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meta-externalagent

The Meta-ExternalAgent crawler crawls the web for use cases such as training AI models or improving products by indexing content directly.
meta-externalagent
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What is meta-externalagent?

meta-externalagent is an AI crawler. The Meta-ExternalAgent crawler crawls the web for use cases such as training AI models or improving products by indexing content directly.

meta-externalagent matters for AI visibility because the pages it collects can shape what large language models learn about your brand, products, and expertise. Allowing it can strengthen how accurately AI systems describe and recommend you, while disallowing it keeps your content out of training data. Either way, knowing meta-externalagent visits is the first step to managing how your brand shows up in AI search.

Tracking which AI crawlers and agents reach your site, and what they do once there, is the foundation of generative engine optimization. See our guides to AI crawlers and robots.txt to control automated access and protect your AI search visibility.

Want to see every AI bot hitting your site? Promptwatch turns your server and CDN logs into a live view of AI crawler and agent traffic, so you can watch ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini, and others crawl your pages and connect those visits to real citations and revenue. Learn more in AI crawler logs.

See every AI bot hitting your site

Promptwatch turns your server and CDN logs into a live view of AI crawler and agent traffic. Watch ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini, and more crawl your pages in real time, see exactly what they take, and connect every crawl to the citations and revenue it drives.

How to handle meta-externalagent

If you do not want meta-externalagent using your content for AI training, disallow it in robots.txt. If you are comfortable contributing to AI systems, leave it allowed.

To control meta-externalagent, add a rule for its user agent to your robots.txt:

User-agent: meta-externalagent
Disallow: /

meta-externalagent generally honors robots.txt directives.

Examples

  • A publisher reviews server logs, sees meta-externalagent requesting long-form articles, and decides whether to allow or disallow it in robots.txt.
  • A site owner adds a Disallow rule for meta-externalagent to keep premium guides out of AI training datasets.

Related bots

AI2Bot

AI2Bot is operated by the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (Ai2) to crawl the web for content to train open-source AI models.

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aiHitBot

aiHitBot collects and maintains historical information about companies.

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Amazonbot

Amazonbot is Amazon's web crawler used to improve our services, such as enabling Alexa to more accurately answer questions for customers.

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Applebot

Applebot powers search features in Apple's ecosystem (Spotlight, Siri, Safari) and may be used to train Apple's foundation models for generative AI features.

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Atlassian Rovo

Crawls and indexes web content for Atlassian Rovo's AI-powered search, chat, and agents.

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Frequently asked questions about meta-externalagent

Learn about AI visibility monitoring and how Promptwatch helps your brand succeed in AI search.

meta-externalagent is an AI crawler; its operator is identified in its user-agent string and public documentation.

Be the brand AI recommends

Monitor your brand's visibility across ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, and Gemini. Get actionable insights and create content that gets cited by AI search engines.

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