What is Bingbot?
Bingbot is a web crawler distributed by Microsoft that gathers data and builds a searchable index on the internet. It’s the bot behind Bing search, performing the same crucial function as Googlebot does for the Google search platform.
Bingbot was launched in October 2010, and is the third most active crawler in the world.
User Agent Strings
Bingbot can be identified by the following User Agent strings:
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; bingbot/2.0; +http://www.bing.com/bingbot.htm)Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko; compatible; bingbot/2.0; +http://www.bing.com/bingbot.htm) Chrome/W.X.Y.Z Safari/537.36Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; Android 6.0.1; Nexus 5X Build/MMB29P) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/W.X.Y.Z Mobile Safari/537.36 (compatible; bingbot/2.0; +http://www.bing.com/bingbot.htm)
Adherence to Standards
Like other major search bots, Bingbot respects the rules outlined in the robots.txt file and honours the “nofollow” directives on links and pages.
Additional Bing Crawlers
In addition to Bingbot, Bing also operates other specialised crawlers, such as AdIdxBot (for Bing Ads) and BingPreview (to generate page snapshots).
