Perplexity-User
Perplexity AI •
Since 2024
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What is Perplexity-User?
Perplexity-User is the user agent used when Perplexity AI's search engine fetches web content in real-time to answer user queries. Unlike PerplexityBot which performs background crawling for indexing, Perplexity-User is triggered by specific user questions and retrieves content on demand. It respects robots.txt directives and operates transparently. Website owners can distinguish between Perplexity's indexing crawler and its user-facing search fetcher to make separate access decisions.
User Agent String
Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko; compatible; Perplexity-User/1.0; +https://perplexity.ai/perplexity-user)
How to Control Perplexity-User
Block Completely
To prevent Perplexity-User from accessing your entire website, add this to your robots.txt file:
# Block Perplexity-User
User-agent: Perplexity-User
Disallow: /
Block Specific Directories
To restrict access to certain parts of your site while allowing others:
User-agent: Perplexity-User
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: Perplexity-User
Crawl-delay: 10
How to Verify Perplexity-User
Verification Method:
Verify requests originate from Perplexity AI IP ranges
Verify requests originate from Perplexity AI IP ranges
Learn more in the official documentation.
⚠️ AI Training Notice
This bot may collect and use your website content for AI model training. Consider whether you want your content used for this purpose before allowing access.
This bot may collect and use your website content for AI model training. Consider whether you want your content used for this purpose before allowing access.
Detection Patterns
Multiple ways to detect Perplexity-User in your application:
Basic Pattern
/Perplexity\-User/iStrict Pattern
/^Mozilla/5\.0 AppleWebKit/537\.36 \(KHTML, like Gecko; compatible; Perplexity\-User/1\.0; \+https\://perplexity\.ai/perplexity\-user\)$/Flexible Pattern
/Perplexity\-User[\s\/]?[\d\.]*?/iVendor Match
/.*Perplexity AI.*Perplexity\-User/iImplementation Examples
// PHP Detection for Perplexity-User
function detect_perplexity_user() {
$user_agent = $_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT'] ?? '';
$pattern = '/Perplexity\\-User/i';
if (preg_match($pattern, $user_agent)) {
// Log the detection
error_log('Perplexity-User 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($_SERVER['REQUEST_URI']) . '.html');
exit;
}
return true;
}
return false;
}
# Python/Flask Detection for Perplexity-User
import re
from flask import request, make_responsedef detect_perplexity_user():
user_agent = request.headers.get('User-Agent', '')
pattern = r'Perplexity-User'
if re.search(pattern, user_agent, re.IGNORECASE):
# Create response with caching
response = make_response()
response.headers['Cache-Control'] = 'public, max-age=3600'
response.headers['X-Robots-Tag'] = 'noarchive'
return True
return False# Django Middleware
class PerplexityUserMiddleware:
def __init__(self, get_response):
self.get_response = get_response
def __call__(self, request):
if self.detect_bot(request):
# Handle bot traffic
pass
return self.get_response(request)
// JavaScript/Node.js Detection for Perplexity-User
const express = require('express');
const app = express();// Middleware to detect Perplexity-User
function detectPerplexityUser(req, res, next) {
const userAgent = req.headers['user-agent'] || '';
const pattern = /Perplexity-User/i;
if (pattern.test(userAgent)) {
// Log bot detection
console.log('Perplexity-User detected from IP:', req.ip);
// Set cache headers
res.set({
'Cache-Control': 'public, max-age=3600',
'X-Robots-Tag': 'noarchive'
});
// Mark request as bot
req.isBot = true;
req.botName = 'Perplexity-User';
}
next();
}app.use(detectPerplexityUser);
# Apache .htaccess rules for Perplexity-User# Block completely
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} Perplexity\-User [NC]
RewriteRule .* - [F,L]# Or redirect to a static version
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} Perplexity\-User [NC]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/static/
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /static/$1 [L]# Or set environment variable for PHP
SetEnvIfNoCase User-Agent "Perplexity\-User" is_bot=1# Add cache headers for this bot
<If "%{HTTP_USER_AGENT} =~ /Perplexity\-User/i">
Header set Cache-Control "public, max-age=3600"
Header set X-Robots-Tag "noarchive"
</If>
# Nginx configuration for Perplexity-User# Map user agent to variable
map $http_user_agent $is_perplexity_user {
default 0;
~*Perplexity\-User 1;
}server {
# Block the bot completely
if ($is_perplexity_user) {
return 403;
}
# Or serve cached content
location / {
if ($is_perplexity_user) {
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_perplexity_user) {
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 | Consider Blocking | Your content may be used for AI training without compensation |
| 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: Perplexity-User
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: Perplexity-User
# Blocking AI training bot
Disallow: /
SaaS/Application Configuration
User-agent: Perplexity-User
Disallow: /app/
Disallow: /api/
Disallow: /dashboard/
Disallow: /settings/
Allow: /
Allow: /pricing/
Allow: /features/
Allow: /docs/
Quick Reference
User Agent Match
Perplexity-UserRobots.txt Name
Perplexity-UserCategory
ai, searchRespects robots.txt
Yes
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