Optimise Your WordPress Site: Mastering the Robots.txt File
Is your WordPress site not performing as well as you’d like? Unnecessary crawl activity and index bloat might be the culprits. By upgrading your `robots.txt` file, you can streamline how search engines interact with your site, enhancing performance and SEO rankings.
**What is the Robots.txt File?**
The `robots.txt` file is a simple text file located in the root directory of your website. It gives instructions to web crawlers (like Googlebot) on which pages or files they can or cannot request from your site. Properly configuring this file helps control the crawling behaviour of search engines, ensuring they focus on your most important content.
**Why Optimise Your Robots.txt?**
An optimised `robots.txt` file reduces server load by preventing unnecessary pages from being crawled and helps prevent index bloat, where undesirable pages appear in search results. This ensures that search engines spend their crawl budget wisely on your valuable content, improving your site’s visibility and performance.
**What to Include**
– **Allow Access** to important directories like `/wp-content/uploads/` where your media files reside.
– **Sitemap Link**: Include a link to your sitemap to help search engines discover all your pages efficiently.
**What to Exclude**
– **Disallow** admin pages (`/wp-admin/
Source: WordPress Robots.txt: What Should You Include?
Author: Alex Moss
