Bingbot: what it does, and what blocking it means
Bing and Copilot together. There is no separate Microsoft AI crawler token, so blocking Bingbot removes you from both at once.
| Operator | Microsoft |
|---|---|
| What it does | Reference |
| Obeys robots.txt | Yes, per its operator's docs |
| Governs | Other AI assistants |
| Has a crawler | Yes |
| Last verified | 2 September 2026 |
| Next review | 2 December 2026. We re-check every entry against the operator’s documentation each quarter. |
What happens if you block Bingbot?
Blocking it affects
- Bing Search
- Copilot answers (one token covers both)
Can you allow Bingbot for Bing Search but not for Copilot?
If you want to stay in Bing Search but out of Copilot answers, user-agent rules cannot express that. Microsoft put those controls in meta tags, and both preserve normal Bing ranking: NOCACHE limits Copilot to your URL, title and snippet; NOARCHIVE takes you out of Copilot answers and Microsoft generative-AI training entirely.
So the check that matters for Copilot is a meta tag on your pages, not a line in robots.txt, which is why a robots.txt-only tool tells you nothing useful about it.
As with Googlebot, we never send a Bingbot user agent at your site. Cloudflare's "Fake Bing Bot" rule exists for the same reason Google's does, and tripping it would produce a false positive rather than a finding.
Bingbot is also on Cloudflare's mixed-use list as of 15 September 2026, which means its AI blocking settings can now reach it. Because Bing and Copilot share this one token, a setting aimed at Copilot takes Bing Search with it, the same trade-off the token itself forces, arriving this time from your CDN rather than your robots.txt.
Worth knowing about Bingbot
Microsoft publishes Bingbot's IP ranges as a plain JSON file. When we checked it on 2 September 2026 it listed 28 address blocks.
How do you block or allow Bingbot in robots.txt?
To block Bingbot:
User-agent: Bingbot
Disallow: /To allow it explicitly, use an Allow: / rule if your file has a blanket User-agent: * disallow:
User-agent: Bingbot
Allow: /With neither rule, Bingbot is allowed by default.
Not sure how Bingbot fits with the others? Build the whole file, or see which AI crawlers to allow.
Is your site blocking Bingbot?
A CDN or bot-management rule can still block Bingbot even when robots.txt says it is welcome. You cannot see that mismatch from the front of the site.
We request your robots.txt and homepage. We read your sitemap only when robots.txt hides pages from a crawler and we need to measure how much is affected. No other page.
Guides about Bingbot
- Is Cloudflare blocking AI crawlers?
A correct robots.txt can still leave a site inaccessible. Here is what to look for when Cloudflare is in the way.
Official sources
- Microsoft’s crawler documentation
- Published IP ranges is the only way to verify a request claiming this user agent really came from Microsoft
Which other crawlers do the same job as Bingbot?
- OAI-AdsBot: Reference, run by OpenAI
- Googlebot: Reference, run by Google
- meta-externalads: Reference, run by Meta
- facebookexternalhit: Reference, run by Meta