AI crawlers · Search indexes
DuckDuckBot
DuckDuckBot is the search index crawler run by DuckDuckGo: indexes pages for DuckDuckGo search. Its operator documents how to verify it: published IP list at duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/duckduckbot.
| User-agent token | DuckDuckBot |
| Operator | DuckDuckGo |
| What it does | indexes pages for DuckDuckGo search |
| Kind | search index crawler |
| Can a request be verified? | Yes — operator published ranges |
| Verification source | published IP list at duckduckgo.com/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/duckduckbot |
| In a CrawlCheck scan | Read from robots.txt; a refusal is scored |
Allow or block it in robots.txt
User-agent: DuckDuckBot Disallow: /
User-agent: DuckDuckBot Allow: /
Add a group that names it: "User-agent: DuckDuckBot" followed by "Disallow: /". A crawler follows only the most specific group that names it, so once a group names DuckDuckBot, rules under "User-agent: *" no longer apply to it; repeat in that group any Disallow lines you still want.
What blocking it changes
Indirectly. It feeds indexes pages for DuckDuckGo search. A refusal removes pages from that index, and most AI answer surfaces still draw on search indexes.
What it actually did on crawlcheck.io
| Verified requests | 147 |
| Requests using its name from outside its operator's ranges | 0 (0% of claims) |
| robots.txt fetched | 0 times |
| Fetches of paths robots.txt disallows | 0 |
| Observed | 2026-08-12 to 2026-11-12 |
Measured on this site’s own traffic, verified against the operator’s published ranges. Every agent’s record: agent conduct.
Other agents from DuckDuckGo
DuckAssistBot— DuckDuckGo DuckAssist
See what DuckDuckBot 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.