# What is llms.txt, and should your website have one?

Published 2026-10-21 by the Axpecto team. Source: https://www.axpecto.com/blog/what-is-llms-txt

**Key takeaways**

- llms.txt is a proposed Markdown file at /llms.txt that summarises a site for AI models.
- It is cheap to add, but no major assistant documents using it yet: a small bonus, not a ranking factor.
- Lead with one sentence on what you are, then facts an assistant can quote and links to your key pages.

llms.txt is a proposed file, served at /llms.txt, that gives AI models a short Markdown summary of a website and links to its most useful pages. It was proposed by Jeremy Howard of Answer.AI in September 2024 (llmstxt.org). It is cheap to add, but as of October 2026 we have not seen OpenAI, Anthropic, Google or Perplexity document using it when their assistants answer questions, so treat it as a small bonus, not a ranking factor.

## What goes in an llms.txt file?

1. An H1 with the name of the site or product.
2. A blockquote with a one or two sentence summary.
3. Optional paragraphs with more detail.
4. H2 sections listing links to your key pages in Markdown, each with a short note on what it covers.

## What does a real llms.txt look like?

This is the start of ours, at axpecto.com/llms.txt:

```
# Axpecto

> Axpecto is an AI visibility (GEO) and AI agent readiness audit tool for websites.

Axpecto (axpecto.com) is a website audit service. It is not the PHP
framework that shares the name.

## Pages

- [AI Visibility (GEO) audit](https://www.axpecto.com/ai-visibility): what the audit measures
- [Pricing](https://www.axpecto.com/pricing): plans, credits and billing FAQ
```

## Does llms.txt help AI visibility?

Probably not much on its own today. The assistants your buyers use find pages through search, then read the pages themselves. What helps more is the same information on your real pages: a clear statement of what you do in the homepage HTML, Organization structured data, and pages that answer real questions. Some developer tools do read llms.txt to load documentation, which is where it is most useful now.

Axpecto's AI Visibility audit records whether you have an llms.txt and how many links it holds, but does not score it, for exactly this reason.

## Should you add one anyway?

- Yes if it takes you ten minutes: there is no downside, and it forces you to write a clear summary of your business, which is useful everywhere.
- Keep it true and current. A stale llms.txt that describes an old product is worse than none.
- Don't block it in robots.txt, and serve it as plain text.