Googlebot Video
SearchVerify Googlebot Video IP Address
Verify if an IP address truly belongs to Google, using official verification methods. Enter both IP address and User-Agent from your logs for the most accurate bot verification.
Googlebot-Video/1.0 is Google’s specialized crawler for discovering and indexing video content across the web. The bot scans pages for embedded video files, metadata, structured data, thumbnails, transcripts, and video sitemaps to understand relevance, quality, and playback details. Crawl behavior is generally targeted and low-impact, focusing on URLs that contain or reference video assets. Its purpose is to ensure accurate, up-to-date representation of video content in Google Search and related surfaces. RobotSense.io verifies Googlebot Video using Google’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine Googlebot Video traffic is identified.
User Agent Examples
Googlebot-Video/1.0Robots.txt Configuration for Googlebot Video
Googlebot-VideoUse this identifier in your robots.txt User-agent directive to target Googlebot Video.
Recommended Configuration
Our recommended robots.txt configuration for Googlebot Video:
User-agent: Googlebot-Video
Allow: /Completely Block Googlebot Video
Prevent this bot from crawling your entire site:
User-agent: Googlebot-Video
Disallow: /Completely Allow Googlebot Video
Allow this bot to crawl your entire site:
User-agent: Googlebot-Video
Allow: /Block Specific Paths
Block this bot from specific directories or pages:
User-agent: Googlebot-Video
Disallow: /private/
Disallow: /admin/
Disallow: /api/Allow Only Specific Paths
Block everything but allow specific directories:
User-agent: Googlebot-Video
Disallow: /
Allow: /public/
Allow: /blog/Set Crawl Delay
Limit how frequently Googlebot Video can request pages (in seconds):
User-agent: Googlebot-Video
Allow: /
Crawl-delay: 10Note: This bot officially honors the Crawl-delay directive.
Put these rules to work
Frequently Asked Questions
- What is Googlebot Video, and why is it visiting my website?
- Googlebot Video is Google's specialized crawler for discovering and indexing video content across the web. It scans pages containing embedded or hosted videos and analyzes related metadata such as structured data, thumbnails, captions, transcripts, playback information, and video sitemaps. Visits are typically triggered when Google detects video-related content through links, sitemap submissions, structured data, or page updates. Crawl behavior is generally targeted and lightweight, focusing mainly on pages and assets associated with video content. Traffic from Googlebot Video is expected for public websites hosting or embedding videos.
- Is Googlebot Video a legitimate bot, or is it commonly spoofed?
- Googlebot Video is a legitimate crawler officially operated by Google as part of Google’s search indexing infrastructure. It is used specifically for video discovery and indexing within Google Search and related video features. Like other widely recognized crawlers, its User-Agent can be spoofed by malicious bots or scraping tools attempting to bypass bot protections or firewall rules. Attackers often impersonate trusted crawlers because many websites automatically allow them access. User-Agent headers alone are not reliable for verification. You can use Google's recommended methods mentioned below to verify a legitimate visit, or use RobotSense.io API to easily verify Googlebot Video visits.
- How can I verify that a request is really coming from Googlebot Video?
- You can use Google's recommended official methods to verify Googlebot Video visits, these include: - IP range checks - Reverse DNS → forward DNS Do not use User-Agent based detection as that can be easily spoofed. Alternatively, you can use RobotSense.io API to easily verify Googlebot Video and all other bots from Google.
- Should I allow or block Googlebot Video on my website?
- Allowing Googlebot Video is generally beneficial for websites that want video content indexed and surfaced in Google Search, video-rich results, and related discovery features. It helps Google understand video relevance, quality, and playback information. Blocking may be appropriate for: - Private or restricted video libraries - Bandwidth-sensitive media environments - Internal video platforms or APIs - Premium or subscriber-only video content Some websites selectively allow public-facing video directories while restricting administrative or non-public assets.
- How can I control or block Googlebot Video using robots.txt or other methods?
- You can add a rule in your robots.txt, as given above to control (crawl-delay) or disallow Googlebot Video. Googlebot Video honors robots.txt directives. Also, you can use further controls in your WAF, or in RobotSense enforcement settings to manage the bot behavior.
- How often does Googlebot Video crawl websites, and can it impact server performance?
- Googlebot Video crawls periodically and revisits content based on video popularity, update frequency, sitemap changes, and search demand. Video-heavy websites or frequently updated media platforms may see more regular crawl activity. For most websites, impact is low to moderate. However, sites serving large media assets may experience increased: - Bandwidth usage - Requests for video files and thumbnails - CDN transfer costs - Load on dynamic video processing or streaming systems Performance impact is typically more noticeable on high-volume media platforms or self-hosted streaming infrastructure.
