What is Buttondown?
Buttondown is an automated RSS feed crawler that fetches content from blogs and websites to convert them into newsletter content, allowing users to turn their RSS feeds into automated mailing lists. You can set up Agent Analytics to see when Buttondown visits your website.
Overview
| Operated By | Buttondown |
| Source | Official Website |
| Expected To Follow Robots.txt | No |
| Insights Last Updated | September 14, 2026 |
Do you operate this agent? Contact us to suggest an update.
Category
Expected Behavior
Buttondown usually makes a single request within seconds of a URL being shared, without crawling further. Traffic rises and falls with sharing activity, so a widely circulated link can produce a sharp burst of fetches.
Buttondown's User Agent
| User Agent | LegibleBot/0.1 (+https://github.com/buttondown/legible) |
How To Block Buttondown With Robots.txt
Add this rule to your robots.txt file to request that Buttondown not access your website, or use Automatic Robots.txt to request the same of all fetchers at once. You can customize which pages are blocked by swapping out / for a different path.
User-agent: Buttondown # https://knownagents.com/agents/buttondown
Disallow: /Insights for Buttondown
As of September 14, 2026, this data reflects agent visits measured across thousands of websites using Agent Analytics, combined with daily scans of the top 1000 websites and their robots.txt files.
Robots.txt Blocked Percentage
Country of Origin
Robots.txt Blocking Trend
6% of top websites block Buttondown in their robots.txts.
Overall Fetcher Traffic
1.7% of all web traffic came from fetchers.
Frequently Asked Questions
Should I Block Buttondown?
Usually not. Blocking Buttondown may leave shared links without a title or image, making them less inviting to click. If it begins fetching at unexpected volume, try rate limiting before blocking it outright. For context, 6% of the top websites we track currently have robots.txt rules for Buttondown.
Does Buttondown Follow Robots.txt Rules?
No. Buttondown is not expected to follow robots.txt rules, so a disallow rule only communicates your preference. Enforce the block with firewall or server rules, then use Agent Analytics to verify that its requests stop.
Does Buttondown Access Private Content?
No. Buttondown has no credentials and should access only the public URL and assets needed for a preview. It does not continue through the rest of your site.
How Can I Tell if Buttondown Is Visiting My Website?
Agent Analytics tracks Buttondown visits in real time. You can also check your server logs for requests whose user-agent string contains "Buttondown". Look for a page and its preview assets being requested without follow-up navigation. Because Buttondown does not publish a verification method, any client can claim its identity and a log match is only a clue.
Why Is Buttondown Visiting My Website?
Someone shared a link to your page. Buttondown fetched it to build a preview card, and each new share may trigger another request. A spike often means your content is circulating more widely.