Ahrefs study: llms.txt files mostly unread by AI crawlers
An Ahrefs analysis spanning roughly 15 million data points found 97% of sites’ llms.txt files were never read by AI crawlers and that adding schema markup produced no measurable lift in AI citations across 1,885 pages tested over 30 days, per Search Engine Journal. The same research found Google AI Overviews cut position-1 click-through rates by 58% in 2026, up from a 34.5% drop in 2025, while 88.46% of AI citations still traced back to pages in the general search index.
Why it matters: The findings undercut two of the most common AEO tactics, llms.txt and schema markup, while reinforcing that traditional search-ranking signals still drive most AI-answer citations.
The record: AhrefsGoogle AI Overviewsllms.txt
Glossary: AI crawlersllms.txtAI Overviews
Posted to the wire August 18, 2026.