A robots.txt file is used to communicate with web crawlers and tell them how a website owner wants their site to be crawled. When a search engine bot visits a website, the robots.txt file is typically the first file it checks for instructions.
Located at the root of a website, this file specifies which pages or sections crawlers are allowed or disallowed from accessing. While robots.txt does not guarantee that restricted pages won’t appear in search results, it helps prevent unnecessary or sensitive content from being crawled. Proper use of a robots.txt file supports search engine optimization by guiding crawlers toward the most valuable content on a site.