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How to Write a Simple robots.txt File

A robots.txt file gives compliant crawlers instructions about which paths they may crawl. It is crawl control, not a reliable method for removing a page from search results.

Updated September 2026

Where the file belongs

The file is normally placed at the root of the host and named robots.txt.

Basic directives

User-agent identifies the crawler. Disallow identifies paths that should not be crawled.

Do not block pages you want crawled

Check that important tools, guides, styles and scripts remain accessible.

Robots.txt and indexing are different

A crawl restriction is not the same as an indexing directive.