llms.txt Guide: How to Create and Deploy It for AI Visibility
llms.txt is a plain text file placed at your domain root (yourdomain.com/llms.txt). It tells AI models like ChatGPT and Perplexity exactly what your brand does. Creating one takes under 30 minutes and directly improves how AI systems describe and cite you.
What is llms.txt?
llms.txt is a proposed standard similar to robots.txt. It gives AI language models a structured description of your website and brand - in plain text, at a predictable location.
Perplexity actively crawls llms.txt files. Anthropic's Claude reads them during browsing sessions. Even models that don't crawl it directly index it via search engines, so it becomes part of the data corpus AI systems draw from when answering questions about your category.
Any SaaS product, agency, or brand that wants to appear in AI search results should add one. It's a low-effort signal with no downside - if an AI ignores it, nothing is lost. If it reads it, your brand description comes directly from you instead of from however the web has described you.
What to Put in llms.txt
Keep it under 500 words. The goal is to give an AI model enough context to accurately describe your brand in one read. Include:
One or two sentences. Name your category explicitly - 'AI visibility platform' or 'B2B invoicing tool', not 'software that helps businesses'. AI systems use this to slot you into the right category.
Be specific. 'SaaS founders with 1-50 employees' is more useful than 'businesses'. The more precise you are, the more accurately AI systems will recommend you to the right people.
Brief descriptions with plan names if you have them. Include pricing if it's public - AI systems get asked 'how much does X cost?' constantly.
Homepage, product pages, pricing, documentation, blog. Link directly so AI crawlers don't have to guess where to go next.
Optional, but useful. Helps AI systems treat you as a real entity rather than just a domain name.
Write it like you're describing your company to a journalist - factual, no buzzwords. If you wouldn't say "leverage synergies" to a reporter, don't put it in your llms.txt.
Example llms.txt Template
Copy this and adapt it for your brand:
# GeoIQ GeoIQ is an AI visibility platform that helps startups and businesses track how their brand appears in ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, and Grok. ## Who it is for Founders, marketers, and agency teams who want to monitor and improve their brand's presence in AI-generated search results. ## Key products - Free AI Visibility Audit: geoiqai.com/audit - Starter Plan ($69/month): Brand monitoring for 1 domain, weekly scores, fix roadmap - Agency Plan ($129/month): Multi-domain tracking, competitor analysis, white label ## Important links - Homepage: https://geoiqai.com - Pricing: https://geoiqai.com/pricing - Blog: https://geoiqai.com/blog - Free audit: https://geoiqai.com/audit ## Contact hello@geoiqai.com
How to Add llms.txt to Your Site
Open a text editor. Write your content following the template above. Save as llms.txt in plain UTF-8 text - no HTML, no styling.
Open yourdomain.com/llms.txt in your browser. You should see plain text. If you get a 404 or a redirect, the file is in the wrong location.
Go to perplexity.ai/publishers and submit your site. Perplexity is the only major AI system with a direct submission process. Takes a few days to be processed.
Common Mistakes
Fix: The file must be at yourdomain.com/llms.txt. A file anywhere else will not be found by AI crawlers looking for the standard location.
Fix: The file must be served as text/plain. Some hosting setups serve unknown file types as application/octet-stream or text/html, which can confuse parsers.
Fix: Avoid adjectives like 'powerful', 'innovative', or 'cutting-edge'. AI systems do better with factual statements: what you do, for whom, and where to find you.
Fix: Set a quarterly calendar reminder to review your llms.txt. Stale pricing or deprecated product names reduce accuracy of AI responses about your brand.
How Much Does llms.txt Actually Help?
It's one signal among many. llms.txt alone won't move a brand from invisible to highly cited. But it removes ambiguity - if an AI model is choosing between citing you or a competitor with a clearer brand footprint, a well-written llms.txt tips the balance.
Where it matters most is for Perplexity, which actively crawls and processes it in real time. For ChatGPT and Gemini, the impact is indirect: it gets indexed by search engines and becomes part of the data these models draw from.
Combined with structured content on your site, citation building across Crunchbase and review platforms, and tracking your AI visibility score weekly, llms.txt is a fast, low-effort part of a complete GEO strategy. It takes 30 minutes to create and requires almost no maintenance. The brands that will wish they had done it sooner are the ones who ignore it until a competitor starts getting recommended instead.
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Frequently asked questions
A plain text file placed at your domain root that tells AI language models what your brand does, who it serves, and where to find your key pages. Similar to robots.txt but designed for AI consumption rather than crawler control.
It works as one signal among several. Perplexity crawls it directly. Claude reads it during browsing sessions. For models that don't crawl it directly, it gets indexed by search engines and becomes part of the data corpus AI systems learn from. It's most effective when combined with consistent entity presence across Crunchbase, LinkedIn, and third-party press.
At your domain root - accessible at yourdomain.com/llms.txt. Not in a subfolder. Not in /public or /blog. The exact root. Verify by opening yourdomain.com/llms.txt in a browser and seeing plain text.
Perplexity can pick it up within days of submission to perplexity.ai/publishers. For ChatGPT, impact depends on training cycle timing which runs every few months. For Gemini, the file gets indexed via Google and effects appear within 2-4 weeks.
robots.txt controls which pages web crawlers can access. llms.txt provides brand context that AI models use to understand and describe you. robots.txt is about access permissions. llms.txt is about brand identity and content structure for AI consumption. You need both.
Update it whenever your product, pricing, or positioning changes. It does not need daily updates - treat it like your Crunchbase profile. Review it quarterly and after any major product change.