Crawlers & Access
Which OpenAI crawlers matter for GEO?
Updated January 12, 2026GEO Expert Team
Summary
OpenAI documents OAI-SearchBot (used to surface sites in ChatGPT search features), GPTBot (training crawler), and ChatGPT-User (user-initiated fetch, not general crawling). OAI-SearchBot is most important for visibility.
Detailed Answer
OpenAI documents several crawlers:
1. OAI-SearchBot
- Purpose: Surfaces sites in ChatGPT search features
- User-agent: OAI-SearchBot
- Important for: AI visibility in ChatGPT
2. GPTBot
- Purpose: Training data collection
- User-agent: GPTBot
- Can block without affecting search visibility
3. ChatGPT-User
- Purpose: User-initiated fetch
- Not general crawling
- Respects user intent
Recommendation:
Allow OAI-SearchBot for search visibility, consider blocking GPTBot if you don't want training use.
openaicrawlersrobots-txtoai-searchbot