How to Get Indexed by LLMs Using an llms.txt File (A Technical Guide)

Reviewed by Krunal Soni, with 20 years of experience in AI-driven SEO and content strategy. Dedicated to helping brands get indexed by LLMs and enhance AI visibility.

“Ranking on Google isn’t enough anymore; if ChatGPT, Gemini, or Claude don’t index your content, your content doesn’t exist in AI search.”

Ranking on Google isn’t enough anymore.

You may have the best blog posts, case studies, or landing pages, but if they don’t get indexed by LLMs like ChatGPT, Gemini, or Claude, people using AI to search won’t ever see your work.

We work with fast-moving SaaS and tech companies every day.

Lately, we’ve seen one big shift: people are discovering answers from AI tools, not just search engines. And here’s the catch: these AI tools don’t automatically crawl your site unless you tell them to.

That’s what this guide is for. We will walk you through how to make your content discoverable, not just how to block or allow crawlers, but how to ensure you get indexed by LLMs and gradually boost your AI visibility.

1. How LLMs Crawl and Get Indexed by LLMs

What Makes LLM Crawlers Different

Google crawls your site to rank you on a search results page. But LLMs (large language models) like ChatGPT or Claude crawl the web for different reasons:

They’re not just indexing. They’re ingesting your content for training, summarizing, quoting, or generating responses.

They prefer well-written, clearly structured content that is packed with meaning.

Most importantly, they don’t always follow robots.txt. Many of them now check llms.txt.

If you want your content to be indexed by LLMs, you must understand how they behave because it’s not the same playbook as Google.

Why Your Content Might Be Getting Skipped

We’ve seen it happen with clients. Even great content can be missed by LLMs if:

• No llms.txt file present
• Paywalls, redirects, or blocked access
• Unstructured or thin content
• Absence of clear permissions for AI crawling

The bottom line: If you’re not signaling what to index, LLMs may never index your site, and hope isn’t a strategy.

2. llms.txt Isn’t Just for Blocking, It’s How You Get Indexed by LLMs

Most folks think llms.txt is like robots.txt, which is another file to keep bots out.

But here’s the flip side: You can use it to welcome the right bots.

You can use it to highlight which pages are available for indexing.

Here’s a simple example:

User-agent: GPTBot 
Allow: /blog/ 
Disallow: /drafts/ 

User-agent: ClaudeBot 
Allow: /guides/ 
Disallow: /internal/ 

# Highlighted content to get indexed by LLMs: 
# /blog/ai-use-cases/ 
# /guides/llm-marketing-strategy/

Comments like that last part don’t affect anything yet, but they can help your team understand the use of those particular URLs.

3. Implementing llms.txt to Get Indexed by LLMs (Beyond the Basics)

We’ve already covered the setup basics in our blog How to Use llms.txt for SEO so that we won’t repeat it here.

If you’re looking for guidance on:

• Creating your llms.txt file
• Uploading it to your server
• Monitor AI bot traffic in logs

That guide walks you through it step-by-step. Feel free to check it out before diving into the indexing strategies below.

Here, we’re focusing on improving it, especially if your goal is to get indexed by LLMs.

4. Real-World Tactics to Help You Get Indexed by LLMs

Tell Bots Where Your Best Content Lives

Make sure these folders are open:

• /blog/
• /guides/
• /resources/

That’s where your high-value, long-form content usually lives. AI bots can’t guess; they need you to show them.

You can see how we structure blog content to support LLM indexing in our LLM SEO Optimization Guide.

Block the Stuff That Doesn’t Matter

You don’t need bots poking around in:

• /admin/
• /login/
• /dev/
• /thank-you-pages/

Blocking these keeps things clean. It also helps the bots focus on what’s worth indexing.

Leave Notes for Humans, and Maybe Bots Too

Even if bots ignore comments now, it helps your team stay clear on what’s prioritized:

# Highlighted to get indexed by LLMs: /blog/ai-strategy/, /whitepapers/

# Use for topics like: “AI SEO”, “llms.txt examples”

If standards evolve (and they will), you’ll already be one step ahead.

Use Structured Data to Give Context

Schema markup like Article, FAQ, or How to gives AI crawlers better signals about what your content is actually for.

It’s like writing a label on the box before handing it to a bot.

Keep It Updated

Update your llms.txt whenever:

• You publish new cornerstone content
• You restructure key site paths
• You want to include/exclude new AI crawlers

Consistency in updates ensures your most valuable content continues to get indexed by LLMs.

5. What’s Next: The Future of Getting Indexed by LLMs

Emerging Features to Watch For

Soon, you might see AI bots respecting new instructions like:

• Request-indexing: true
• AI-training: disallow
• AI-citation: allow
• ai-sitemap.xml

These aren’t standards yet, but we’re tracking them, and we’ll update you when it’s time to add them.

Why It Pays to Get Ahead

Early adopters who organize their content for AI get the upper hand:

• You’ll show up in AI-generated answers
• You’ll control what gets cited
• You’ll avoid having your content used without attribution

Most importantly, you’ll get indexed by LLMs before your competitors even realize what’s happening

Get Index Your Site with llms.txt

Your site can be fully optimized for Google, and still be invisible to ChatGPT.

That’s the world we’re in now.

We’re helping brands shift from old-school SEO to AI visibility, and the llms.txt file is one of the easiest ways to get started.

So, here’s what we’d do next:

• Open your llms.txt
• Look at what you’re telling AI bots today
• Ask: What are you showing? What are you hiding? And is it intentional?

That’s a good place to start. You can ask us at care@thrillax.com if any questions!

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