Does nbcnews.com block AI crawlers?
Blocks AI training and AI answers
nbcnews.com blocks both AI training crawlers and AI answer crawlers in its robots.txt.
Checked from nbcnews.com/robots.txt. Robots rules change; the live file is the source of truth.
- AI crawlers blocked
- 12 of 12
- AI bots named in robots.txt
- 13
- llms.txt
- Not found
- Popularity
- Tranco top 1,000 (#897)
Can AI assistants cite nbcnews.com?
- ChatGPT search: its search crawler is blocked
- Claude: its search crawler is blocked
- Perplexity: its search crawler is blocked
nbcnews.com opts out of AI training by OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Apple, Common Crawl, ByteDance, Meta. 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 nbcnews.com |
|---|---|---|
| GPTBotOpenAI | AI training | Blocked |
| OAI-SearchBotOpenAI | AI answers | Blocked |
| ChatGPT-UserOpenAI | AI answers | Blocked |
| ClaudeBotAnthropic | AI training | Blocked |
| Claude-SearchBotAnthropic | AI answers | Blocked |
| Claude-UserAnthropic | AI answers | Blocked |
| PerplexityBotPerplexity | AI answers | Blocked |
| Google-ExtendedGoogle | AI training | Blocked |
| Applebot-ExtendedApple | AI training | Blocked |
| CCBotCommon Crawl | AI training | Blocked |
| BytespiderByteDance | AI training | Blocked |
| Meta-ExternalAgentMeta | AI training | Blocked |
How nbcnews.com compares
- 19% of the 1,278 popular sites we checked block GPTBot; nbcnews.com is one of them.
- 18% of the 1,278 popular sites we checked block ClaudeBot; nbcnews.com is one of them.
- 14% of the 1,278 popular sites we checked block PerplexityBot; nbcnews.com is one of them.
- Among 201 sites of similar popularity, 30% block at least one AI crawler.
The robots.txt rules that apply to AI crawlers
User-agent: * Disallow: /search Disallow: /pages/search/ Disallow: /pages/news-connect Disallow: /error404.aspx Disallow: /widget/ Disallow: /*ns/local_news* Disallow: /bentoapi/ Disallow: /akam/ Disallow: /sigma.html Disallow: /sports/world-cup/fifa-world-cup-2026-bracket-challenge/group Disallow: /mynewsapi/ Disallow: /*?*canonicalCard= User-agent: anthropic-ai Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: Applebot-Extended Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: Bytespider User-agent: ByteSpider Desktop Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: CCBot Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: ChatGPT-User Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: ClaudeBot Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: Claude-Web User-agent: Claude-User User-agent: Claude-SearchBot Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: Google-Extended Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: GPTBot Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: Meta-ExternalAgent User-agent: meta-externalagent Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: OAI-SearchBot Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063 User-agent: PerplexityBot User-agent: Perplexity-User Disallow: / Allow: /select Allow: /select/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/about-nbc-news-digital-n1232178 Allow: /subscribe/supplemental-terms Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/contact-us-n1232521 Allow: /news/us-news/nbc-news-digital-editors-n893846 Allow: /tips Allow: /tips/ Allow: /information/nbc-news-info/closed-captioning-n1307063
Excerpt: only groups for all user-agents (*) or named AI crawlers, up to 40 rules per group.
Sites with a similar AI policy
Does nbcnews.com block GPTBot?
Yes. As of Oct 2, 2026, nbcnews.com's robots.txt disallows GPTBot, OpenAI's training crawler.
Can ChatGPT search show results from nbcnews.com?
Its robots.txt blocks a ChatGPT search crawler, so ChatGPT search is unlikely to read or cite those pages.
Does nbcnews.com have an llms.txt file?
We didn't find a valid llms.txt at nbcnews.com/llms.txt when we checked.
Data: nbcnews.com's public robots.txt and llms.txt, fetched by AskableHQ. Popularity rank from the Tranco list (ID Y83YG). Methodology.