Google-Extended vs PerplexityBot: Which AI Crawler Should You Allow or Block?
Complete side-by-side comparison of Google-Extended (Google) and PerplexityBot (Perplexity AI): user-agent strings, safety ratings, SEO impact, and copy-paste blocking rules. Updated August 2026.
Quick Verdict
Both Google-Extended and PerplexityBot carry the same safety rating (Safe). Your decision should come down to whether you want your content used by Google versus Perplexity AI, and whether each bot's purpose (training, search, or user requests) aligns with your content strategy.
| Attribute | Google-Extended | PerplexityBot |
|---|---|---|
| Operator | Perplexity AI | |
| User-agent string | Google-Extended |
PerplexityBot |
| Category | AI & LLM Bots | AI & LLM Bots |
| Safety rating | Safe | Safe |
| SEO impact if blocked | Low - No SEO ranking impact | Low - No SEO ranking impact |
| Recommendation | Generally safe to allow; provides legitimate crawling value. | Generally safe to allow; provides legitimate crawling value. |
| Official docs | Google-Extended docs | PerplexityBot docs |
What is Google-Extended?
A standalone token that allows web publishers to control whether their content is used to train Google's AI models (Gemini, Vertex AI) without affecting Google Search ranking.
Full Google-Extended guideWhat is PerplexityBot?
PerplexityBot is the web crawler for Perplexity AI. It gathers real-time information to answer user queries with citations.
Full PerplexityBot guideHow to block each bot
Block Google-Extended in robots.txt
User-agent: Google-Extended Disallow: /
Block PerplexityBot in robots.txt
User-agent: PerplexityBot Disallow: /
Want to block or allow many bots at once? Use our free robots.txt generator with 196+ bot presets, then verify with the AI crawler checker.
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