What is the YouBot User-Agent string?

The YouBot User-Agent string is: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; YouBot/1.0; +https://about.you.com/youbot/)

How do I block YouBot in robots.txt?

To control YouBot access, add the following to your robots.txt file: User-agent: YouBot Allow: / # To block: # User-agent: YouBot # Disallow: /

Does YouBot respect robots.txt?

Yes, YouBot respects robots.txt directives.

YOUBOT

LOW RISK🔍 SEARCH & AI CRAWLER

You.com's web crawler for its AI-powered search engine and assistant

ORGANIZATION

You.com

FIRST SEEN

2022-06

RESPECTS ROBOTS.TXT

✓ YES

DOCUMENTATION

about.you.com

—

DAILY VISITS

—

COUNTRIES ACTIVE

TRACKING

STATUS

—

LAST SEEN

📡 YOUBOT USER-AGENT STRING

Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; YouBot/1.0; +https://about.you.com/youbot/)

This is the User-Agent header sent by YouBot in HTTP requests. Use this to identify YouBot in your server access logs.

📋 ABOUT YOUBOT

YouBot is the web crawler for You.com, an AI-powered search engine that combines traditional web search with conversational AI. You.com offers multiple search modes including Smart (quick answers), Genius (deep research), and Research (comprehensive analysis), all powered by content indexed by YouBot.

YouBot represents the new generation of search crawlers built specifically for AI-powered search rather than traditional link-based search. The content it indexes is used to generate conversational, cited answers rather than simple ranked link lists. This shift in search paradigm makes YouBot's indexing decisions particularly relevant for content visibility in the AI search era.

NORAD.io tracks YouBot as part of the emerging AI search engine landscape. With AI search engines like You.com, Perplexity, and ChatGPT Search growing in popularity, understanding which AI search crawlers access your content is increasingly important for maintaining visibility across the evolving search ecosystem.

🎯 HOW TO DETECT YOUBOT

▸User-Agent contains 'YouBot'
▸Moderate crawl volumes
▸Focus on content-rich pages suitable for AI search answers
▸Respects robots.txt directives
▸Part of the growing AI search engine ecosystem

🔄 CRAWL BEHAVIOR

Moderate crawl rates. Respects robots.txt. Indexes content for You.com's AI search engine. Does not execute JavaScript. Follows sitemaps.

PURPOSE

Indexes web content for You.com, an AI-powered search engine that provides conversational search results. Powers You.com's Smart, Genius, and Research modes with real-time web information.

🤖 ROBOTS.TXT CONFIGURATION

User-agent: YouBot
Allow: /

# To block:
# User-agent: YouBot
# Disallow: /

YouBot respects robots.txt directives. Add this to your robots.txt file at the root of your domain.

→ Complete Guide: robots.txt for AI Bots

🗺️ WHERE IS YOUBOT ACTIVE?

⚠️ RELATED THREATS

Prompt Injection

Attempts to override bot instructions via malicious content embedded in web pages

Data Exfiltration

Bots attempting to extract sensitive data from websites including PII and credentials

Credential Stuffing

Automated login attempts using leaked credentials from data breaches

Aggressive Content Scraping

Bots aggressively scraping content beyond robots.txt limits and ToS

📂 MORE 🔍 SEARCH & AI CRAWLERS

GPTBotOpenAI ClaudeBotAnthropic GooglebotGoogle Google-ExtendedGoogle BingbotMicrosoft BytespiderByteDance

📚 RELATED GUIDES

How to Detect AI Bots →robots.txt for AI Bots →NORAD API Docs →

PROTECT YOUR WEBSITE

Deploy SiteTrust to monitor and control AI bot access to your site with the Agent Passport Standard.

INSTALL SITETRUST →