What is OAI-SearchBot and how do I allow it?
OAI-SearchBot is OpenAI's web crawler that indexes content for ChatGPT's shopping features. If your robots.txt file blocks this crawler, your products won't appear in ChatGPT Shopping results.
ShopRank AI checks whether your store's robots.txt allows OAI-SearchBot access. If it's blocked:
In your Shopify admin, go to Online Store → Themes and click Edit Code on your active theme.
Under the Templates folder, create a new file called robots.txt.liquid (if it doesn't already exist).
In the Liquid code, make sure OAI-SearchBot is not listed in any Disallow rules.
Save. Changes take effect immediately, but may take time for crawlers to pick up. Trigger a recalculation in ShopRank AI to verify.
✅ Most Shopify stores allow all crawlers by default. This check fails mainly for stores that have added custom robots.txt rules.