Safe Official docs Google Bots

FeedFetcher-Google

Operated by Google

Quick Facts

User-Agent:
FeedFetcher-Google
Category:
Google Bots
Operator:
Google
Safety:
Safe
Blocking Impact:
Medium - Affects a specific feature, not rankings
SEO Impact Score:
6/10
Official docs:
developers.google.com

Confirmed by the operator

Google names FeedFetcher-Google on its own documentation page, linked above. The token, purpose and robots.txt behaviour on this profile come from that page, re-checked on October 19, 2026.

What is FeedFetcher-Google?

FeedFetcher-Google retrieves RSS and Atom feeds on behalf of Google services that subscribe to them, such as Google News and PubSubHubbub delivery.

FeedFetcher-Google retrieves RSS and Atom feeds on behalf of Google services that subscribe to them, such as Google News and PubSubHubbub delivery.
FeedFetcher-Google identifies itself with the user-agent token FeedFetcher-Google. You can control it with a User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google group in robots.txt. Robots.txt is voluntary, so for hard enforcement combine it with server-level blocking.

What happens if you block FeedFetcher-Google?

⚠️ Blocking FeedFetcher-Google does not affect how your pages rank in Google Search, because it is not the indexing crawler. What it does stop is feed delivery: Google products that subscribe to your RSS or Atom feed will no longer receive updates, so feed-driven surfaces go stale. If you do not publish a feed, blocking it changes nothing at all.
Allow it if you publish a feed that Google products consume.

How to control FeedFetcher-Google with robots.txt

<code>User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google</code> - Matching is case-insensitive. Robots.txt is fetched from the root of each subdomain separately.

Block completely (robots.txt)
User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google Disallow: /
Allow all (robots.txt)
User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google Allow: /
Block private only (robots.txt)
User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google Disallow: /private/ Disallow: /api/ Disallow: /admin/ Allow: /
Nginx server block
# Nginx: Block FeedFetcher-Google if ($http_user_agent ~* "FeedFetcher-Google") { return 403 "Bot blocked"; }
Apache .htaccess
# Apache: Block FeedFetcher-Google SetEnvIfNoCase User-Agent "FeedFetcher-Google" bad_bot Order Allow,Deny Allow from all Deny from env=bad_bot
Meta robots tag
<meta name="robots" content="noindex, nofollow">
X-Robots-Tag header
X-Robots-Tag: noindex, nofollow

Is FeedFetcher-Google safe to allow?

Yes, FeedFetcher-Google is a safe and legitimate crawler. It is operated by Google and documented publicly, and it identifies itself honestly with the token FeedFetcher-Google. Allow it if you publish a feed that Google products consume.
Verify by reverse-DNS: genuine Google fetchers resolve to googlebot.com, google.com or googleusercontent.com. Confirm the forward lookup matches the original IP.

What does FeedFetcher-Google do?

Understanding what FeedFetcher-Google is for helps you decide whether to allow or block it.

  • Retrieves RSS and Atom feed documents
  • Serves Google products that subscribe to feeds
  • Refetches feeds when publishers push updates
  • Does not perform general page crawling
  • Respects robots.txt directives

FeedFetcher-Google in context

FeedFetcher-Google is a user-triggered agent operated by Google. In plain terms, it builds a search or answer index. Our database files it under Google crawlers and ranks it Tier 3, mid-priority crawlers with a clear purpose but a smaller audience. 20 of the 24 Google crawlers in our database share this tier.

Its safety rating is safe and its blocking impact is critical. So FeedFetcher-Google is both well behaved and costly to lose: the strongest case for allowing it. How we rate safety and impact.

How site owners treat FeedFetcher-Google

Our robots.txt study of the Tranco top 10,000 did not track FeedFetcher-Google as a named token, so we do not publish an adoption figure for it. If you run a large site, your own logs are the best evidence of how often it visits.

Does it follow robots.txt?

FeedFetcher-Google's operator says it does not follow robots.txt for these requests, so a robots.txt rule will not stop FeedFetcher-Google. Use a firewall, CDN or server rule if you need to block it.

Google crawlers and close alternatives

FeedFetcher-Google is one of 32 Google crawlers in our database. A User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google group controls FeedFetcher-Google only; the other Google tokens below need their own lines.

  • FeedFetcher-Google: this crawler (Tier 3)
  • AdsBot-Google: Google Ads Quality (Desktop), checks pages for an SEO, uptime or analytics service (Tier 3)
  • AdsBot-Google-Mobile: Google Ads Quality (Mobile), checks pages for an SEO, uptime or analytics service (Tier 3)
  • APIs-Google: APIs-Google, fetches a page when a person asks an assistant or app to open it (Tier 3)
  • Chrome-Lighthouse: Lighthouse Audit, checks pages for an SEO, uptime or analytics service (Tier 4)
  • Gemini-Deep-Research: Gemini-Deep-Research, fetches a page when a person asks an assistant or app to open it (Tier 3)
  • Google-Agent: Google Agent (Project Mariner), fetches a page when a person asks an assistant or app to open it (Tier 2)
  • Google-CloudVertexBot: Google Vertex AI, fetches a page when a person asks an assistant or app to open it (Tier 3)
  • Google-CWS: Chrome Web Store Fetcher, checks pages for an SEO, uptime or analytics service (Tier 4)

To give FeedFetcher-Google the same answer as its siblings, stack User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google with their lines above one set of rules; to treat FeedFetcher-Google differently, give it its own group.

