robots.txt template

Hugo can generate a customized robots.txt in the same way as any other template.

To generate a robots.txt file from a template, change the site configuration:

enableRobotsTXT: true

enableRobotsTXT = true

{
   "enableRobotsTXT": true
}

By default, Hugo generates robots.txt using an embedded template.

User-agent: *

Search engines that honor the Robots Exclusion Protocol will interpret this as permission to crawl everything on the site.

robots.txt template lookup order

You may overwrite the internal template with a custom template. Hugo selects the template using this lookup order:

/layouts/robots.txt
/themes/<THEME>/layouts/robots.txt

robots.txt template example

layouts/robots.txt

User-agent: *
{{ range .Pages }}
Disallow: {{ .RelPermalink }}
{{ end }}

This template creates a robots.txt file with a Disallow directive for each page on the site. Search engines that honor the Robots Exclusion Protocol will not crawl any page on the site.

To create a robots.txt file without using a template:

Set enableRobotsTXT to false in the site configuration.
Create a robots.txt file in the static directory.

Remember that Hugo copies everything in the static directory to the root of publishDir (typically public) when you build your site.

Last updated: February 17, 2025 : all: Change shortcode usage and design to prevent invalid HTML (0fca8ef25)

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