Blocked by robots.txt shows up in Search Console for most Shopify stores. Usually it's Shopify doing its job. Here's what causes it, and how to fix it when it matters.
Found, but not fetched
A robots file tells search engines which addresses not to crawl. Blocked by robots.txt means Google found a page, but wasn't allowed to fetch it. Indexed, though blocked means Google indexed the address anyway, usually from links, without seeing the page.
- robots.txt: Tells crawlers what not to fetch
- Blocked: Found, but not crawled
- Indexed, though blocked: Indexed without the page being seen
Shopify blocks these on purpose
Shopify's default robots file blocks some pages on purpose. Admin, cart, checkout, account, and order pages, which are private or specific to one customer. Plus filtered and sorted collection pages, which duplicate your collections. Shopify says this default is optimal for SEO.
- Private: Admin, account and order pages
- Checkout: Cart and checkout
- Duplicates: Filtered and sorted collections
- Shopify says: The default is optimal for SEO
Which blocked pages matter?
Open Indexing, then Pages, and click the blocked row. Look at the addresses. Cart, checkout, account, or collection links with sort or filter settings? Leave them. A product, collection, or blog post you want found? Check for a custom robots rule, or an old app or proxy workaround.
1. Indexing → Pages → the blocked row
2. Cart, checkout, filters: leave them
3. Real products or posts: investigate
4. Look for custom rules or old workarounds
Edit robots.txt.liquid, carefully
To change the rules, go to Online Store, then Themes, open Edit code, and add or edit the robots.txt dot liquid template. Shopify warns this is unsupported, and a mistake can cost you all your traffic. If you're unsure, hire a Shopify Partner.
1. Online Store → Themes → Edit code
2. Add or edit the robots.txt.liquid template
- Warning: Unsupported: mistakes can drop traffic
- Unsure?: Hire a Shopify Partner
Blocking isn't removing
For indexed, though blocked. If you want a page out of search, blocking it isn't enough, because Google can't see a noindex tag on a page it can't crawl. Allow crawling, and add noindex. For Shopify's own cart and checkout pages, it's usually safe to leave them.
| Blocked only | To remove it |
|---|---|
| Google can't crawl it, so can't see noindex | Allow crawling, and add a noindex tag |
Keep the defaults
To stop it coming back, keep Shopify's default rules unless you have a clear reason. If you customize, use Liquid, not pasted plain-text rules, which Shopify says can go out of date. And recheck the report after any change.
- ✅ Keep Shopify's default rules
- ✅ Customize with Liquid, not plain text
- ✅ Recheck the report after changes
- ❌ Blocking pages you want found
Doing this at scale
ConvertLens doesn't touch robots files, or indexing. It helps with what comes after a page is crawled. It scores each product page, and drafts content fixes you approve. If a robots rule is blocking a product, fix the rule first. See ConvertLens.