Nikkei 225 site survey: llms.txt on 5.0%, AI crawlers named in robots.txt by 4.9%
AI company Uravation checked the official websites of the 225 Nikkei Average companies. Of 180 sites that responded, 9 (5.0%) had an llms.txt file for AI. Of 184 that responded on robots.txt, 9 (4.9%) mentioned AI crawlers by name, and none blocked AI search bots entirely.
Key points
- 9 of the 180 responding sites (5.0%) had an llms.txt file
- 9 of the 184 responding sites (4.9%) named AI crawlers in robots.txt; the other 175 (95.1%) did not
- No company fully blocked the search bots of ChatGPT, Claude or Perplexity (OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, PerplexityBot)
Background
The survey fetched each site's robots.txt and llms.txt once on October 23, 2026. Sites that could not be fetched (41 for robots.txt, 45 for llms.txt) were left out of the totals.
The sample is large listed companies, so small shops may behave differently. The survey firm also sells AI-search optimisation services, and the survey does not test whether llms.txt actually increases citations.
What it means for shops
It shows that most large companies have not made a clear choice about AI crawlers. For shops and small businesses, whether their information appears in AI search answers may depend on basic site settings and how clearly their information is laid out.
What shops should do
- Open your site's robots.txt (at the domain root) and check that you are not unintentionally blocking AI search bots
🔒 3 more action items for subscribers
Summaries are written by Seiichi Studio based on the original releases. Always check the source for the exact details.