- What happens if I block Googlebot Video? SEO, visibility, and feature impact explained.
- Blocking Googlebot Video can reduce or prevent video visibility within Google's search and video discovery features. Potential impacts include: - Videos excluded from video search features - Reduced eligibility for video-rich results - Missing video thumbnails in search listings - Reduced discovery through Google video surfaces Typically unaffected: - Standard text-based page indexing by regular Googlebot - Non-video website content rankings - Direct website accessibility Blocking Googlebot Video does not usually remove normal web pages from Google Search, but it can significantly reduce visibility for hosted or embedded videos.
- Does Googlebot Video collect, scrape, or use my content for training or reuse?
- Googlebot Video collects publicly accessible video-related content to support Google's video indexing and search systems. It may fetch video files, thumbnails, captions, transcripts, structured data, metadata, and surrounding page content associated with video playback. Collected information may be used for: - Video indexing - Thumbnail and preview generation - Video search ranking - Playback understanding - Structured data analysis Google stores indexed video metadata and related content within its search infrastructure. Public documentation describes Googlebot Video primarily as a search indexing crawler rather than a dedicated AI training crawler, although Google broadly uses machine learning systems across search and video understanding technologies.
Other Google Bots
Google operates other crawlers you may also need to configure.
AdsBot
AdsAdsBot-Google is Google’s crawler responsible for evaluating landing pages used in Google Ads campaigns. It performs desktop-focused checks on page quality, load speed, relevance, and policy compliance. These assessments directly influence ad quality scores, cost efficiency, and overall eligibility. Blocking AdsBot prevents Google from reviewing landing pages, which can degrade or disable ad performance. Crawl activity is selective and tied to active or recently modified ad campaigns rather than broad indexing. Its purpose is to ensure that advertisers maintain fast, trustworthy, and policy-compliant landing pages. It ignores the global user agent (*) rule. RobotSense.io verifies AdsBot/AdsBot-Google using Google’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine AdsBot/AdsBot-Google traffic is identified.
AdsBot Mobile Web
Ads[This crawler is officially retired as per Google] AdsBot-Google-Mobile bot is Google’s mobile-focused crawler used to evaluate the landing page experience for Google Ads. It simulates mobile device conditions to assess page quality, load performance, mobile usability, and policy compliance. These evaluations directly influence Google Ads quality scores and ad eligibility. If you run ads, blocking it may negatively affect ad performance because Google cannot verify the mobile landing page experience. Crawl activity is targeted and low-volume, triggered when ads are created, updated, or actively running. Its purpose is ensuring advertisers provide fast, compliant, and user-friendly mobile pages. It ignores the global user agent (*) rule. RobotSense.io verifies AdsBot Mobile Web/AdsBot-Google-Mobile using Google’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine AdsBot Mobile Web/AdsBot-Google-Mobile traffic is identified.
AdSense / Mediapartners-Google
AdsMediapartners-Google is Google’s crawler dedicated to evaluating webpages for Google AdSense. It scans pages to understand content, layout, and context so Google can deliver relevant ads and optimize revenue for publishers. Unlike Googlebot, this crawler does not index content for Search - its role is purely advertising-related. Blocking it may prevent AdSense from analyzing pages and serving targeted ads effectively. Crawl activity is generally light and focused on pages where AdSense code is present, helping Google match ad inventory with page themes and user interests. It ignores the global user agent (*) rule. RobotSense.io verifies AdSense / Mediapartners-Google using Google’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine AdSense / Mediapartners-Google traffic is identified.
APIs-Google
Developer ToolsAPIs-Google is a service crawler used by Google to verify and interact with endpoints tied to various Google APIs. It is typically triggered when applications, scripts, or integrations using Google services need to fetch or validate external resources. Common use cases include OAuth flows, link previews, data validation, push notification messages, and API-driven checks performed on behalf of Google products. Crawl activity is usually low-volume and event-driven, reflecting specific API operations rather than broad crawling or indexing associated with Google Search. It ignores the global user agent (*) rule. RobotSense.io verifies APIs-Google using Google’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine APIs-Google traffic is identified.
Chrome Web Store / Google-CWS
Developer ToolsChrome Web Store fetcher or Google-CWS is a Google user-agent associated with Chrome Web Services, typically used for link preview generation, safe browsing checks, and content fetching triggered by Chrome features. It performs lightweight requests to retrieve metadata, page titles, favicons, and safety signals from URLs that developers provide in the metadata of their Chrome extensions and themes. This bot is not a search crawler and does not influence Google Search indexing or rankings. Activity occurs when Chrome or Google services need to quickly inspect a URL for previews, safety evaluation, or rendering behavior. It ignores robots.txt rules. RobotSense.io verifies Chrome Web Store fetcher using Google’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine Chrome Web Store fetcher traffic is identified.
