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# Perplexity-User

> Perplexity-User is an AI assistant fetcher run by Perplexity. It visits a page when a Perplexity user asks a question, to help answer it and link to the page. Perplexity says it is not used for web crawling or to collect AI training data.

- Operator: Perplexity
- Kind: AI assistant fetcher
- robots.txt token: Perplexity-User
- Follows robots.txt: no
- Source: https://docs.perplexity.ai/guides/bots (checked 2026-11-05)
- Page: https://invisit.dev/bots/perplexity-user

## What is Perplexity-User?

It visits a page when a Perplexity user asks a question, to help answer it and link to the page. Perplexity says it is not used for web crawling or to collect AI training data.

Fetches a page because a person asked an assistant about it, right now. Operators often say robots.txt does not apply to these user-triggered fetches.

Perplexity lists Perplexity-User as a robots.txt tag but also says that, because a user requested the fetch, it generally ignores robots.txt rules.

- [Perplexity’s documentation](https://docs.perplexity.ai/guides/bots)

## Perplexity-User user agent

Perplexity documents this user agent for Perplexity-User. Version numbers in it change over time, so match on the name, not the whole string.

```
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; Perplexity-User/1.0; +https://perplexity.ai/perplexity-user)
```

## Should you block Perplexity-User?

Usually allow it. Each fetch is a person asking about your page right now, which is close to a visit. Blocking it in robots.txt may not stop it, since operators often treat these fetches as the person’s own.

## How to block Perplexity-User in robots.txt

Add a group for its token to robots.txt at the root of your site. Perplexity says it does not follow robots.txt, so this may not stop every fetch.

A bot follows only the group that names it, so it ignores your `User-agent: *` rules once it has a group of its own. Repeat any paths you also want kept from it there.

```
User-agent: Perplexity-User
Disallow: /
```

- [Build a robots.txt for AI bots](https://invisit.dev/tools/robots-txt-generator)

## How to verify a request is really Perplexity-User

Anyone can send any user agent, so the string alone proves nothing.

Perplexity publishes the IP ranges Perplexity-User crawls from. A request that claims to be Perplexity-User from any other address is not Perplexity-User.

- [Perplexity-User IP ranges](https://www.perplexity.ai/perplexity-user.json)

## See when Perplexity-User reads your site

Bots don’t run JavaScript analytics, so a script tag never sees them. invisit records crawler reads on the server instead, through its server SDK or a Cloudflare Worker, and shows which bots read which pages, next to your visitors.

- [Track crawlers with invisit](https://invisit.dev/docs/server/sdk#crawler-reads)

## Common questions

### What is Perplexity-User?

Perplexity-User is an AI assistant fetcher run by Perplexity. It visits a page when a Perplexity user asks a question, to help answer it and link to the page. Perplexity says it is not used for web crawling or to collect AI training data.

### Is Perplexity-User safe to block?

Usually allow it. Each fetch is a person asking about your page right now, which is close to a visit. Blocking it in robots.txt may not stop it, since operators often treat these fetches as the person’s own.

### How do I block Perplexity-User?

Add “User-agent: Perplexity-User” followed by “Disallow: /” to your robots.txt. Perplexity doesn’t promise to follow it in every case, so block it at your server too if it matters.