Google publishes its guide to optimizing for generative AI
Google’s new guide said you do not need AI text files to appear in its generative AI features, and listed creating llms.txt among the things to skip.
Last updated
What happened?
Google announced the guide on the Search Central blog on Friday 15 May 2026, in a post by John Mueller; the documentation changelog for the same day reads “Added a new guide on optimizing for generative AI features on Search.”
What did it say about llms.txt?
As first published, the guide said: “You don’t need to create new machine readable files, AI text files, markup, or Markdown to appear in generative AI search.” Its list of takeaways included skipping “creating unnecessary AI text files (like llms.txt)”.
A month later, on 15 June, Google narrowed the wording to Google Search and added that publishing llms.txt is fine. That change has its own post.
What does it mean for your site?
For Google, optimizing for AI search is ordinary SEO: useful pages that crawlers can reach and read. llms.txt plays no part in it.
Write the file for other readers, such as coding agents and documentation tools, and judge it by whether it describes your site accurately.