Meta-ExternalAds: user agent, IP verification and robots.txt
Meta-ExternalAds is operated by Meta. It is classified here as Retrieval (Advertising and business products). Verification method: None available.
Exact user-agent string
meta-externalads/1.1 (+/documentation/sharing/webmasters/web-crawlers)
robots.txt token: Meta-ExternalAds. The user-agent string is self-asserted and can be
forged by anyone. It is a claim, not proof.
How to verify Meta-ExternalAds is genuine
Meta publishes no IP range file and no reverse DNS method for Meta-ExternalAds. There is no way for anyone, including us, to prove a request claiming this identity is genuine.
How to block or allow Meta-ExternalAds
User-agent: Meta-ExternalAds
Disallow: /Replace Disallow with Allow to permit it explicitly.
What blocking Meta-ExternalAds costs you
Meta describes this crawler as improving advertising and other business-related products. If you advertise on Meta, blocking it degrades the signal Meta uses on your own campaigns. If you do not, the cost is close to nothing.
What is specific to Meta-ExternalAds
Meta-ExternalAds is the least discussed of Meta's five tokens and the one most likely to be missing from a robots.txt that was written to block Meta's AI crawling. It is a separate token from Meta-ExternalAgent, so a disallow aimed at training does not touch it. Meta publishes no IP ranges for any of its crawlers, so as with the rest of the set the user-agent is the only signal and it cannot be verified. The published form is a bare meta-externalads/1.1 with no browser prefix.
Verify a request claiming to be Meta-ExternalAds
Check a Meta-ExternalAds request against Meta's published ranges
Source
Primary documentation: https://developers.facebook.com/docs/sharing/webmasters/web-crawlers/. Last verified 2026-08-02.
Other Meta crawlers
- Meta-ExternalAgent - AI training and indexing crawler
- Meta-ExternalFetcher - User-triggered fetch
- Meta-WebIndexer - Meta AI search index
- FacebookExternalHit - Link preview fetch