CrawlCheck is a comprehensive, free, and client-side suite of tools designed to help website owners control how AI crawlers interact with their sites and optimize for Generative Engine Optimization (GEO). In an era where AI answer engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude increasingly influence content discovery, ensuring proper visibility and citation is crucial.
The platform offers three primary tools:
AI Crawler Auditor
This tool allows users to paste their existing robots.txt file and instantly audit it against a database of over 60 known AI crawlers, including GPTBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot, and Bytespider. It provides a clear breakdown of which AI engines are allowed or blocked from accessing specific parts of the site, helping identify potential visibility issues or unintended blocks. This feature is vital for understanding the current state of AI accessibility and its implications for AI-driven referral traffic.
robots.txt Generator
For those needing to create or update their robots.txt file, CrawlCheck provides an intuitive generator. Users can select from various presets or fine-tune permissions for individual crawlers. The generated file updates in real-time, allowing for quick adjustments and easy copying to the site's root directory. This ensures that websites can implement a policy that balances AI visibility with content protection, preventing unwanted scraping while maximizing opportunities for AI citation.
Structured Data Generator
Recognizing the importance of structured data for AI answer engines, CrawlCheck includes a generator for FAQPage, HowTo, and Article schema. These JSON-LD formats are easily consumed by AI models, improving the chances of content being quoted and referenced in AI-generated answers. Users can fill out simple forms to generate valid schema markup, which can then be pasted directly into their page's <head> section.
Why Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) Matters
The platform emphasizes the growing significance of Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), highlighting that AI referral traffic is rapidly increasing. A single Disallow: / rule in robots.txt can render a site invisible to major AI platforms. CrawlCheck addresses this by providing the tools to manage access for dozens of AI crawlers, a task impossible to do manually. All tools run entirely in the browser, ensuring user data privacy as nothing is uploaded, logged, or tracked.
CrawlCheck also provides a suite of GEO guides, covering topics from the fundamentals of GEO and robots.txt for AI crawlers to strategies for getting cited by ChatGPT and Perplexity, understanding llms.txt, measuring AI visibility, and avoiding common GEO mistakes. These resources empower users to move from auditing to implementing effective AI optimization strategies.
