What is iAskBot?
iAskBot is an undocumented AI agent operated by iAsk. You can set up Agent Analytics to see when iAskBot visits your website.
Category
| Example User Agent | Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/605.1.15 (KHTML, like Gecko; compatible; iAskBot/1.0; +https://iask.ai/) Chrome/124.0.6367.171 Safari/605.1.15 |
| Operated By | iAsk |
| Source | Official Website |
| Triggered By | Unknown |
| Used for AI Model Training | Unknown |
| Affects AI Chat & Search Visibility | Unknown |
| Expected To Follow Robots.txt | Yes |
Why Is iAskBot Visiting My Website?
iAsk has not disclosed why it visits. Possibilities include training-data collection, index building, or an unannounced experiment. Its request pattern is the best available clue to its purpose.
Should I Block iAskBot?
Be cautious. iAsk has not stated why iAskBot visits, so any benefit is difficult to weigh against the cost. Block it if the traffic is excessive or targets content you do not want collected. Doing so does not affect traditional search rankings. For context, 9% of the top websites we track currently have robots.txt rules for iAskBot.
How Do I Block iAskBot Using Robots.txt?
Add this rule to your robots.txt file to block iAskBot from accessing your website, or use Automatic Robots.txt to block all undocumented AI agents at once. You can customize which pages are blocked by swapping out / for a different path.
User-agent: iAskBot # https://knownagents.com/agents/iaskbot
Disallow: /Insights for iAskBot
As of October 29, 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 Compliance
Country of Origin
Robots.txt Blocked Percentage
Frequently Asked Questions
What Traffic Patterns Should I Expect From iAskBot?
iAskBot has no reliable traffic profile. Its crawl rate and targeting may change without notice, so the patterns recorded in Agent Analytics are the best guide to its behavior.
Does iAskBot Follow Robots.txt Rules?
iAskBot is expected to follow robots.txt rules, so a disallow rule is the appropriate first step if you want to block it. Automatic Robots.txt can add and maintain that rule, while Agent Analytics lets you verify whether iAskBot respects it.
Is iAskBot Used for AI Model Training?
Unknown. iAskBot's operator has not documented enough about its purpose to determine whether collected content is used for AI model training.
Does Blocking iAskBot Affect AI Search or Citations?
Unknown. iAskBot's role is not documented well enough to determine whether blocking it affects AI search results or citations.
Does iAskBot Access Private Content?
Unknown. No access boundaries have been published for iAskBot. Assume it can read anything publicly reachable, and make sure sensitive areas require authentication.
How Can I Verify a Request From iAskBot?
Agent Analytics tracks iAskBot visits in real time. You can also check your server logs for requests whose user-agent string contains "iAskBot". Compare its volume and targets over time; sudden changes may reveal a shift in purpose. Because iAskBot does not publish a verification method, any client can claim its identity and a log match is only a clue.