DuplexWeb-Google
Others[This crawler is officially retired as per Google] DuplexWeb-Google is a Google crawler associated with Duplex and Assistant-related technologies that fetch web content to help generate conversational responses and perform task-oriented actions. It retrieves page information needed to understand structured data, business details, menus, appointment flows, and other interactive elements. Crawl activity is selective and generally tied to user-initiated tasks or systems that prepare content for automated assistance. Its purpose is to support natural-language interactions by ensuring Google’s assistant technologies can interpret and use real-time webpage information accurately. It ignores the global user agent (*) rule. RobotSense.io verifies DuplexWeb-Google using Google’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine DuplexWeb-Google traffic is identified.
Similar Bots
Other Search bots from different operators.
Amzn-SearchBot
Searchby Amazon
[Amazon Bots can take upto 30 days to read your Robots.txt updates.] Amzn-SearchBot is Amazon’s web crawler used to discover and retrieve publicly available content for Amazon search and AI-related services. It fetches webpages to analyze text, metadata, and structured information that can support Amazon’s search features and machine learning systems. Crawl activity is typically moderate and focused on publicly accessible pages. Its purpose is to help Amazon improve content discovery, relevance, and information retrieval across its ecosystem. It ignores the global user agent (*) rule. RobotSense.io verifies Amzn-SearchBot using Amazon’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine Amzn-SearchBot traffic is identified.
Applebot
Searchby Apple
Applebot is Apple's official web crawler used to power search and content features across Apple services such as Siri, Spotlight Suggestions, and Safari. It crawls webpages to discover content, metadata, and structured information that enhance on-device and cloud-based search experiences. Crawl activity is generally moderate and focused on high-quality, publicly accessible content. Its purpose is to improve search relevance, answers, and suggestions across Apple’s ecosystem without operating a standalone public web search engine. Data crawled by Applebot may be utilized by Apple for foundational model training. Apple allows site owners to opt-out of having their content used for generative model training by disallowing Applebot-Extended in the robots.txt file. RobotSense.io verifies Applebot using Apple's official validation methods, ensuring only genuine Applebot traffic is identified.
Bingbot
Searchby Microsoft
Bingbot is Microsoft’s primary web crawler, responsible for discovering and indexing content for Bing Search and other Microsoft services. The crawler fetches HTML, structured data, images, and metadata to understand page relevance and ranking signals. Crawl activity varies based on site authority, update frequency, and sitemap signals. Its purpose is to keep Bing’s search index fresh, accurate, and aligned with user search intent across Microsoft platforms. RobotSense.io verifies Bingbot using Microsoft’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine Bingbot traffic is identified.
BingVideoPreview
Searchby Microsoft
BingVideoPreview is Microsoft’s crawler for fetching video-related content to generate previews, thumbnails, and metadata for Bing’s video search experiences. It retrieves video files, poster images, structured data, captions, and surrounding context. This crawler does not perform full-site indexing; instead, it focuses specifically on video assets and the information required to power Bing’s video carousels and preview interfaces. Activity is targeted and relatively low-volume, driven by pages that contain or reference video content. RobotSense.io verifies BingVideoPreview using Microsoft’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine BingVideoPreview traffic is identified.
OAI-SearchBot
Searchby OpenAI
OAI-SearchBot is a search bot operated by OpenAI. Data collected from the bot is used to link to and surface websites in search results in ChatGPT's search features. As per OpenAI, it is not used to crawl content to train its generative AI foundation models. OpenAI recommends allowing OAI-SearchBot in your site’s robots.txt file to help ensure that your site appears in search results. RobotSense.io verifies OpenAI OAI-SearchBot using OpenAI’s official validation methods, ensuring only genuine OAI-SearchBot traffic is identified.
PetalBot
Searchby Huawei
PetalBot is the web crawler operated by Huawei, used to power Petal Search and related Huawei mobile services. It crawls publicly accessible webpages to discover content, metadata, structured data, and links for indexing. PetalBot supports search results delivered across Huawei devices and applications. Crawl frequency depends on site authority, update frequency, and internal ranking signals, similar to other search engine crawlers. Its purpose is to build and maintain Huawei's independent search index for global users. RobotSense.io verifies PetalBot using Huawei's official validation methods, ensuring only genuine PetalBot traffic is identified.