Shopify robots.txt: what the default file blocks and when to edit it

Where to see your robots.txt

Open yourstore.com/robots.txt in a browser. That is the live file. There is no robots.txt in the theme by default: Shopify builds it, and it adds your sitemap line (Sitemap: https://yourstore.com/sitemap.xml) at the end.

The default file, line by line

These are the main rules from the default file of a live Shopify store we checked in October 2026. Your store's file may have a few more lines, and Shopify updates the defaults from time to time.

Shopify also adds separate groups for some bots, such as a crawl delay for AhrefsBot, and a sitemap line in each group.

"Blocked by robots.txt" in Search Console is usually fine

In Search Console > Indexing > Pages, many Shopify stores see hundreds of URLs under Blocked by robots.txt. Open the list. If it is cart, checkout, account, search, sort and filter URLs, that is Shopify working as designed. Do nothing.

Only act if a URL you want in Google is on that list, such as a product or collection. Then something has changed the file, usually a robots.txt.liquid edit or an app.

How to edit robots.txt on Shopify

Shopify's steps (Shopify Help Center, editing robots.txt.liquid, checked October 2026):

1. In the admin, go to Online Store > Themes.
2. Click the three dots on your theme, then Edit code.
3. Click Add a new template, choose robots, then Create template.
4. Edit the template and save it on your published theme.

Shopify's warning is worth reading twice: "This is an unsupported customization. Shopify Support can't help with edits to the robots.txt.liquid file... Incorrect use of the feature can result in loss of all traffic."

Safe edits, with code

Shopify's developer docs recommend keeping the default rules and adding to them with Liquid, rather than replacing the file with plain text (Shopify Dev, customize robots.txt). The new template starts with code that prints the defaults. To add one rule to the main group:

{% for group in robots.default_groups %}
  {{- group.user_agent }}

  {%- for rule in group.rules -%}
    {{ rule }}
  {%- endfor -%}

  {%- if group.user_agent.value == '*' -%}
    {{ 'Disallow: /*?q=*' }}
  {%- endif -%}

  {%- if group.sitemap != blank -%}
    {{ group.sitemap }}
  {%- endif -%}
{% endfor %}

To block one crawler completely, add a new group as plain text after the loop:

User-agent: GPTBot
Disallow: /

Good reasons to edit:

• A search or filter app creates crawlable URLs with its own parameter.
• You want to block AI training crawlers.
• You need an extra sitemap line for a second sitemap.

Bad reasons:

• Hiding a page from Google. Use noindex, see how to noindex a page in Shopify.
• Blocking /collections/*/products/*. Those URLs carry a canonical to the clean product URL. Google needs to crawl them to read it.
• Blocking theme assets or /cdn/. Google needs CSS, JavaScript and images to render your pages.

AI crawlers on Shopify

Shopify's default file does not block AI crawlers. Each AI company now runs separate bots for training and for search answers:

Sources: OpenAI bots, Google common crawlers. Blocking the search bots can keep your products out of AI shopping answers, so most stores only block training bots, if any.

The noindex conflict

Robots.txt controls crawling. Noindex controls indexing. If you block a URL in robots.txt, Google cannot see a noindex tag on it, and the URL can stay in results without a description (Google Search Central, robots.txt intro). For any URL, pick one.