Does washingtonpost.com block AI crawlers?
Blocks AI training and AI answers
washingtonpost.com blocks both AI training crawlers and AI answer crawlers in its robots.txt.
Checked from washingtonpost.com/robots.txt. Robots rules change; the live file is the source of truth.
- AI crawlers blocked
- 6 of 12
- AI bots named in robots.txt
- 7
- llms.txt
- Not found
- Popularity
- Tranco top 500 (#367)
Can AI assistants cite washingtonpost.com?
- ChatGPT search: its search crawlers may read the site
- Claude: its search crawlers may read the site
- Perplexity: its search crawler is blocked
washingtonpost.com opts out of AI training by Anthropic, 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 washingtonpost.com |
|---|---|---|
| GPTBotOpenAI | AI training | Some paths restricted |
| 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 | Blocked |
| Google-ExtendedGoogle | AI training | Some paths restricted |
| Applebot-ExtendedApple | AI training | Blocked |
| CCBotCommon Crawl | AI training | Blocked |
| BytespiderByteDance | AI training | Blocked |
| Meta-ExternalAgentMeta | AI training | Blocked |
How washingtonpost.com compares
- 19% of the 1,278 popular sites we checked block GPTBot; washingtonpost.com does not.
- 18% of the 1,278 popular sites we checked block ClaudeBot; washingtonpost.com is one of them.
- 14% of the 1,278 popular sites we checked block PerplexityBot; washingtonpost.com is one of them.
- Among 195 sites of similar popularity, 30% block at least one AI crawler.
The robots.txt rules that apply to AI crawlers
User-agent: * Disallow: /*_print.html Disallow: /*_email.html Disallow: /*_singlePage.html Disallow: /*_allComments.html Disallow: /*_jsn.json Disallow: /*_jsonpStatic.js Disallow: /*_nitf.xml Disallow: /*_newsml.html Disallow: /*_qa.html Disallow: /*_meta.xml Disallow: /*_jsnp.js Disallow: /*_json.json Disallow: /*_search.html Disallow: /*_jsonp.js Disallow: /*_jsnpStatic.js Disallow: /*_rss.xml Disallow: /*_mobile.mobile Disallow: /*_mobile.xml Disallow: /*_allCommentsClassicBlog.html Disallow: /*_seo.html Disallow: /*_nimbusJson.json Disallow: /*_nimbusJsonp.js Disallow: /*_nimbusJsonpStatic.js Disallow: /*_modal.html Disallow: /todays_paper/ Disallow: /rw/WashingtonPost/Content/Epaper/ Disallow: /ac2/ Disallow: /blogs/slow-ride/ Disallow: /local/blogsandcolumns/slow-ride-story-tanked Disallow: /local/blogsandcolumns/slow-ride-story-achenblog Disallow: /local/blogsandcolumns/slow-ride-stream-tanked Disallow: /local/blogsandcolumns/slow-ride-front Disallow: /utils/ Disallow: /jobs/JS_JobSearchResult Disallow: /jobs/UpdateJobEmployerCounterServlet Disallow: /jobs/JS_Login Disallow: /jobs/EU_UpdateJobEmployerCounter Disallow: /blogs/nationals-journal-beta/ Disallow: /blogs/test/ Disallow: /posttv-beta/ User-agent: anthropic-ai Disallow: / Allow: /creativegroup/ Allow: /advertising/ User-agent: Applebot-Extended Disallow: / Allow: /creativegroup/ Allow: /advertising/ User-agent: Bytespider Disallow: / Allow: /creativegroup/ Allow: /advertising/ User-agent: CCBot Disallow: / Allow: /creativegroup/ Allow: /advertising/ User-agent: ClaudeBot Disallow: / Allow: /creativegroup/ Allow: /advertising/ User-agent: meta-externalagent Disallow: / Allow: /creativegroup/ Allow: /advertising/ User-agent: PerplexityBot Disallow: / Allow: /creativegroup/ Allow: /advertising/
Excerpt: only groups for all user-agents (*) or named AI crawlers, up to 40 rules per group.
Sites with a similar AI policy
Does washingtonpost.com block GPTBot?
No. As of Oct 2, 2026, washingtonpost.com's robots.txt doesn't block GPTBot, though some paths are restricted for all crawlers.
Can ChatGPT search show results from washingtonpost.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 washingtonpost.com have an llms.txt file?
We didn't find a valid llms.txt at washingtonpost.com/llms.txt when we checked.
Data: washingtonpost.com's public robots.txt and llms.txt, fetched by AskableHQ. Popularity rank from the Tranco list (ID Y83YG). Methodology.