What is llms.txt? A plain-English guide for website owners

If you've heard that your website "needs an llms.txt," you're probably wondering what that is, whether it matters, and how much work it is. Here's the short version: it's a small text file, it takes about 20 minutes, and it's a sensible thing to have, as long as you know what it can and can't do.

What llms.txt is

llms.txt is a plain text file that lives at the root of your website, at yoursite.com/llms.txt. It gives AI tools a short, curated summary of your site: who you are, what you do, and links to the pages that matter most.

The idea was proposed by Jeremy Howard of Answer.AI in September 2024, and the proposal is published at llmstxt.org. Think of it as a menu written for AI assistants: instead of making them wade through navigation, pop-ups and footers, you hand them the highlights.

What goes in the file

The file uses Markdown, the same simple formatting many writing tools use. A typical llms.txt has four parts:

1. A title: your business or project name, on the first line, starting with #. This is the only required part.
2. A one-line summary, starting with >, that says what you do.
3. Sections with headings that start with ##, each listing links to key pages with a short note.
4. An optional "Optional" section for less important pages that AI tools can skip when they're short on space.

Here's a small example for a local bakery:

# Rosie's Bakery

> Family bakery in Dublin, Ohio making sourdough, cakes and custom wedding orders.

## Main pages
- [Menu](https://rosiesbakery.com/menu): Breads, pastries and cakes with prices
- [Wedding cakes](https://rosiesbakery.com/weddings): Tastings, designs and how to order
- [Visit us](https://rosiesbakery.com/visit): Address, hours and parking

## Optional
- [Blog](https://rosiesbakery.com/blog): Recipes and news

What llms.txt does, and what it doesn't

Let's be straight about this, because a lot of marketing around llms.txt isn't.

• It is not a ranking switch. Adding the file won't, on its own, make ChatGPT or Google recommend you. Google has said publicly that it doesn't use llms.txt, and studies of server logs show the big AI crawlers rarely request it today.
• It is a clear, low-cost signal. Developer documentation sites and AI coding tools use llms.txt files widely, and anyone building an AI agent can read yours. It costs nothing to publish and forces a useful exercise: deciding which pages you most want people (and AI tools) to see.
• It's one part of being "AI-ready." Fast pages, clear content, structured data (schema) and consistent business information across the web matter more. llms.txt sits alongside those, not instead of them.

How to create one in a few minutes

1. Write it. Use our free llms.txt generator: fill in your name, a sentence about what you do and your key pages, then download the file.
2. Publish it. On WordPress, popular SEO plugins can create the file for you. Otherwise, upload it to your site's main folder so it loads at yoursite.com/llms.txt. Our help page covers WordPress, Squarespace, Wix and Shopify.
3. Check it. Run it through the llms.txt validator. You'll get a score and a plain-English list of anything to fix.

Keep it working

The most common problem we see isn't a badly written file. It's a file that quietly stops working: a theme update, a security plugin or a site migration replaces it with an error page, and nobody notices. If you publish an llms.txt, check it now and then, or list it on LLMs Ledger and let us check it for you.

Bottom line: llms.txt is a small, honest improvement. Spend 20 minutes on it, make sure it works, and then put your bigger effort into clear content and a fast, well-structured site.