01 · Operator
Who operates Reflectionbot
- Company
- Reflection AI
- Type
- AI training crawler
- Official docs
- reflection.ai
02 · Behavior
What Reflectionbot does
Reflectionbot visits public web pages and reads robots.txt at the root of each site. Reflection AI uses the collected content to build and improve its AI models. It identifies itself with the single token Reflectionbot. Reflection AI says robots.txt changes are usually picked up within about a day.
03 · Impact
Why Reflectionbot matters for your site
If you allow it
- Your content may inform Reflection AI's models
- The crawler honors robots.txt and publishes its IP ranges
If you block it
- Content is used for model training, not for referral traffic
- Crawling adds server load without direct visits
04 · Allow
How to allow Reflectionbot
robots.txt
User-agent: Reflectionbot
Allow: /Cloudflare
# Security › WAF › Custom rules › Create rule
Expression: (http.user_agent contains "Reflectionbot")
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: Reflectionbot
Allow: /nginx
# nginx serves every user agent by default.
# Make sure no rule like this blocks it:
# if ($http_user_agent ~* "Reflectionbot") { return 403; }Apache
# Apache serves every user agent by default.
# Make sure .htaccess has no rule like this:
# RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} Reflectionbot [NC]
# RewriteRule .* - [F,L]05 · Block
How to block Reflectionbot
Reflectionbot follows robots.txt, so one rule is enough. Use a server or CDN rule only to stop spoofed copies.
robots.txt
User-agent: Reflectionbot
Disallow: /Cloudflare
# Security › WAF › Custom rules › Create rule
Expression: (http.user_agent contains "Reflectionbot")
Action: BlockWordPress
# WordPress serves a virtual robots.txt. Edit it with your SEO plugin:
# Yoast: SEO › Tools › File editor · Rank Math: General Settings › Edit robots.txt
User-agent: Reflectionbot
Disallow: /nginx
# In your server { } block:
if ($http_user_agent ~* "Reflectionbot") {
return 403;
}Apache
# .htaccess
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} Reflectionbot [NC]
RewriteRule .* - [F,L]
</IfModule>06 · User agents
User agents we see for Reflectionbot
| User agent | Share | Last seen | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko; compatible; Reflectionbot/1.0; +https://reflection.ai/bot) Chrome/151.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 |
100% | Unverified | |
Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko; compatible; Reflectionbot/1.0; +https://reflection.ai/bot) Chrome/151.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 |
0% | Verified |
07 · Verification
Is it really Reflectionbot?
Anyone can copy a user agent. Real Reflectionbot requests come from the IP ranges published at reflection.ai/bot/ips.json. A reverse DNS lookup of a real request resolves to reflection.ai, and that hostname resolves back to the same IP.
IP addresses we saw from verified Reflectionbot requests
| IP range | Share | Last seen |
|---|---|---|
16.216.88.188 |
33% | |
16.216.88.21 |
33% | |
130.211.168.29 |
33% |
Always check against the operator’s current list; ranges change.
FAQ
Questions about Reflectionbot
What is Reflectionbot?
Reflectionbot is Reflection AI's web crawler. It collects public pages to build and improve the company's AI models.
How do I block Reflectionbot?
Add a robots.txt group for User-agent: Reflectionbot with Disallow: /. Reflection AI says changes are usually picked up within about a day.
How can I verify Reflectionbot traffic?
Check that the IP resolves to a hostname under reflection.ai, or compare it with the list at reflection.ai/bot/ips.json.
Last reviewed Oct 8, 2026