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AI crawler profile

What is Applebot-Extended? How to allow or block Apple's crawler

User-agent string to match in robots.txt and server logs: Applebot-Extended

Operator

Apple

Purpose

AI model training

robots.txt

Respects robots.txt

Official docs

Apple documentation ↗

Applebot-Extended, like Google-Extended, is a robots.txt control token rather than a distinct crawler: pages are still fetched by the regular Applebot that powers Siri and Spotlight. Disallowing Applebot-Extended opts your content out of Apple Intelligence model training without affecting Siri/Spotlight visibility.

Does Applebot-Extended respect robots.txt?

Apple documents the token officially and honors it via Applebot's crawl infrastructure.

Verify it's really Applebot-Extended

The user-agent string above is self-declared, so anything can send it. Apple publishes Applebot-Extended's IP ranges as JSON, which is what makes a rule verifiable: check the request's IP against the published prefixes instead of trusting the name. Requests claiming to be Applebot-Extended from outside those ranges are spoofed — useful to know whether you're allowing or blocking it.

Block Applebot-Extended with robots.txt

robots.txt — block
User-agent: Applebot-Extended
Disallow: /

Explicitly allow Applebot-Extended

robots.txt — allow
User-agent: Applebot-Extended
Allow: /

Block Applebot-Extended at the server or CDN

robots.txt is the right first step for Applebot-Extended, since Apple honors it. Use these only if you want the block enforced rather than requested — for example to stop agents spoofing the user agent. Matching on the user-agent string still trusts a self-declared header — pair it with an IP check against the published ranges above for a rule that can't be spoofed.

nginx
if ($http_user_agent ~* "Applebot-Extended") {
    return 403;
}
apache — .htaccess
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} Applebot-Extended [NC]
RewriteRule .* - [F,L]
cloudflare — WAF expression
(http.user_agent contains "Applebot-Extended")

Find Applebot-Extended in your server logs

shell
grep -i "Applebot-Extended" /var/log/nginx/access.log | wc -l

Should you block Applebot-Extended?

Blocking Applebot-Extended opts your content out of Apple's model training — a legitimate choice for original content you don't want reproduced by AI. The trade-off: models trained without your content are less likely to know your brand or recommend it unprompted. There is no direct traffic loss today, since training crawlers don't send visitors. See our guide on whether to block AI bots for the full decision framework.

Check and monitor Applebot-Extended on your site

Related reading

Frequently asked questions

What is Applebot-Extended?

Applebot-Extended is Apple's web crawler for collecting AI training data. Controls use of content for training Apple's AI models (Apple Intelligence).

Does Applebot-Extended respect robots.txt?

Apple documents the token officially and honors it via Applebot's crawl infrastructure.

How do I block Applebot-Extended?

Add "User-agent: Applebot-Extended" followed by "Disallow: /" to your robots.txt file. The change takes effect the next time the bot fetches your robots.txt.

Does blocking Applebot-Extended hurt my Google rankings?

No. Applebot-Extended is separate from Googlebot, which handles Google Search indexing. Blocking Applebot-Extended has no effect on your traditional search rankings.

How can I tell if Applebot-Extended is crawling my site?

Search your server access logs for the string "Applebot-Extended" — for example: grep -i "Applebot-Extended" /var/log/nginx/access.log | wc -l. Our free AI Bot Log Analyzer does this in your browser: paste a log file and it counts hits per AI crawler, including Applebot-Extended, with per-path breakdowns.

How do I use Applebot-Extended?

You don't — Applebot-Extended isn't a tool you run. It's Apple's own crawler, operated by Apple, that visits your site from their infrastructure. The only control you have over it is whether you allow or block it, via robots.txt or a server rule. If you're looking to crawl other sites yourself, you'd write your own crawler or use a crawling library; sending "Applebot-Extended" as your user agent would be impersonating Apple.

Where is the official Apple documentation for Applebot-Extended?

Apple publishes it at https://support.apple.com/en-us/119829. That page is the authoritative source for the user-agent string and Apple's stated crawling policy, and Apple also publishes Applebot-Extended's IP ranges as JSON at https://search.developer.apple.com/applebot.json so you can verify requests rather than trusting the header.

More Apple agents

Part of our directory of every known AI crawler, refreshed monthly. Last verified: 2026-08-14.