YandexMarket bot

What is YandexMarket?

YandexMarket is a web crawler operated by Yandex, Russia's largest search engine company. It's specifically designed to collect and index product information from e-commerce websites for Yandex.Market, Yandex's online marketplace and price comparison service. Similar to Google Shopping, Yandex.Market allows consumers to compare products, prices, and retailers across the Russian internet.

The crawler functions as a specialized indexing bot that identifies and catalogs product listings, prices, availability, specifications, and retailer information. When visiting websites, YandexMarket typically identifies itself with the user-agent string YandexMarket/1.0 or variations that include "YandexMarket" followed by version numbers.

YandexMarket is distinctive in how it focuses exclusively on commercial product data rather than general web content. It's particularly active on e-commerce platforms, online stores, and websites that feature product catalogs, especially those serving Russian-speaking markets.

Why is YandexMarket crawling my site?

If YandexMarket is crawling your website, it's most likely because your site contains product listings or e-commerce content that Yandex wants to include in its marketplace comparison service. The crawler is specifically looking for:

• Product names, descriptions, and images
• Pricing information and availability status
• Technical specifications and product features
• Retailer information and shipping details

The frequency of visits depends on your site's size, popularity, and how often you update product information. Sites with frequently changing prices or inventory may experience more regular crawling. YandexMarket typically increases its crawling activity during shopping seasons or sales periods when product information changes more rapidly.

This crawling is generally considered authorized for public e-commerce websites, as it helps drive potential customers to your products through Yandex's comparison service.

What is the purpose of YandexMarket?

YandexMarket's primary purpose is to power Yandex.Market, a major online marketplace and price comparison platform that dominates the Russian e-commerce ecosystem. By crawling product information, YandexMarket enables consumers to:

• Compare prices for the same product across multiple retailers
• View product specifications and features in a standardized format
• Read customer reviews and ratings
• Find the best deals and shipping options

For website owners and retailers, inclusion in Yandex.Market can significantly increase visibility to Russian-speaking consumers. Many shoppers use Yandex.Market as their starting point for product research and purchasing decisions, making it a valuable channel for e-commerce businesses targeting Russian markets.

The data collected is used to create structured product listings in Yandex's marketplace, allowing for easy comparison and filtering by consumers. This can benefit website owners by driving qualified traffic from comparison shoppers who are actively looking to purchase specific products.

How do I block YandexMarket?

YandexMarket respects the robots.txt protocol, making it relatively straightforward to control its access to your website. If you wish to block YandexMarket from crawling your entire site, add the following directives to your robots.txt file:

User-agent: YandexMarket
Disallow: /

If you only want to block access to specific sections of your site, you can use more targeted directives:

User-agent: YandexMarket
Disallow: /private-products/
Disallow: /upcoming-releases/
Allow: /

Keep in mind that blocking YandexMarket means your products won't appear in Yandex.Market search results, which could significantly reduce your visibility to Russian-speaking consumers. Before blocking this bot, consider whether the traffic it might generate outweighs any concerns about crawling.

For retailers targeting Russian markets, allowing YandexMarket to index your products is generally beneficial. However, if you're experiencing excessive crawling that impacts site performance, you might consider using the Crawl-delay directive in your robots.txt file to slow down the crawler rather than blocking it entirely:

User-agent: YandexMarket
Crawl-delay: 10

This instructs the bot to wait 10 seconds between requests, reducing the load on your server while still allowing your products to be indexed.