# llms.txt Explained: What It Is, What It Does Not Do, and How to Add One to WordPress

URL: https://amasoai.com/llms-txt-explained/
Updated: 2026-10-31
Site: Amaso AI

**In short:** llms.txt is a plain text file, written in Markdown and placed at the root of a website (for example *yoursite.com/llms.txt*), that gives AI tools a short, clean summary of the site and links to its most useful pages. It is a proposal, not a standard. It can help AI tools read your site, but no AI assistant has promised to cite you because you have one, and Google says you need no special file to appear in its AI features. Add it because it is cheap and useful, not because it is a shortcut.

## Where does llms.txt come from?

The format was proposed in September 2024 by Jeremy Howard of Answer.AI. The idea is simple: web pages are full of menus, scripts and layout that language models have to dig through, so a site can offer a short Markdown version of what matters most. Some documentation sites publish one, including Anthropic’s developer docs.

## What goes in an llms.txt file?

The proposal describes a small, readable structure:

- a title (the name of the site or business) on the first line;
- a one-paragraph summary of what you do, for whom and where;
- sections of links to your key pages, each with one line saying what the page contains: services, prices, contact, guides, policies.

A companion file, *llms-full.txt*, can hold the full text of those pages in one place.

## What does llms.txt not do?

- **It does not control crawling.** Which bots may read your site is set in robots.txt. If you block an AI crawler there, an llms.txt file will not let it in.
- **It is not a ranking or citation signal anyone has confirmed.** None of the main assistants has documented using it to choose what to cite.
- **It does not replace good pages.** If your service page does not say what you do, where and at what price, a summary of that page will not either.

## So is it worth adding?

Yes, if it is kept up to date and costs you nothing to maintain. It gives any AI tool that does read it an accurate, current summary of your business, written by you. The risk is a stale file: an llms.txt listing old prices or a closed service sends the wrong facts to exactly the tools you want to inform. An outdated file is worse than none.

## How do I add llms.txt to a WordPress site?

1. **Use a plugin that builds it from your content**, so it updates when your pages change. [Amaso AI Free](https://wordpress.org/plugins/amaso/), free on WordPress.org, generates /llms.txt and /llms-full.txt from your business profile and your published pages, and adds a pointer to them in robots.txt.
2. **Check that only one plugin writes it.** SEO plugins and some hosting tools can generate their own llms.txt. Two generators means one silently overwrites the other: keep one. A static llms.txt file uploaded to your web root also takes priority over any plugin.
3. **Open yoursite.com/llms.txt in a browser** and read it as a stranger would. Is the summary right? Are the links your most important pages? Is anything private or outdated in it?
4. **Check robots.txt** to make sure the answer crawlers you want (OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, PerplexityBot) are allowed; training crawlers such as GPTBot, ClaudeBot and Google-Extended are a separate choice.

## What matters more than llms.txt?

The pages it points to. AI assistants cite pages that answer a question directly, state concrete facts and are described the same way across the web. Structured data helps machines read those facts: see our [JSON-LD guide for WordPress](/json-ld-schema-for-ai-visibility-a-beginners-guide-for-wordpress-sites/). And the only way to know whether any of this works is to check what the assistants actually say: our guide [How to check whether ChatGPT cites your WordPress site](/how-to-check-whether-chatgpt-cites-your-wordpress-site/) shows how.

## Frequently asked questions

### Does Google use llms.txt?

Google’s guidance for its AI features says no special file is required to appear in them. Normal search eligibility (a crawlable, indexable page) is what counts.

### Can llms.txt block AI from using my content?

No. To allow or block AI crawlers, use robots.txt. llms.txt only offers a summary to tools that choose to read it.

### How often should llms.txt be updated?

Whenever your services, prices or key pages change. A generator that rebuilds it from your published content keeps it current without manual work.

### Is llms.txt the same as a sitemap?

No. A sitemap lists every page for search engines. llms.txt is a short summary of the pages that matter most, meant to be read by language models.

### Can someone set this up for me?

Yes. Our team and our partner agency Vatam can check your llms.txt, schema and key pages for you, starting with a free consultation. See [AI visibility, done for you](/services/).

Read more: [What Is AI Visibility (GEO)?](/what-is-ai-visibility-geo/)