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# How to Measure AhrefsBot

AhrefsBot is Ahrefs' SEO crawler. Count it in logs and Hardal's SEO-tools bucket. Never send it to conversion APIs or ChatGPT Ads.

Source: https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-ahrefsbot-traffic
Published: 2026-08-11
Updated: 2026-08-11
Author: Ecem Bircan
Category: Marketing

---

**AhrefsBot** is how Ahrefs fetches pages for its index (backlinks, site explorer, audits). Same job family as [SemrushBot](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-semrushbot-traffic): an SEO tool crawler rather than an LLM trainer or a media channel.

Marketers search "how to measure AhrefsBot" because it shows up as a top bot in Cloudflare and because AI-crawler roundups dump every UA into one list. Keep it on the list, but give it a different decision.

## How it shows up

`AhrefsBot` in the user-agent. High volume is normal if you are a site other people link to. Verify IPs when you rate-limit; UA spoofing is common for scrapers wearing a famous name.

It never reaches GA4 or Ads Manager, and it never produces an `order_created` event.

## What to report

- Crawl volume vs Googlebot (Ahrefs should not out-crawl Google on a site you care about ranking)
- WAF / CDN cost if the bot is recursive on parameters
- Explicit exclusion from conversion destinations

AhrefsBot hitting `/blog` means Ahrefs' link graph wants the URL, not that ChatGPT cited you. Citations come from [OAI-SearchBot](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-oai-searchbot-traffic) or [ChatGPT-User](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-chatgpt-user-traffic).

## robots.txt

```
User-agent: AhrefsBot
Allow: /
```

if you use Ahrefs and want their index to match production.

```
User-agent: AhrefsBot
Disallow: /
```

if you do not want the extra crawl. Googlebot is unrelated.

## How Hardal measures it

Hardal files it under SEO tools in [AI Visibility](https://usehardal.com/ai-visibility) rather than under OpenAI or Anthropic, on the same server-side pipeline as Hardal Analytics. For ChatGPT Ads conversions, use [the hub](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-chatgpt-ads) plus [Hardal's OpenAI Ads destination](https://usehardal.com/blog/hardal-chatgpt). For the decision layer on AI trainers vs fetchers, [AI crawler traffic for marketers](https://usehardal.com/blog/ai-crawler-traffic-for-marketers).

**Series:** [ChatGPT Ads](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-chatgpt-ads) · [GPTBot](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-gptbot-traffic) · [ClaudeBot](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-claudebot-traffic) · [Google-Extended](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-google-extended-traffic) · [PerplexityBot](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-perplexitybot-traffic) · [OAI-SearchBot](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-oai-searchbot-traffic) · [ChatGPT-User](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-chatgpt-user-traffic) · [Meta-ExternalAgent](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-meta-externalagent-traffic) · [Googlebot](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-googlebot-traffic) · [Bingbot](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-bingbot-traffic) · [SemrushBot](https://usehardal.com/blog/how-to-measure-semrushbot-traffic) · AhrefsBot