Mail.RU_Bot user agent
Operated by VK
Mail.RU_Bot is the crawler of Mail.ru search in Russia.
The Mail.RU_Bot bot at a glance
- Mail.RU_Bot is operated by VK and crawls web pages for a search engine index.
- The robots.txt token for Mail.RU_Bot is Mail.RU_Bot.
- Blocking a search engine crawler removes your pages from that search engine's results.
- Mail.RU_Bot robots.txt support: Not documented.
- Recommendation for Generative Engine Optimization (GEO): Allow.
What is Mail.RU_Bot?
Mail.RU_Bot indexes pages for the Mail.ru portal and search.
Mail.ru’s former robots help page no longer loads, so this profile relies on the open crawler-user-agents list.
Should you block Mail.RU_Bot?
Allow Mail.RU_Bot unless it causes a measurable load problem.
| Effect on search rankings | Blocking a search engine crawler removes your pages from that search engine's results. |
|---|---|
| Effect on AI visibility | AI features built on that search index, such as Google AI Overviews and AI Mode on top of Googlebot, also lose access to your pages. |
| Follows robots.txt | Not documented |
| Recommendation | Allow |
How to block or allow Mail.RU_Bot
Put the robots.txt rule in the file at the root of every domain and subdomain, for example https://example.com/robots.txt. The token Mail.RU_Bot is matched case-insensitively. robots.txt alone may not stop Mail.RU_Bot, so add the Nginx, Apache or Cloudflare rule as well.
robots.txt: block
# Block Mail.RU_Bot
User-agent: Mail.RU_Bot
Disallow: /robots.txt: allow
# Allow Mail.RU_Bot
User-agent: Mail.RU_Bot
Allow: /robots.txt: partial
# Keep Mail.RU_Bot out of private areas only
User-agent: Mail.RU_Bot
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /cart/
Disallow: /checkout/
Disallow: /my-account/
Allow: /Nginx
# Nginx: return 403 to Mail.RU_Bot
if ($http_user_agent ~* "(Mail\.RU_Bot)") {
return 403;
}Apache
# Apache .htaccess: return 403 to Mail.RU_Bot
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} (Mail\.RU_Bot) [NC]
RewriteRule .* - [F,L]Cloudflare WAF
# Cloudflare > Security > WAF > Custom rule, action: Block
(http.user_agent contains "Mail.RU_Bot")How to verify real Mail.RU_Bot traffic
VK publishes no IP list or reverse DNS pattern for Mail.RU_Bot, so the user agent cannot be verified. Anyone can send the same string. Rate-limit unusual volume instead of trusting the name.
How to find Mail.RU_Bot in your server logs
Search the web server access log for the token. The command below counts Mail.RU_Bot requests per URL on Nginx or Apache.
grep -i "Mail.RU_Bot" access.log | awk '{print $7}' | sort | uniq -c | sort -rn | head -20For a full report per AI bot, upload the log to the AI Log File Analyzer, a free tool by Justin Hà.
Mail.RU_Bot user agent string
The full user agent VK publishes for Mail.RU_Bot. Version numbers such as Chrome/W.X.Y.Z change over time, so match the token, not the whole string.
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; Linux x86_64; Mail.RU_Bot/2.0; +http://go.mail.ru/help/robots)Mail.RU_Bot FAQ
Mail.RU_Bot identifies itself with the robots.txt token "Mail.RU_Bot". A typical request header reads: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; Linux x86_64; Mail.RU_Bot/2.0; +http://go.mail.ru/help/robots)
VK has not documented how Mail.RU_Bot treats robots.txt. Add a robots.txt rule and back it with a server rule if the traffic matters to you.
Blocking a search engine crawler removes your pages from that search engine's results. AI features built on that search index, such as Google AI Overviews and AI Mode on top of Googlebot, also lose access to your pages.
Add two lines to the robots.txt file at the root of each domain and subdomain: "User-agent: Mail.RU_Bot" followed by "Disallow: /". The token is case-insensitive. Changes can take up to 24 hours to be picked up.
Not reliably. VK publishes no IP list or reverse DNS pattern for Mail.RU_Bot, so anyone can send the same user agent. Rate-limit unusual volume instead of trusting the name.
Search your server access log for "Mail.RU_Bot", for example with: grep -i "Mail.RU_Bot" access.log. The AI Log File Analyzer by Justin Hà counts visits per AI bot from an uploaded log file.
Sources: Public bot registry. Last reviewed by Justin Hà.
See which of these bots actually reach your website
The AI Log File Analyzer by Justin Hà counts visits from GPTBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot and other AI crawlers in your server log, for free. The GEO Technical Package sets up robots.txt, llms.txt and crawler access for AI search.
