Sidetrade Indexer Bot
SafeUser-agent: Sidetrade Indexer Bot
Category: SEO Tools
SEO impact if blocked: 2/10
Sidetrade
1 crawler operated by Sidetrade
Who Sidetrade is, for site owners
Sidetrade operates 1 crawler in our directory, filed under SEO Tools. Its crawl behaviour is rated safe.
Blocking Sidetrade carries an SEO impact score of 2/10. Blocking impact is rated: Low - No SEO ranking impact.
Our recommendation for Sidetrade: Generally safe to allow; provides legitimate crawling value.
Sidetrade at a glance
| Operator | Sidetrade |
|---|---|
| Crawler in directory | 1 |
| Categories | SEO Tools |
| SEO impact if blocked | 2/10 |
| Crawl behaviour | 1 rated safe |
Crawler operated by Sidetrade
What Sidetrade's crawlers are for
Sidetrade runs 1 crawler in our database. Grouped by the job each one does:
- a utility crawler:
Sidetrade Indexer Bot
The highest-priority token is Tier 4. That makes Sidetrade a lower-priority operator for most sites: worth a deliberate decision, but rarely the one that decides your visibility.
How site owners treat Sidetrade
How often site owners write rules for Sidetrade's tokens, from our own robots.txt study of the Tranco top 10,000:
| Token | Files naming it | Files blocking it |
|---|---|---|
Sidetrade Indexer Bot | 82 (1.5%) | Not measured |
A Sidetrade token can be blocked without being named, through a User-agent: * group with Disallow: /, so its blocking share can be higher than its naming share.
All counts come from 5,583 valid files fetched October 20, 2026.
Writing one policy for Sidetrade
A robots.txt file cannot say "Sidetrade"; it can only name Sidetrade's tokens, one group at a time. With a single token, one group is the whole policy.
# One token controls everything Sidetrade fetches through it
User-agent: Sidetrade Indexer Bot
Disallow: /private/
Allow: /- Decide per job, not per company. Training, search and user-triggered fetching have different trade-offs, even from the same operator.
- Name every token you mean. A token you leave out follows
User-agent: *. - Repeat shared rules. A named group ignores the
*group, so copy anyDisallowlines you still want it to obey. - Verify from outside. Run the AI bot crawlability test after any change to see the result for each Sidetrade token, including firewall refusals.
Test yourself: does User-agent: Sidetrade block all of Sidetrade's crawlers?
No. robots.txt matches crawler tokens, not company names. Use the token Sidetrade Indexer Bot.
Test yourself: if you block one Sidetrade token, are the others blocked too?
No. Each token is read separately. Blocking one leaves the rest following whatever group applies to them.
Each Sidetrade crawler, explained
A one-paragraph brief for every Sidetrade token in our database, covering what it does, how it treats robots.txt and how often large sites write rules for it:
- Sidetrade Indexer Bot (
Sidetrade Indexer Bot, Tier 4): a utility crawler that checks pages for an SEO, uptime or analytics service. Rated safe. Sidetrade Indexer Bot's operator does not clearly document how it treats robots.txt. Write the Sidetrade Indexer Bot rule anyway, then confirm in your logs that its requests stop. 1.5% of top-site robots.txt files name it.
Common mistakes with Sidetrade's crawlers
The errors we see most often with Sidetrade's crawlers in the files and firewalls we test:
- Treating Sidetrade's crawlers as an AI or search crawler. Blocking it has little effect on visibility; decide based on load and what it does with your data.
- Relying on robots.txt alone when Sidetrade's crawlers is rated caution or aggressive. Back the rule with a server-side block.
- Blocking Sidetrade's crawlers by IP alone. Ranges change; match the token and verify with logs.
All three hide inside a file that looks correct, so check Sidetrade's crawlers from outside after every change.
What our own data shows about Sidetrade
Everything below comes from the AI Crawler Check bot database and our two most recent robots.txt scans of the Tranco top 10,000, not from Sidetrade's marketing. Sidetrade has one token in our database, so the whole picture fits in one place.
Sidetrade Indexer Bot in our records
We first recorded Sidetrade Indexer Bot on March 17, 2026. We could not find a page where Sidetrade names it, so treat the token as reported rather than documented. Sidetrade Indexer Bot is outside our tracked token set, but 82 of 5,583 top-site files already name it, which is enough to show owners treat it as a real crawler.
Among the 19 SEO tools in our database, Sidetrade Indexer Bot sits 17th by priority (Tier 4), level with AhrefsBot, AhrefsSiteAudit, AwarioBot, AwarioRssBot. 16 of the 19 share its safe rating. Other operators with a crawler that checks pages for an SEO, uptime or analytics service: OAI-AdsBot (OpenAI, Tier 2), AdIdxBot (Microsoft, Tier 3), AdsBot-Google (Google, Tier 3), AdsBot-Google-Mobile (Google, Tier 3), Baiduspider-ads (Baidu, Tier 3). A policy for Sidetrade Indexer Bot is usually a policy for these too.
