# Ahrefs: 97% of llms.txt files were never requested

> The Ahrefs study of 137 thousand domains - how many sites publish llms.txt, who requests it and why the numbers need to be read with caveats

Page: https://llms-full-txt.ru/en/blog/ahrefs-llms-txt-study/
Site index: https://llms-full-txt.ru/en/llms.txt

Event date: 2026-06-15

Published: 2026-10-03

On June 15, 2026, [Ahrefs](https://ahrefs.com/blog/llmstxt-study) published a study of requests to `llms.txt`. It is the largest measurement so far made from request logs rather than from the presence of the file.

## What was measured

The sample is 137,210 domains connected to Ahrefs web analytics. The period is May 2026. The authors looked at who has the file and who requested it.

| Measure | Value |
|---|---|
| Domains with the file | 28% |
| Files with no requests in a month | 97% |
| Requests made by bots | 96% |
| Share of SEO audit tools | 21.7% |
| Share of AI bots | 19.5% |

Among AI bots, agents made the most requests, and bots that collect answers to user questions made the fewest: about one percent.

## How to read it

**28% is an upper bound.** Ahrefs analytics is installed by people who work on promotion. A crawl of the whole web gives about two percent.

**"Requested" does not mean "used".** A log shows a request to an address. What the bot did with the content is not visible in the log.

**A notable share of requests comes from checking tools.** The file is requested by an audit more often than by an AI system.

## What the study does not show

- That the file is useless for agents in code editors: there the user gives the address, and that request is rare but purposeful.
- How the picture changes after the second edition of the proposal, which came out in August.

## What a site owner should do

Look in your own server logs to see who requests `/llms.txt`. It is the only measurement that concerns your site: [How to measure AI visibility](https://llms-full-txt.ru/en/guides/ai-visibility/). A summary of all studies: [Does llms.txt work](https://llms-full-txt.ru/en/guides/does-llms-txt-work/).