Today we launched LLMs Ledger, a free tool for checking, creating and listing your website’s llms.txt file. You can check any site’s llms.txt for free in a few seconds with no account, get a score out of 100, and see every problem explained in plain English.
We’re a WordPress and SEO agency in Dublin, Ohio. We built this because our clients kept asking us the same two questions, and we wanted a straight answer for both.
What is llms.txt?
An llms.txt file is a short text file at the root of a website, like yoursite.com/llms.txt. It gives AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity a clean summary of what the site is about and which pages matter most.
The format was proposed by Jeremy Howard in September 2024. It’s written in Markdown: a heading with your site’s name, a one-line summary, and a short list of your most important pages with a note on each. Here’s what one looks like for a small bakery:
# Main Street Bakery
> Family bakery in Dublin, Ohio making sourdough, celebration cakes and custom wedding orders.
## Main pages
- [Menu](https://yourbakery.com/menu): Breads, pastries and cakes with prices
- [Custom cakes](https://yourbakery.com/custom-cakes): Order a wedding or birthday cake
- [Visit us](https://yourbakery.com/visit): Hours, parking and directionsIf you run WordPress, you may already have one. Yoast SEO can generate it (Settings → Site Features → AI Tools), and All in One SEO turns it on by default (under Sitemaps → LLMs.txt).
An honest note on what llms.txt does and doesn’t do
Nobody can promise that an llms.txt file will get your business recommended by an AI assistant. How much each AI company relies on the file is still an open question.
Google has been the most direct. Its Search team says llms.txt isn’t needed for AI Overviews or AI Mode, and John Mueller has compared it to the old keywords meta tag. At the same time, Chrome’s Lighthouse 13.3 added an llms.txt check to its new Agentic Browsing audit, describing the file as a summary built for AI agents. Even within Google, the answer depends on who you ask.
So here’s how we think about it: llms.txt is cheap to publish and easy to get right. If you publish one, it should be correct, and it should stay up. A broken one isn’t helping anybody.
Why we built it
Clients kept asking two questions:
- “Do we need an llms.txt file?”
- “Is ours actually working?”
The first is a judgment call. The second should have a simple yes or no, but there wasn’t an easy way to get one.
Publishing the file is easy. Keeping it working is the hard part. We work on WordPress sites every day, and we know how often small changes have side effects. A theme update, a plugin update, a caching or security plugin, or a move to new hosting can quietly replace your llms.txt with an error page. The site looks fine to visitors. The file is just gone, and nobody notices until someone asks why.
What LLMs Ledger does
Free validator
Enter any website and get a score out of 100, with every problem explained in plain English. Run the llms.txt validator.
Free generator
Don’t have a file yet? The llms.txt generator scans your site for its key pages and writes the file for you in about two minutes. You review it, then upload it or paste it into your SEO plugin.
Free AI readiness check
This looks beyond llms.txt to whether ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Google can actually reach and read your site.
Public directory
Any site can be listed in the public directory, searchable by industry. Free listings are rechecked every three months and show a small “Listed on LLMs Ledger” badge on your site.
Monitoring (paid)
This is the part that keeps answering “is ours actually working?” instead of answering it once. LLMs Ledger checks your file on a schedule, monthly or nightly, and emails you when it breaks. Nightly plans also email you when it changes, with exactly what changed.
Pricing
Checking a site is free, and you don’t need an account to do it. Paid plans add monitoring:
- Free: validate, generate and get listed.
- Monthly checks: $9/mo or $90/yr. Email alerts when the file fails, plus version history, and no badge required.
- Nightly checks: $19/mo or $190/yr per site. Adds change alerts and nightly link checks.
- Agency: $79/mo or $790/yr per 10 sites. Add and verify sites in bulk, and get one summary email each morning instead of one per site.
Full details are on the pricing page.
Why an agency built a product
We built the agency plan for people like us. When you look after dozens of client sites, you don’t want 40 separate alert emails. You want one summary that tells you which sites need attention today.
LLMs Ledger is a Mobilize Cloud product, and it sits next to the work we already do. We run WordPress hosting and maintenance, where every update gets tested before it goes live, and SEO and Google Ads for businesses in Columbus and beyond. If you’d rather have someone set up your llms.txt, AI readiness and the rest of your site for you, see our hands-on WordPress AI optimization help.
FAQ
What is an llms.txt file?
It’s a short Markdown file at yoursite.com/llms.txt that gives AI assistants a summary of what your site is about and links to its most important pages.
Will an llms.txt file get my site recommended by ChatGPT or Google?
No one can promise that. Google says it isn’t needed for AI Overviews or AI Mode, and other AI companies haven’t said how much they rely on it. If you publish one, the goal is simply to keep it accurate and working.
How do I check if my llms.txt is working?
Enter your site at llmsledger.com. The free validator fetches the file, scores it out of 100 and explains any problems. No account is needed.
Can WordPress create an llms.txt file automatically?
Yes. Yoast SEO and All in One SEO can both generate one. It’s still worth checking the result, because updates, caching or security plugins can break it later.
What does LLMs Ledger cost?
Checking, generating and listing are free. Monitoring starts at $9/month for monthly checks, $19/month per site for nightly checks, and $79/month per 10 sites for agencies.
Check your site free
It takes a few seconds and you don’t need an account. Check your llms.txt free at llmsledger.com.