See it on a real storeBots, pages and people sent by AI on an example store. No sign-up.Search engines, run by Huawei.
What is PetalBot? Huawei's search engine crawler. Verifiable by reverse DNS.
Run by Huawei.
Purpose: Search engines. A visit means your page is being crawled for a classic search index.
robots.txt name: PetalBot.
Verifiable by reverse DNS.
At a glance, the facts in one table.
PetalBot at a glance. Taken from SenseGap's open bot directory, the same data that sorts every visit in the dashboard.
All bots| PetalBot | |
|---|---|
| Operator | Huawei |
| Purpose | Search engines |
| User agent contains | PetalBot |
| robots.txt name | PetalBot |
| Verification | Reverse DNS |
| Documentation | None listed |
Purpose, what it does and why it came.
What PetalBot does. SenseGap sorts every visit by purpose. PetalBot is in the Search engines group.
PetalBot is Huawei's search engine crawler that indexes pages for Huawei's search results.
What a visit means
A visit means your page is being crawled for a classic search index. SenseGap keeps search engines in your reports so you can compare AI activity with them.
Comparing how often a search engine and AI assistants read the same pages shows which content AI relies on more, or less, than search does.
Detection, the header SenseGap matches.
How SenseGap recognizes PetalBot. By its User-Agent header. A separate check then decides whether the visit is real.
Every request carries a User-Agent header naming the software that sent it. SenseGap counts a request as PetalBot when that header contains PetalBot, in any letter case. The header is plain text, so any script can copy it. Matching the name is where recognition starts, not where trust starts.
/PetalBot/iVerification, how to tell a real visit from a fake.
How to verify PetalBot. Huawei publishes the DNS names its servers use, so a real visit can be proven.
How we verify bots- 01
Look up the visiting address
Run a reverse DNS lookup on the IP address the request came from. It returns a hostname.
- 02
Check the hostname
The hostname must end in .petalsearch.com. Anything else is not PetalBot.
*.petalsearch.com - 03
Look the hostname up again
Run a forward lookup on that hostname. It must return the same IP address, otherwise the reverse record could have been set by anyone.
$ host <visiting-ip>
… domain name pointer <hostname>.petalsearch.com.
$ host <hostname>.petalsearch.com
<hostname>.petalsearch.com has address <visiting-ip>SenseGap runs this check on every visit that claims to be PetalBot. A pass is marked Real. A visit that sends the name and fails is marked Fake, and stays out of your other reports.
robots.txt, rules you can copy.
Block or allow PetalBot in robots.txt. Its robots.txt name is PetalBot. Paste a group into the robots.txt at your site's root.
User-agent: PetalBot
Disallow: /User-agent: PetalBot
Allow: /User-agent: PetalBot
Disallow: /private/One rule catches people out. Under the robots.txt standard (RFC 9309), a crawler that finds a group naming it follows only that group and ignores your User-agent: * rules. If you add a PetalBot group, repeat in it anything from the catch-all group you still want applied.
robots.txt is a request, not a lock. To enforce a block, match the User-Agent header at your server or CDN. In nginx:
# nginx, inside a server block
if ($http_user_agent ~* "PetalBot") {
return 403;
}SenseGap reads your robots.txt and shows, bot by bot, what you allow and which bots fetched pages you disallowed. See what you get.
Trade-off, what blocking changes.
Should you block PetalBot? It depends on what you want from Huawei. Here is what each choice means.
If you allow it
Your pages can rank and be found in that search engine.
If you block it
Your pages drop out of that search engine's results over time. For major engines this is rarely what a site wants.
Huawei, every bot it runs.
More bots from Huawei. Huawei runs 2 bots in the directory, each with its own job.
Search engines, other bots with the same job.
Other search engine crawlers. Same purpose, different companies.
Browse the directoryFAQ, PetalBot in short answers.
PetalBot, answered plainly
What is PetalBot?
PetalBot is Huawei's search engine crawler that indexes pages for Huawei's search results.
Who runs PetalBot?
Huawei. SenseGap's directory has no documentation link for it yet.
What does a visit from PetalBot mean?
A visit means your page is being crawled for a classic search index. SenseGap keeps search engines in your reports so you can compare AI activity with them.
What user agent does PetalBot use?
Its User-Agent header contains "PetalBot". SenseGap matches it regardless of letter case.
How do I block PetalBot?
Add "User-agent: PetalBot" followed by "Disallow: /" to your robots.txt. robots.txt is a request, not a lock; to enforce it, block the user agent at your server or CDN.
How do I know a visit is really PetalBot?
Run a reverse DNS lookup on the address: the hostname must end in .petalsearch.com, and a forward lookup of that hostname must return the same address. SenseGap runs these checks on every visit.
Does Huawei publish IP ranges for PetalBot?
Not as a list SenseGap uses. It can be verified by reverse DNS instead: real hosts end in .petalsearch.com.
What happens if I block PetalBot?
Your pages drop out of that search engine's results over time. For major engines this is rarely what a site wants.