Hello,
We apologize for the issue you are facing with the llms.txt file on your website. It seems that the custom rule provided may not be applicable since Bluehost typically uses Apache servers rather than Nginx.
To resolve the 404 error for your llms.txt file, please ensure that the file is correctly set up and accessible at `https://rankmath.com/kb/fix-common-robots-txt-issues/. Here are a few steps you can take:
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Check File Existence: Ensure that the llms.txt file exists in the root directory of your website. You can do this by accessing your site via FTP or the file manager in your hosting control panel.
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File Permissions: Make sure that the permissions for the llms.txt file are set correctly so that it can be accessed publicly. Typically, permissions should be set to 644.
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Clear Cache: If you have any caching plugins or server-level caching enabled, clear the cache to ensure that you are not seeing a cached version of your site.
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Rewrite Rules: If you have custom rewrite rules in your .htaccess file, ensure they are not conflicting with the access to the llms.txt file.
If you continue to experience issues, please reply to this ticket with your website URL so that we can assist you further. A human agent from our support team will take over and provide more specific guidance based on your setup.
Thank you for bringing this concern to our attention!
Sources:
How to Use llms.txt in Rank Math SEO » Rank Math
Hello,
Thank you for your query and we are so sorry about the trouble this must have caused.
We might need to take a closer look at the settings. Please edit the first post on this ticket and include your WordPress & FTP logins in the designated Sensitive Data section.
Please do take a complete backup of your website before sharing the information with us.
It is completely secure and only our support staff has access to that section. If you want, you can use the below plugin to generate a temporary login URL to your website and share that with us instead:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/temporary-login-without-password/
You can use the above plugin in conjunction with the WP Security Audit Log to monitor what changes our staff might make on your website (if any):
https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-security-audit-log/
We really look forward to helping you.
Hello,
I have updated the sensitive data as requested. Can you please check further?
Thank you.
I appreciate your effort regarding my issue with a llms.txt file generation. I added in my first post of the topic a temporary link.
Thank you Jeremy
Hello,
Thank you for sharing your WP admin login. We also need your FTP login so we can debug the issue further.
Looking forward to hearing back from you.
Hello,
I have updated the sensitive data as requested. Can you please check further?
Thank you.
Steps to Fix the llms.txt Problem
Locate the File
Check the folder where the software expects llms.txt to be.
Make sure the file exists and isn’t empty or corrupted.
Check Permissions
Ensure the file is readable and writable by the program.
On Windows: Right-click → Properties → Security → Ensure your user has full control.
On Linux/macOS: Run chmod 644 llms.txt to set read/write permissions.
Restore a Backup
If you have a previous version of llms.txt, replace the corrupted one with the backup.
Regenerate the File (If Possible)
Some applications can recreate llms.txt automatically if it’s deleted.
Delete or rename the old file and restart the application to see if it generates a fresh version.
Check for Software Updates
Sometimes the error reappears because of a bug. Updating the software may resolve repeated issues.
Scan for Malware
Rarely, repeated corruption can be caused by malware. Run a full system scan to be safe.
Hello user USA Tube,
Thank you very much for your post. I am familiar with all the things that you listed, and in my case, none of that is actually the problem. In my case, the llms.txt file was not present in the root at all, and therefore, when I clicked on the link in the RankMath dashboard under the LLMs module settings, I got a 404 error as expected.
Now, I created my own llms.txt file with a few site links inside and uploaded it to the root. Now, the link is ok and I can open it. For me, the only question now is whether the support team from RankMath will manage to detect and fix an issue, or I will have to continue to use the file I manually created.
In any case, it would be nice to have it managed from RM since I use the plugin for my SEO and On-Page LLM optimization
Hello to all,
I´d like to know if someone from the rankmath support team managed to login and inspect the files after I updated my data for accessing in the “sensitive data” section?
Kind regards
It seems the issue is with the file not being generated or accessible via Apache. Since Bluehost uses Apache, try creating a physical llms.txt file in your public_html directory manually, then check its permissions (644). If it still returns 404, add this line to your .htaccess before other rules:
RewriteRule ^llms\.txt$ /llms.txt [L]
This ensures Apache serves the file correctly.
Thank you very much for your reply, James. I appreciate your assistance. I manually created the file named llms.txt and added myself the content from my site to it. I’m happy to share that when I follow the link available under the RankMath Dashboard – LLMS Module Settings, I no longer encounter a 404 error; the page opens successfully.
I added the rule you suggested to the .htaccess file. First, I renamed the llms.txt file to see if the RankMath plugin would generate a new one in the root directory after I added the rule. Unfortunately, I only received a 404 error again. I then uploaded my llms.txt file again and deleted its contents to check if the plugin would add new content to it. However, I was met with a white screen, indicating that the file remains empty.
I will leave things as they are since the file I uploaded works perfectly fine. If I need to add new content in the future, I will do so manually.
Thank you all for your help.
Best regards.
Hello,
Sorry for the delay in response.
We would like to troubleshoot the issue now but the FTP login you shared isn’t working at the moment. Can you please verify this further from your end so we can start debugging the issue?
Looking forward to helping you with this one.
Hello,
I have updated the sensitive data as requested. Can you please check further?
Thank you.
Hello, Jeremy.
No problem at all. I have updated my data in the “Sensitive Data” area.
In the root there is the llms.txt file that I created along with the content in it!
Looking forward to your feedback about the issue.
