What is llms.txt and do you need one?

What it is

llms.txt is a simple Markdown file at the root of your domain (yoursite.com/llms.txt) that tells AI crawlers what your site is about and which pages matter most. Think of it as a sitemap written for language models instead of search engines.

It's an emerging convention, not yet a hard standard — but it's trivial to add and aligns your site with how AI tools want to read it.

What goes in it

A short description of what your site/product does, then curated links to your most important pages — tools, key guides, docs, pricing — each with a one-line description. Keep it clean and high-signal; it's a guide to your best content, not a dump of every URL.

Does it actually help?

Honestly: it's not a magic ranking lever, and being cited by AI depends far more on what third-party sources say about you. But llms.txt is near-zero effort, it makes your site easier for AI tools to understand, and it signals you take AI discoverability seriously. Low cost, sensible upside.

How to add one

Generate it from the same source as your sitemap so it stays in sync, and serve it at /llms.txt as plain text/Markdown. If you use Next.js, Astro or similar, a small route or static file does it. Then add an llms.txt to your routine whenever you ship important new pages.

Frequently asked questions

Is llms.txt required? No — it's optional and emerging. It's a cheap nice-to-have, not a must.

Does it replace robots.txt or sitemap.xml? No. Keep all three; they serve different crawlers and purposes.