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Googlebot-Video: allow it or block it?

Googlebot-Video is Google's video crawler: rules addressed to it affect video features in Google Search and other Google products that depend on videos. Allow it if you want your videos shown there. Blocking it saves real bandwidth but leaves your pages indexed by Googlebot. Verify a heavy visitor's address before you throttle it, because the header is easy to forge.

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AI traffic · attensira.com30 days to 4 Oct 2026

Not splitthe board does not count Googlebot-Video apart from Googlebot

Googlebot: 189 requests, may include it

Search engine crawlers on the board, beside attensira.com's rule for each
AgentAI requests, 30 daysattensira.com robots.txt
Googlebot-Video (this page)0Parent's rule
bingbot541Allowed
Googlebot189Allowed
Applebot0Allowed
Googlebot-Image0Parent's rule
GoogleOther0Allowed
GoogleOther-Image0Parent's rule
Kagibot0Wildcard
PetalBot0Wildcard

2 of 9 had requests filed in the window. User agents as sent, not checked against address lists.

Analyst agentAnalyst · reads the AI traffic boardAI traffic board, read over the Attensira MCP, and our live robots.txt · · n=143,601 AI requests
Karl-Gustav KallasmaaKarl-Gustav Kallasmaa, Founder & CEOLast updated

How do I allow or block Googlebot-Video in robots.txt?

Paste this into the robots.txt at the root of your domain. Beside it, the group attensira.com serves Googlebot-Video today.

robots.txt · for your sitepaste-ready
# Keep video files out of Google's video features, keep# the pages indexed.User-agent: Googlebot-VideoDisallow: /media/ # Or withdraw from video features entirely.User-agent: Googlebot-VideoDisallow: /
Example · a group to paste, written for the token Googlebot-Video
attensira.com/robots.txtvia a parent token
# No group names Googlebot-Video, so it reads the# Googlebot group.User-agent: GooglebotAllow: /Disallow: /api/
As served at attensira.com/robots.txt ·

We do not name Googlebot-Video. It follows the Googlebot group instead (Google lists Googlebot as its second token), which allows everything except /api/.

Read the whole file, or write yours with the robots.txt generator.

Who runs Googlebot-Video, and what is it for?

Google runs it, and we file it under search indexing. Fetches video for the video features in Google Search and other Google products. Blocking it saves bandwidth and leaves your pages indexed by Googlebot.

From Google’s documentation, read . Why a training fetch and a search fetch are different decisions: the AI crawler guide.

Is Googlebot-Video a visibility decision or a bandwidth decision?

Bandwidth first. Google documents rules addressed to Googlebot-Video as affecting video-related Google Search features and other products dependent on videos2. A video crawl pulls media files, and media files are the most expensive bytes most sites serve. That makes this the token people reach for when transfer costs spike.

The trade is real in both directions. Blocking a training crawler saves little bandwidth and costs no visibility. Blocking Googlebot-Video saves real bandwidth and costs real placements in Google's video features. It does not cost you the pages: they are indexed by Googlebot whatever you tell this token.

So the middle path is usually right. The robots.txt block above shows both options: a scoped rule that keeps one media directory out and an absolute rule that withdraws from video features entirely. Scope it to the files whose placements you do not need.

Why throttle only after you verify?

Because a site under bandwidth pressure still grants exceptions to Google, and that makes the name attractive to forge. Google publishes the header as Googlebot-Video/1.03, a short string anyone can send, and its statement that common crawlers obey robots.txt5 covers Google's crawler and nothing else.

A rate limit applied to the header alone throttles the real crawler and does nothing to the client that copied it. Run the check in the verification section above first. If the heavy client fails it, it is not Google, robots.txt will not stop it, and the fix belongs at your CDN.

Does a Googlebot-Video group override your other rules?

Yes. Google documents two tokens for this crawler, Googlebot-Video and Googlebot4, and its crawlers follow only the group with the most specific matching user agent, ignoring the rest1. Two consequences:

  • While you have no Googlebot-Video group, your Googlebot group governs video crawling, whether or not anyone meant it to.
  • Once you write a Googlebot-Video group, it replaces both the Googlebot group and User-agent: * for this crawler. A permissive Googlebot-Video group under a restrictive wildcard is a real exemption, and any rule you still want for video has to be repeated inside it.

If video crawling has stopped and the groups read the way you meant, look past robots.txt: a CDN or firewall rule, or video files the crawler cannot reach.

Is Googlebot-Video used for AI training?

Google documents it as a crawler for video features in Search and other video-dependent products, which in the four-way job taxonomy of the AI crawler guide is search indexing. Google's documented control for training future Gemini models is a different token, Google-Extended, which sends no requests at all. Never sweep Googlebot-Video into a wildcard aimed at training crawlers; the costs are opposite.

How does Googlebot-Video compare with the image crawler?

  • Googlebot-Video

    Documented effect of a rule
    Video features in Search and video-dependent products
    Main cost of blocking
    Video placements

  • Googlebot-Image

    Documented effect of a rule
    Images, Discover, Google Video, and images, logos and favicons in Search
    Main cost of blocking
    Image placements, favicons

  • Googlebot

    Documented effect of a rule
    Google's search indexes
    Main cost of blocking
    Being in Search at all

Both media crawlers share Googlebot's verification path and both have Googlebot as a parent token.

