Applebot
Apple •
Since 2015
Quick Actions
Official Docs
What is Applebot?
Applebot is Apple's web crawler that powers search features across Apple's ecosystem, including Siri web answers, Spotlight Suggestions, and Safari's search features. Introduced in 2015, Applebot has become increasingly important as Apple expands its search capabilities. The bot renders JavaScript, supports modern web standards, and respects robots.txt directives. With Apple's focus on privacy, Applebot doesn't build user profiles or track individuals. As Apple continues to develop its search technologies and potentially its own search engine, Applebot's role in the search ecosystem continues to grow.
User Agent String
Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_5) AppleWebKit/605.1.15 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/13.1.1 Safari/605.1.15 (Applebot/0.1; +http://www.apple.com/go/applebot)
How to Control Applebot
Block Completely
To prevent Applebot from accessing your entire website, add this to your robots.txt file:
# Block Applebot
User-agent: Applebot
Disallow: /
Block Specific Directories
To restrict access to certain parts of your site while allowing others:
User-agent: Applebot
Disallow: /admin/
Disallow: /private/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Allow: /public/
Set Crawl Delay
To slow down the crawl rate (note: not all bots respect this directive):
User-agent: Applebot
Crawl-delay: 10
How to Verify Applebot
Verification Method:
Reverse DNS to applebot.apple.com
Reverse DNS to applebot.apple.com
Learn more in the official documentation.
Detection Patterns
Multiple ways to detect Applebot in your application:
Basic Pattern
/Applebot/i
Strict Pattern
/^Mozilla/5\.0 \(Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_5\) AppleWebKit/605\.1\.15 \(KHTML, like Gecko\) Version/13\.1\.1 Safari/605\.1\.15 \(Applebot/0\.1; \+http\://www\.apple\.com/go/applebot\)$/
Flexible Pattern
/Applebot[\s\/]?[\d\.]*?/i
Vendor Match
/.*Apple.*Applebot/i
Implementation Examples
// PHP Detection for Applebot
function detect_applebot() {
$user_agent = $_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT'] ?? '';
$pattern = '/Applebot/i';
if (preg_match($pattern, $user_agent)) {
// Log the detection
error_log('Applebot detected from IP: ' . $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR']);
// Set cache headers
header('Cache-Control: public, max-age=3600');
header('X-Robots-Tag: noarchive');
// Optional: Serve cached version
if (file_exists('cache/' . md5($_SERVER['REQUEST_URI']) . '.html')) {
readfile('cache/' . md5($_SERVER['REQUEST_URI']) . '.html');
exit;
}
return true;
}
return false;
}
# Python/Flask Detection for Applebot
import re
from flask import request, make_response
def detect_applebot():
user_agent = request.headers.get('User-Agent', '')
pattern = r'Applebot'
if re.search(pattern, user_agent, re.IGNORECASE):
# Create response with caching
response = make_response()
response.headers['Cache-Control'] = 'public, max-age=3600'
response.headers['X-Robots-Tag'] = 'noarchive'
return True
return False
# Django Middleware
class ApplebotMiddleware:
def __init__(self, get_response):
self.get_response = get_response
def __call__(self, request):
if self.detect_bot(request):
# Handle bot traffic
pass
return self.get_response(request)
// JavaScript/Node.js Detection for Applebot
const express = require('express');
const app = express();
// Middleware to detect Applebot
function detectApplebot(req, res, next) {
const userAgent = req.headers['user-agent'] || '';
const pattern = /Applebot/i;
if (pattern.test(userAgent)) {
// Log bot detection
console.log('Applebot detected from IP:', req.ip);
// Set cache headers
res.set({
'Cache-Control': 'public, max-age=3600',
'X-Robots-Tag': 'noarchive'
});
// Mark request as bot
req.isBot = true;
req.botName = 'Applebot';
}
next();
}
app.use(detectApplebot);
# Apache .htaccess rules for Applebot
# Block completely
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} Applebot [NC]
RewriteRule .* - [F,L]
# Or redirect to a static version
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} Applebot [NC]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/static/
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /static/$1 [L]
# Or set environment variable for PHP
SetEnvIfNoCase User-Agent "Applebot" is_bot=1
# Add cache headers for this bot
<If "%{HTTP_USER_AGENT} =~ /Applebot/i">
Header set Cache-Control "public, max-age=3600"
Header set X-Robots-Tag "noarchive"
</If>
# Nginx configuration for Applebot
# Map user agent to variable
map $http_user_agent $is_applebot {
default 0;
~*Applebot 1;
}
server {
# Block the bot completely
if ($is_applebot) {
return 403;
}
# Or serve cached content
location / {
if ($is_applebot) {
root /var/www/cached;
try_files $uri $uri.html $uri/index.html @backend;
}
try_files $uri @backend;
}
# Add headers for bot requests
location @backend {
if ($is_applebot) {
add_header Cache-Control "public, max-age=3600";
add_header X-Robots-Tag "noarchive";
}
proxy_pass http://backend;
}
}
Should You Block This Bot?
Recommendations based on your website type:
| Site Type | Recommendation | Reasoning |
|---|---|---|
| E-commerce | Allow | Essential for product visibility in search results |
| Blog/News | Allow | Increases content reach and discoverability |
| SaaS Application | Block | No benefit for application interfaces; preserve resources |
| Documentation | Allow | Improves documentation discoverability for developers |
| Corporate Site | Allow | Allow for public pages, block sensitive areas like intranets |
Advanced robots.txt Configurations
E-commerce Site Configuration
User-agent: Applebot
Crawl-delay: 5
Disallow: /cart/
Disallow: /checkout/
Disallow: /my-account/
Disallow: /api/
Disallow: /*?sort=
Disallow: /*?filter=
Disallow: /*&page=
Allow: /products/
Allow: /categories/
Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml
Publishing/Blog Configuration
User-agent: Applebot
Crawl-delay: 10
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /drafts/
Disallow: /preview/
Disallow: /*?replytocom=
Allow: /
SaaS/Application Configuration
User-agent: Applebot
Disallow: /app/
Disallow: /api/
Disallow: /dashboard/
Disallow: /settings/
Allow: /
Allow: /pricing/
Allow: /features/
Allow: /docs/
Quick Reference
User Agent Match
Applebot
Robots.txt Name
Applebot
Category
search
Respects robots.txt
Yes
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