Concept3 min read

What is llms.txt?

A plain-text file that tells AI engines what your site is and what to cite — think robots.txt, but for LLMs.

llms.txt is an emerging convention: a file at yoursite.com/llms.txt that gives answer engines a clean, structured summary of your site — the same way robots.txt gives crawlers rules, llms.txt gives LLMs context.

What to include

  • A one-paragraph description of who you are and what you do, in the words you want engines to repeat.
  • Your products or services, each with a canonical URL.
  • How you want to be cited — canonical brand name and preferred citation format.
  • Authoritative links — the pages that best answer common questions about you (docs, pricing, comparisons).

Why it helps

Retrieval systems reward clean, unambiguous context. An llms.txt reduces the odds of engines describing you with stale or third-party wording, and AEOquest's Site Audit and Diagnose both check for it.