VerificationGoogle
Reverse DNS ends in
*.googlebot.com*.geo.googlebot.com
IP range file
common-crawlers.json
Researcher agentResearcherTranscribed from Google documentation ·

How should you match Googlebot-Video in logs?

Match the bare token Googlebot-Video, case-insensitively, as a whole word. The 1.0 is a version Google may increment, so the string is flagged volatile above. A firewall rule pinned to the full string fails open or fails closed one day with no log line saying so.

On a media-heavy site, report this agent in its own row rather than inside a "Google" total. Its requests are few and expensive, and averaging them into page fetches hides exactly the cost you are trying to manage.

What can Attensira show you about Googlebot-Video?

AI traffic, on Growth and Business, counts which URLs crawlers fetch, per operator and declared purpose, measured at the edge, so expensive media fetches are visible rather than averaged away. It reports user agents as sent and leaves the reverse DNS check to you. Whether Google's AI answers mention your brand is a separate daily reading, on every plan. See crawler logs and the robots.txt generator.

User-AgentGoogle
Googlebot-Video/1.0
Researcher agentResearcherTranscribed from Google documentation ·

Should I allow Googlebot-Video in my situation?

Concrete cases, and what each one implies for this agent.

  • Your egress bill jumped and the logs are full of a client calling itself Googlebot-Video pulling whole media files.

    Verify the source addresses before you rate-limit, and before you conclude Google is responsible.

    The published header is nineteen characters with no browser shape to it, so it is among the cheapest identities on the web to forge, and a media-heavy site is exactly the target where forging it pays. If the addresses do not reverse-resolve into Google's documented hostnames, a robots.txt rule aimed at Googlebot-Video would have changed nothing at all.

  • You disallowed Googlebot-Video expecting the video pages to drop out of Search.

    Expect the pages to stay and the video features to go.

    Google documents this token's scope as video-related Search features and other products dependent on videos, while page indexing belongs to the Googlebot token. Blocking video crawling removes the enrichment, not the result.

  • You have a permissive Googlebot-Video group and a restrictive wildcard group, and video crawling is not happening.

    Look for the cause somewhere other than the wildcard. Check that the group really names Googlebot-Video, then check the network layer and the pages themselves.

    Google's crawlers follow only the group with the most specific matching user agent and never combine it with the wildcard, so a correctly named Googlebot-Video group does exempt the crawler from a restrictive * group. If crawling still stops, the usual causes are a misspelt token, a CDN or firewall rule that never reads robots.txt, or video URLs the crawler cannot reach.

What else do people ask?

Will blocking Googlebot-Video remove my video pages from Google Search?
No. The pages are crawled and indexed by Googlebot. A Googlebot-Video rule changes what happens to the video files in Google's video features, not whether the pages that host them are in Search.
Does a Googlebot rule apply to Googlebot-Video?
Yes. Google lists Googlebot as a second valid token for this crawler and says only one token needs to match for a rule to apply. An existing Googlebot group governs video crawling until you write a Googlebot-Video group; from then on that group alone applies, because Google's crawlers follow the most specific matching group.
Something calling itself Googlebot-Video is pulling whole media files. Is it Google?
Check before you act. Run a reverse DNS lookup on the address, confirm the name is in googlebot.com, google.com or googleusercontent.com, and forward-resolve it back to the same address, or match the address against common-crawlers.json. A rate limit on the header alone throttles the real crawler and misses the copy.

Where do these facts come from?

6 claims on this page, each with the page it was read from; last checked . The numbers in the text point here.

  1. Google documents that only one robots.txt group is valid for a particular crawler. Its crawlers follow the group with the most specific user agent that matches and ignore the others, and user-agent-specific groups are not combined with the * group.

    developers.google.com · retrieved

    “Only one group is valid for a particular crawler.”

  2. Google documents crawling preferences addressed to the Googlebot-Video user agent as affecting video-related Google Search features and other products dependent on videos.

    developers.google.com · retrieved

    “video-related Google Search features and other products dependent on videos.”

  3. Google publishes Googlebot-Video's User-Agent in HTTP requests as "Googlebot-Video/1.0".

    developers.google.com · retrieved · changes often, check the source

    “Googlebot-Video/1.0”

  4. Google documents two robots.txt user agent tokens for this crawler, Googlebot-Video and Googlebot, and states that only one crawler token needs to match for a rule to apply.

    developers.google.com · retrieved

    “Some crawlers have more than one user agent token; you need to match only one crawler token for a rule to apply.”

  5. Google states that its common crawlers always obey robots.txt rules when crawling automatically.

    developers.google.com · retrieved

    “They always obey robots.txt rules when crawling automatically.”

  6. Google documents verifying its crawlers by reverse DNS lookup on the accessing address, checking the domain name is googlebot.com, google.com or googleusercontent.com, then a forward lookup back to the same address; the common crawlers' ranges are published in common-crawlers.json.

    developers.google.com · retrieved

    “Verify that the domain name is either googlebot.com, google.com, or googleusercontent.com.”

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