DotBot/1.2

GoodBotCommunity-sourced

DotBot is a web crawler developed by Moz, designed to efficiently and responsibly collect data from websites. It is utilized by Moz's tools, such as Open Site Explorer, to gather information for SEO analysis. DotBot adheres to the guidelines specified in a website's robots.txt file, ensuring that it only accesses pages that the site owner has permitted. This respectful approach helps maintain the integrity and performance of websites while allowing Moz to provide accurate and up-to-date SEO insights. Operated by Moz.

Operator website ↗

GoodBot

Assessment

SEO

What is DotBot/1.2?

DotBot is the proprietary web crawler operated by Moz, a leading provider of search engine optimization software. It systematically traverses the web to collect link data, which is then processed to power Moz's Link Explorer, the Moz API, and various campaign-level SEO insights. Unlike Moz's other crawler, Rogerbot, which focuses on site-specific audits, DotBot is designed for large-scale discovery to maintain a massive, multi-trillion link index used by marketers to evaluate domain authority and competitive search performance.

Helpful — It is a well-documented, industry-standard crawler used by SEO professionals to analyze backlink profiles and site authority.

Identification

Bot name

DotBot/1.2

Operator

Moz

How we rated this bot

Identifies itself honestly, and we found no credible reports of abuse.

Names itself honestly

Yes

Verified by Cloudflare

Says it follows robots.txt and opt-outs

Yes

Ignores site rules

None found

Disguises itself or evades blocks

None found

Overloads sites

None found

How widely people complain

One or two isolated anecdotes from individual site owners

Reddit discussion

There is no Reddit discussion of this bot in the evidence

What we read

Why it crawls your site

DotBot crawls the web to populate Moz's comprehensive link index, which serves as the backbone for their SEO analytics tools. By mapping the web's link structure, Moz provides users with data on backlink profiles, site authority, and competitive benchmarking. The crawler respects standard robots.txt directives, allowing site owners to control or restrict its access, and provides a clear contact email for administrative inquiries regarding its activity.

IP ranges

Requests from DotBot/1.2 originate from these published ranges. For strict verification, match the source IP against this list in addition to checking the user-agent and reverse-DNS.

Block or allow DotBot/1.2

Block it

Add a Disallow rule for Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; DotBot/1.2; +https://opensiteexplorer.org/dotbot; [email protected]) in your robots.txt file. You can also block at the server level using your web server configuration or CDN firewall rules to filter requests matching the user-agent string.

# Block DotBot/1.2 from crawling your entire site
User-agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; DotBot/1.2; +https://opensiteexplorer.org/dotbot; [email protected])
Disallow: /

# Allow DotBot/1.2 full access
User-agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; DotBot/1.2; +https://opensiteexplorer.org/dotbot; [email protected])
Allow: /

Allow & verify

Ensure your robots.txt allows Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; DotBot/1.2; +https://opensiteexplorer.org/dotbot; [email protected]). Verify requests by checking the user-agent string.