A decision record for Sidetrade Indexer Bot
Teams that review crawlers once a quarter keep one short entry per token, so anyone can see why a rule exists and when it was last checked. Filled in from our data, the Sidetrade Indexer Bot entry reads:
- Operator and job: Sidetrade; it checks pages for an SEO, uptime or analytics service.
- Priority and behaviour: Tier 4, rated safe, blocking impact not documented.
- Suggested starting point: Allow by default; revisit if it costs you bandwidth.
- Enforcement: Sidetrade Indexer Bot's operator does not clearly document how it treats robots.txt. Write the Sidetrade Indexer Bot rule anyway, then confirm in your logs that its requests stop.
User-agent: Sidetrade Indexer Bot
Allow: /Paste the line into the validator with one of your own URLs before it goes live. Revisit the Sidetrade Indexer Bot entry once a quarter, or when Sidetrade publishes a new token next to it.
Checking Sidetrade Indexer Bot on your own site
Because Sidetrade runs only Sidetrade Indexer Bot in our records, one check covers the whole operator. Search your access logs for the string Sidetrade Indexer Bot over the last 30 days, note how many requests it made and which paths it asked for, then compare that with what your robots.txt allows. Sidetrade publishes no page about the crawler that we could find, so judge it by the requests you actually see rather than by its name. A Tier 4 crawler rated safe rarely needs more than a quarterly look, and our log checker does the counting for you.
How top sites treat Sidetrade's crawlers
From our robots.txt study of the Tranco top 10,000 (5,583 valid files, fetched October 20, 2026):
None of the tokens for Sidetrade's crawlers is tracked by name in our study. For scale, 20.1% of top-site files block at least one AI training crawler and 4.3% refuse every unnamed crawler with User-agent: * and Disallow: /, which would catch Sidetrade's crawlers too.
More questions about Sidetrade
- Will blocking Sidetrade affect my Google rankings?
- Only if one of its tokens is a Google search crawler. None of Sidetrade's tokens are Googlebot, so classic Google rankings are unaffected.
- How quickly does a robots.txt change take effect for Sidetrade?
- Crawlers cache robots.txt, commonly for up to a day. Expect a change to apply within about 24 hours, and confirm it in your logs.
- Can I allow Sidetrade on some sections and block it on others?
- Yes. Inside the group for
Sidetrade Indexer Bot, addDisallowlines for the paths to keep private andAllowlines for exceptions. The longest matching rule wins. - Does blocking Sidetrade delete content it already collected?
- No. robots.txt only controls future visits. For content already collected, check whether Sidetrade offers a removal or opt-out process.
- Is a firewall block better than robots.txt for Sidetrade?
- A firewall enforces the decision, while robots.txt asks politely. Many operators recommend robots.txt because blocking their IPs can stop them reading your rules at all. Use robots.txt first, and add a firewall rule only if requests continue.
A five-minute Sidetrade review
- Confirm the token. Compare the user-agent in your logs with the tokens listed on this page. A close spelling is not the same crawler.
- Decide the outcome per crawler. Use the briefs above to choose allow, limit or block for each token.
- Write the group. Add or edit one
User-agentgroup per decision and repeat any shared rules inside it. - Publish and wait. Allow about a day for crawlers to fetch the new file.
- Confirm the result. Check your logs, then run the AI crawlability test to see the outcome from outside, including any firewall layer.
How to block or allow Sidetrade in robots.txt
This rule covers the single crawler Sidetrade operates. Add it to the robots.txt file at the root of your domain.
Block Sidetrade completely
User-agent: Sidetrade Indexer Bot
Disallow: /
Allow Sidetrade explicitly
User-agent: Sidetrade Indexer Bot
Allow: /
These Sidetrade rules ask; they do not enforce. If a Sidetrade token ignores them, block it at the server or CDN. Paths are case-sensitive, and each rule matches the token, not the full user-agent string.
Frequently asked questions about Sidetrade
What crawler does Sidetrade run?
Sidetrade operates 1 crawler in our directory: Sidetrade Indexer Bot (user-agent Sidetrade Indexer Bot).
Should I block Sidetrade?
Generally safe to allow; provides legitimate crawling value. The SEO impact score for blocking is 2/10, where 10 means blocking costs you the most visibility.
How do I block Sidetrade in robots.txt?
Add the following to robots.txt at your domain root: User-agent: Sidetrade Indexer Bot then Disallow: /.
Does blocking Sidetrade hurt my search rankings?
Blocking impact is rated: Low - No SEO ranking impact. Google's own ranking crawler is Googlebot, which this operator does not run, so blocking Sidetrade does not by itself remove you from Google's index. What it can change is whether AI assistants and analytics tools can read your pages.