01 · Operator
Who operates YandexImages
- Company
- Yandex
- Official docs
- yandex.com
02 · Behavior
What YandexImages does
YandexImages crawls images and adds them to the Yandex Images index. Yandex documents that it follows robots.txt. You can target it separately from the main YandexBot crawler.
03 · Impact
Why YandexImages matters for your site
If you allow it
- Your images can appear in Yandex Images
- Can bring image search traffic
- Honors robots.txt
If you block it
- Little value if you have no audience in Yandex markets
- You may not want images reused in search
04 · Allow
How to allow YandexImages
robots.txt
User-agent: YandexImages
Allow: /Cloudflare
# Security › WAF › Custom rules › Create rule
Expression: (http.user_agent contains "YandexImages")
Action: Skip › All Super Bot Fight Mode rules
# Also check Security › Bots: "Block AI bots" can block it regardless of robots.txt.WordPress
# WordPress serves a virtual robots.txt. Edit it with your SEO plugin:
# Yoast: SEO › Tools › File editor · Rank Math: General Settings › Edit robots.txt
User-agent: YandexImages
Allow: /nginx
# nginx serves every user agent by default.
# Make sure no rule like this blocks it:
# if ($http_user_agent ~* "YandexImages") { return 403; }Apache
# Apache serves every user agent by default.
# Make sure .htaccess has no rule like this:
# RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} YandexImages [NC]
# RewriteRule .* - [F,L]05 · Block
How to block YandexImages
YandexImages follows robots.txt, so one rule is enough. Use a server or CDN rule only to stop spoofed copies.
robots.txt
User-agent: YandexImages
Disallow: /Cloudflare
# Security › WAF › Custom rules › Create rule
Expression: (http.user_agent contains "YandexImages")
Action: BlockWordPress
# WordPress serves a virtual robots.txt. Edit it with your SEO plugin:
# Yoast: SEO › Tools › File editor · Rank Math: General Settings › Edit robots.txt
User-agent: YandexImages
Disallow: /nginx
# In your server { } block:
if ($http_user_agent ~* "YandexImages") {
return 403;
}Apache
# .htaccess
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} YandexImages [NC]
RewriteRule .* - [F,L]
</IfModule>06 · User agents
User agents we see for YandexImages
The user agent published by the operator:
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; YandexImages/3.0; +http://yandex.com/bots)07 · Verification
Is it really YandexImages?
Anyone can copy a user agent. A reverse DNS lookup of a real request resolves to yandex.ru</code>, <code>yandex.net</code>, <code>yandex.com, and that hostname resolves back to the same IP.
FAQ
Questions about YandexImages
What is YandexImages?
YandexImages is the Yandex robot that indexes images for Yandex Images search.
Can I block only YandexImages?
Yes. Yandex documents that it follows robots.txt, so add a group with User-agent: YandexImages and your Disallow rules.
How do I verify a real Yandex robot?
Run a reverse DNS lookup on the IP. The hostname must end in yandex.ru, yandex.net or yandex.com, and a forward lookup must return the same IP.
Last reviewed Oct 7, 2026