2026. https://kuldeep.cc/data/ai-search/crawlers/googlebot.
@misc{paul2026googlebot, author = {Paul, Kuldeep}, title = {Googlebot — AI crawler directory}, year = {2026}, howpublished = {\url{https://kuldeep.cc/data/ai-search/crawlers/googlebot}}, note = {Dataset, CC BY 4.0, updated 2026-10-29} }
<a href="https://kuldeep.cc/data/ai-search/crawlers/googlebot">Googlebot — AI crawler directory</a> (data: Kuldeep Paul, kuldeep.cc)