AI crawler index
What is DuckAssistBot?
DuckAssistBot is DuckDuckGo's crawler for AI search. Crawls pages in real time for DuckDuckGo's AI-assisted answers, which cite their sources.
At a glance
| Operator | DuckDuckGo |
|---|---|
| Purpose | AI search |
| User agent | DuckAssistBot/1.2; (+http://duckduckgo.com/duckassistbot.html) |
| Obeys robots.txt | Yes, according to the operator |
| Published IP ranges | https://duckduckgo.com/duckassistbot.json |
| How to verify it | Requests come from the IP addresses DuckDuckGo publishes. |
| Official documentation | https://duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/duckassistbot |
Should you block DuckAssistBot?
It builds the index an AI search engine cites from. Blocking it can remove your pages from that engine's answers and links, so if you want to be cited there, allow it.
DuckDuckGo says it is not used to train AI models, a robots.txt block takes effect within 72 hours, and opting out does not affect organic DuckDuckGo rankings.
How to block or allow DuckAssistBot in robots.txt
Block it everywhere:
User-agent: DuckAssistBot
Disallow: /Allow it everywhere:
User-agent: DuckAssistBot
Allow: /Rules are matched by the token on the User-agent line. Test the result with the robots.txt tester before you publish it.
Check your own site
The AI crawler checker tells you which AI crawlers your robots.txt lets in, and the log file analyzer shows how often each one actually visits. For the bigger picture, see what AI crawlers are and the full AI crawler index.
FAQ
DuckAssistBot questions
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