CrawlCheck

AI crawlers · Answer engines

DuckAssistBot

DuckAssistBot is the answer-engine crawler run by DuckDuckGo: DuckDuckGo DuckAssist. Its operator documents how to verify it: published IP ranges.

User-agent tokenDuckAssistBot
OperatorDuckDuckGo
What it doesDuckDuckGo DuckAssist
Kindanswer-engine crawler
Can a request be verified?Yes — operator documented
Verification sourcepublished IP ranges
In a CrawlCheck scanRead from robots.txt; a refusal is scored

Allow or block it in robots.txt

User-agent: DuckAssistBot
Disallow: /
User-agent: DuckAssistBot
Allow: /

Add a group that names it: "User-agent: DuckAssistBot" followed by "Disallow: /". A crawler follows only the most specific group that names it, so once a group names DuckAssistBot, rules under "User-agent: *" no longer apply to it; repeat in that group any Disallow lines you still want.

What blocking it changes

Yes. It is how DuckDuckGo reaches a page to answer a question or to build the index its answers read, so refusing it stops that engine reading the site.

Other agents from DuckDuckGo

See what DuckAssistBot and every other named agent receive from your own site: run a free scan. The full catalogue is on AI crawlers and as JSON at /ai-crawlers.json.

Questions about DuckAssistBot

QHow do I block DuckAssistBot in robots.txt?
Add a group that names it: "User-agent: DuckAssistBot" followed by "Disallow: /". A crawler follows only the most specific group that names it, so once a group names DuckAssistBot, rules under "User-agent: *" no longer apply to it; repeat in that group any Disallow lines you still want.
QHow can I tell if a request from DuckAssistBot is real?
Its operator documents how to verify it: published IP ranges.
QDoes blocking DuckAssistBot affect whether my site appears in AI answers?
Yes. It is how DuckDuckGo reaches a page to answer a question or to build the index its answers read, so refusing it stops that engine reading the site.
QDoes CrawlCheck test my site as DuckAssistBot?
Not as a request. CrawlCheck reads the rules your robots.txt sets for DuckAssistBot and reports them. A refusal of it counts toward the grade, because it costs the site visibility.