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Guides/check/is perplexity user blocked

Is Perplexity-User Blocked on Your Site? | SEO AEO Specialist SEO & AEO Specialist

In short

To check, open your robots.txt and look for a Disallow rule under User-agent: Perplexity-User. If it disallows /, this fetcher is blocked — meaning Perplexity cannot retrieve your page on demand when a user's query prompts it to visit your URL directly.

Perplexity-User is Perplexity's user-action fetcher. It retrieves a specific page in real time in response to a user query, rather than crawling your whole site for indexing. Its activity reflects genuine user intent, not scheduled indexing.

Blocking Perplexity-User prevents these user-initiated fetches, so Perplexity can't pull your live page into an answer even when a user explicitly asks about it.

How to check and control it

To check, look in your robots.txt for a rule targeting this user-agent. To allow or block it:

User-agent: Perplexity-User
Disallow: /        # blocks it — remove or set "Allow: /" to permit

For an instant check across your whole site, use SEO AEO Specialist's free AI crawler checker, and see the llms.txt & AI crawler guide.

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FAQ

How is Perplexity-User different from PerplexityBot?

Perplexity-User fetches a page in real time when a user's query requires it, while PerplexityBot crawls and indexes your site in the background. Blocking Perplexity-User stops on-demand fetches; blocking PerplexityBot removes you from Perplexity's index and citations.

Should I block Perplexity-User?

Usually not, since it acts on real user requests and blocking it mainly limits your reach when users ask about your content. If you want full control over which Perplexity agents can access your site, SEO AEO Specialist diagnoses and helps you fix each rule, not just monitor it.

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