Does latimes.com block AI crawlers?
Blocks AI training, allows AI answers
latimes.com blocks at least one AI training crawler but still lets AI answer engines read its pages.
Checked from latimes.com/robots.txt. Robots rules change; the live file is the source of truth.
- AI crawlers blocked
- 3 of 12
- AI bots named in robots.txt
- 3
- llms.txt
- Not found
- Popularity
- Tranco top 1,000 (#922)
Can AI assistants cite latimes.com?
- ChatGPT search: its search crawlers may read the site
- Claude: its search crawlers may read the site
- Perplexity: its search crawlers may read the site
latimes.com opts out of AI training by OpenAI, Anthropic, ByteDance. Training crawlers and answer crawlers are separate: blocking training doesn't by itself remove a site from AI answers.
AI crawler access, bot by bot
| Crawler | Used for | Status on latimes.com |
|---|---|---|
| GPTBotOpenAI | AI training | Blocked |
| OAI-SearchBotOpenAI | AI answers | Some paths restricted |
| ChatGPT-UserOpenAI | AI answers | Some paths restricted |
| ClaudeBotAnthropic | AI training | Blocked |
| Claude-SearchBotAnthropic | AI answers | Some paths restricted |
| Claude-UserAnthropic | AI answers | Some paths restricted |
| PerplexityBotPerplexity | AI answers | Some paths restricted |
| Google-ExtendedGoogle | AI training | Some paths restricted |
| Applebot-ExtendedApple | AI training | Some paths restricted |
| CCBotCommon Crawl | AI training | Some paths restricted |
| BytespiderByteDance | AI training | Blocked |
| Meta-ExternalAgentMeta | AI training | Some paths restricted |
How latimes.com compares
- 19% of the 1,278 popular sites we checked block GPTBot; latimes.com is one of them.
- 18% of the 1,278 popular sites we checked block ClaudeBot; latimes.com is one of them.
- 14% of the 1,278 popular sites we checked block PerplexityBot; latimes.com does not.
- Among 205 sites of similar popularity, 29% block at least one AI crawler.
The robots.txt rules that apply to AI crawlers
User-agent: * Disallow: /search Disallow: /recipes/search Disallow: /changebrowser Disallow: /thirdpartyservice Disallow: /*/thirdpartyservice Disallow: /config/ Disallow: /*/config Disallow: /dzcfg Disallow: /*/dzcfg Disallow: /*/test-template Disallow: /test/ Disallow: /includes/ Disallow: /_comments/ Disallow: /deeplinkid/ Disallow: /searchsuggest Disallow: /*/searchsuggest Disallow: /svgimageproc Disallow: /hive/ Disallow: /get-galleryfragment* Disallow: /gs-* User-agent: Bytespider Disallow: / User-agent: ClaudeBot Disallow: / User-agent: GPTBot Disallow: /
Excerpt: only groups for all user-agents (*) or named AI crawlers, up to 40 rules per group.
Sites with a similar AI policy
- hbr.org · 3 blocked
- onet.pl · 2 blocked
- webmd.com · 3 blocked
- figma.com · 5 blocked
- academia.edu · 7 blocked
- flightradar24.com · 2 blocked
- flashscore.com · 3 blocked
- moloco.com · 1 blocked
All sites that are “blocks ai training, allows ai answers” →
Does latimes.com block GPTBot?
Yes. As of Oct 2, 2026, latimes.com's robots.txt disallows GPTBot, OpenAI's training crawler.
Can ChatGPT search show results from latimes.com?
Its robots.txt doesn't block OAI-SearchBot or ChatGPT-User, so ChatGPT's search crawlers may read it. Whether pages are actually shown depends on ChatGPT.
Does latimes.com have an llms.txt file?
We didn't find a valid llms.txt at latimes.com/llms.txt when we checked.
Data: latimes.com's public robots.txt and llms.txt, fetched by AskableHQ. Popularity rank from the Tranco list (ID Y83YG). Methodology.