No other crawler in our Google crawlers category has exactly the same purpose, which makes FeedFetcher-Google an unusual case: decide about it on its own merits.

We first recorded FeedFetcher-Google on May 31, 2026. Google documents it on developers.google.com, and we recheck that page before each release.

Which rule FeedFetcher-Google actually follows

FeedFetcher-Google reads exactly one group in robots.txt, the most specific one that names FeedFetcher-Google, and never combines rules across groups. This short file shows the trap:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /private/

User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google
Disallow: /drafts/
  1. Find the group. FeedFetcher-Google looks for a group naming FeedFetcher-Google. One exists, so it ignores User-agent: * completely.
  2. Apply only that group. It is refused /drafts/ and nothing else.
  3. The surprise. /private/ is open to FeedFetcher-Google, because that rule lives in the * group it no longer reads. To keep it out of both, repeat Disallow: /private/ inside its own group.
Test yourself: does a rule under User-agent: * apply to FeedFetcher-Google if the file also has a User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google group?

No. Once a group names it, FeedFetcher-Google reads only that group. Put every rule you want it to follow inside its own group.

Test yourself: will blocking FeedFetcher-Google remove your pages from AI answers?

Often, yes. FeedFetcher-Google is a user-triggered agent, so pages it cannot fetch can drop out of the answers or results it supports.

Test yourself: is User-agent: feedfetcher-google the same as User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google?

Yes. RFC 9309 makes user-agent matching case-insensitive. Paths are a different story: Disallow: /Blog/ does not block /blog/.

Should you allow FeedFetcher-Google? Decide by situation

Recommended setting for FeedFetcher-Google by type of site
If you are...Recommended setting
You publish content and want AI answers to cite itAllow it. FeedFetcher-Google fetches pages for answers, so blocking it can remove you from them.
You license content and want to stop AI trainingBlocking it does not stop training, because FeedFetcher-Google is a user-triggered agent. Block the operator's training crawler instead.
You run an online shopAllow it unless it is overloading your servers.
Your server is under load from botsRate-limit before blocking. It is rated safe in our database.

Check FeedFetcher-Google on your own site

  1. Open /robots.txt on your domain and search for FeedFetcher-Google. If it is not named, it follows User-agent: *.
  2. List the Disallow lines in the group FeedFetcher-Google follows and test your key URLs against them; the longest match wins, and Allow wins a tie.
  3. Look beyond the file. A firewall or bot manager can refuse FeedFetcher-Google even when robots.txt allows it, and that never shows in the file.
  4. Run our blocked AI crawler check to see how FeedFetcher-Google and every other crawler we track are treated in one pass, including firewall refusals.

Common mistakes with FeedFetcher-Google

The errors we see most often with FeedFetcher-Google in the files and firewalls we test:

  1. Assuming a robots.txt rule will stop FeedFetcher-Google. User-triggered fetches act for a person, and some operators say robots.txt may not apply to them. Check the operator's statement above.
  2. Blocking FeedFetcher-Google as if it were a bulk crawler. It fetches one page because a person asked; blocking it means that person's assistant cannot read your page.
  3. Counting FeedFetcher-Google visits as crawl volume. Each request maps to a real user question, which makes the paths it requests a useful signal of what people ask about you.

All three hide inside a file that looks correct, so check FeedFetcher-Google from outside after every change.

Spotting FeedFetcher-Google in your logs

robots.txt says what FeedFetcher-Google may do; your access logs show what it actually did.

Count requests

On a server with standard Nginx or Apache logs, this counts matching requests per day (adjust the log path for your host):

grep -iE "FeedFetcher-Google" /var/log/nginx/access.log \
  | awk '{print $4}' | cut -d: -f1 | sort | uniq -c

And this shows which paths it requested most, which is the quickest way to see whether your Disallow lines are being respected:

grep -iE "FeedFetcher-Google" /var/log/nginx/access.log \
  | awk '{print $7}' | sort | uniq -c | sort -rn | head -20

Check the requests are genuine

Anyone can send the FeedFetcher-Google user-agent, so confirm the source before acting on a match:

  • FeedFetcher-Google: we hold no published IP list, so use reverse DNS where the operator documents a hostname and treat an unverifiable FeedFetcher-Google request with caution.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the user-agent string for FeedFetcher-Google?
FeedFetcher-Google uses the token FeedFetcher-Google. Match it case-insensitively in robots.txt and in any server-level rule.
Is FeedFetcher-Google safe?
Yes. FeedFetcher-Google is operated by Google and is documented publicly. FeedFetcher-Google retrieves RSS and Atom feeds on behalf of Google services that subscribe to them, such as Google News and PubSubHubbub delivery.
Will blocking FeedFetcher-Google hurt my SEO?
Blocking FeedFetcher-Google does not affect how your pages rank in Google Search, because it is not the indexing crawler. What it does stop is feed delivery: Google products that subscribe to your RSS or Atom feed will no longer receive updates, so feed-driven surfaces go stale. If you do not publish a feed, blocking it changes nothing at all.

Related: how AI engines choose their sources

How do I block FeedFetcher-Google in robots.txt?
Add these lines to /robots.txt:
User-agent: FeedFetcher-Google
Disallow: /

To restrict only part of your site, disallow specific paths and allow the rest.

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