Does llms.txt work? Not for rankings, as far as anyone has shown.
Does llms.txt work? As a tidy map that helps AI agents find documentation, yes, and some developer docs use it that way. We found no evidence that it improves rankings or AI citations. It’s a proposal, not a formal standard, and Google says you don’t need AI text files for its AI features. It’s cheap to add, so add it if it’s easy.
Reviewed by Anubhav Gupta, Bespoke Devs · Updated
Does llms.txt work? What the evidence says
| Source | What it says or does |
|---|---|
| llmstxt.org | Calls itself “a proposal to standardise on using an /llms.txt file”. It was published in September 2024, and it’s open for community input |
| “You don’t need to create new machine readable files, AI text files, or markup to appear in these features” | |
| OpenAI | Its crawler page doesn’t list llms.txt as a way to be included. Its docs do link to an llms.txt index of the documentation |
| Perplexity | Same pattern: its docs link to an llms.txt index, and its crawler guidance doesn’t mention it as a ranking signal |
| Anthropic | Its crawler article doesn’t mention llms.txt. Its Claude Code docs link to an llms.txt index |
| Next.js | Its docs also point agents to an llms.txt index |
From each organisation’s own pages.
How to read that
There’s a real pattern here. Developer documentation sites publish llms.txt so that coding agents can find the right page. That’s a useful job, and it’s what the proposal describes. It’s a different thing from a marketing site earning citations in ChatGPT, which we’ve seen no provider confirm.
Is llms.txt worth it? It depends what it would cost you. As a small file listing your main pages, it takes minutes and does no harm. We include one in the launch work on our MVPs for that reason. Don’t pay much for it, and don’t expect it to change your traffic.
Common questions
No. It’s a proposal. Its own site says the specification is open for community input, and no standards body has adopted it as far as its site says.
Yes, that’s the clearest use. Coding agents reading your docs are exactly who it’s for, and it can make your API easier to use.
No. They do different jobs. See [llms.txt vs robots.txt](/seo-for-saas/llms-txt-vs-robots-txt).
Check that crawlers can reach your pages, then write clear answers. See [how to get cited by AI](/seo-for-saas/get-cited-by-ai).
Keep reading
- SEO for SaaSTechnical foundations, programmatic pages and AI search, explained.→
- llms.txt vs robots.txtWhat each file does, and what the evidence says.→
- How to get cited by AICrawler access, clear facts and a simple way to measure it.→
- SEO vs AEO vs GEOWhat the terms mean, and what to actually do differently.→
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