geo/aeoplaybooks

State of llms.txt — August 2026: 2 of the Tranco top-30 serve a valid file

Monthly fixed-cohort tracker: 2/30 Tranco-head domains serve a spec-valid llms.txt (6.7%). Down 373 domains vs the 2026-07-11 snapshot (375/5000).

GEO & AEO Playbooks State of llms.txt — August 2026: 2 of the Tranco top-30 serve a valid file geo/aeo playbooks · independent GEO lab

Our monthly tracker re-checked /llms.txt on the same fixed cohort — the Tranco top-30 (list 94Y92) — on 2026-08-01. This note is generated from the logged snapshot, nothing else.

The numbers

  • 2 of 30 domains serve a spec-valid llms.txt (6.7%)
  • 10 serve something at /llms.txt at all (valid or malformed)
  • 0 were unreachable to our probe this run
  • Down 373 domains vs the 2026-07-11 snapshot (375/5000).

Why a fixed cohort

Same 30 domains every month means the line is comparable — adoption movement, not sampling noise. The heavier top-1,000 baseline (8.5% valid) lives in the full data study , dataset downloadable under CC BY 4.0.

Check your own

The spec is cheap to satisfy and most of the web still hasn't: validate yours with the llms.txt validator , or generate a spec-valid file in the browser with the generator . The five signals AI engines actually need are covered by the free checker .

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