ImagesiftBot is Hive's crawler for publicly available images. It also saves page text that sits with those images. Hive stores both in an index used for similar-image search. You name ImagesiftBot in robots.txt when you want to change that access.
What the crawler saves
Hive's crawler page says ImagesiftBot scrapes public images for Hive's web intelligence products. Product naming on that page is Imagesift by Hive.
Each saved image includes the host URL and the text on that page. Alt text associated with the image is saved too. Hive says ImageSift analyzes the downloaded images and the page text. That information is stored in an index. Hive's products use the index to search for similar images and to retrieve them.
The ImageSift homepage says you can identify duplicates and variants of an image across the web. Visitors get a reverse image search form. Upload a file, or paste an image link, then run Search. Uploads accept JPEG, PNG, TIFF, GIF, WebP, and AVIF. Placeholder text in the link box reads "Paste Image Link Here".
Nothing on the about page describes an AI training dataset. Aiola's ImagesiftBot entry sets the category to indexing. Its notes describe public images and page text in an index for similar-image search and retrieval. The shared Indexing bucket is described as crawled for AI or search indexing. That description covers the bucket, not a separate Hive claim. Notes on the record are the statement for this bot.
Match the published user agent
Hive publishes this user-agent string:
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; ImagesiftBot; +imagesift.com)
Inside that string, the token is ImagesiftBot. Aiola stores that same sample on the crawler entry. Its robots.txt token is ImagesiftBot. Vendor on the record is Hive, and the vendor domain is thehive.ai. Last verification on the record is 2026-10-23.
Hive's heading writes ImageSiftBot, with a capital S. Both the user-agent and the robots.txt samples use ImagesiftBot. Put ImagesiftBot in your rule so it matches those samples.
IP range type on the entry is none. No fetched ranges are listed for this bot. No IP verification is published for this bot, so treat the token as a claim.
Block every path
Hive respects standard robots.txt directives that target ImagesiftBot. Use this group when you want every path disallowed:
User-agent: ImagesiftBot
Disallow: /Serve the file at /robots.txt on the hostname you care about. Aiola's robots.txt guide says to do that for each relevant hostname. After you deploy, open the public robots.txt URL and read the response.
Do not assume a named group inherits path rules from the wildcard group. If an ImagesiftBot group is already present, edit that group. Contradictory duplicate groups should be removed, the guide says.
Sample files in the guide place this token with other indexing bots. A sample can include a Content-Signal line. Hive's about page does not mention Content-Signal. Those samples are not proof that every token honors the lines, the guide says.
Limit paths or follow Googlebot
Hive's own sample allows the site and blocks one prefix:
User-agent: ImagesiftBot
Allow: /
Disallow: /private/Hive says that sample lets the crawler fetch all pages except paths under /private/.
Crawl-delay is supported in the same kind of group. Count that number as the minimum seconds between the start of consecutive requests. Hive's example sets the value to 5. From there, the crawler splits the day into five-second intervals. It issues at most one request to your domain inside each interval.
If no rule targets ImagesiftBot, and a rule targets Googlebot, the Googlebot rule is used. Hive shows a wildcard block beside a Googlebot exception:
User-agent: *
Disallow: /
User-agent: Googlebot
Allow: /
Disallow: /private/In that example, ImagesiftBot fetches all pages except those under /private/. A wildcard Disallow does not replace that Googlebot group. Hive states this fallback only when a Googlebot rule exists. It does not state what happens when the file names neither agent.
Directory notes say the same two behaviors in shorter form. ImagesiftBot robots.txt rules are honored, those notes say. Googlebot directives apply when no ImagesiftBot group exists.
What Aiola can show you
Aiola Analytics includes ImagesiftBot in Indexing. The Analytics docs describe the AI view.
The AI view shows crawl totals, bots, pages, and activity over time. It groups hits into Answers, Indexing, Training, and Other. AI-answer referrals, crawler 404s, and discovery-file health also appear there.
Crawlers do not run JavaScript, so the browser tag cannot see them. One server or edge snippet from the setup guide posts each matching hit. Only known crawler user agents are stored.
A recorded crawl is not proof that the vendor cited the page. An empty period is not proof that the vendor cannot reach the site.
Contact Hive
Questions about ImagesiftBot can go to support@imagesift.com. Hive lists that address for an opt-out of crawling as well.
Try it in Aiola
Download Aiola free for macOS 12 or later and Windows 10 or later. Hosted Analytics needs Pro or the 7-day trial, and the pricing page lists both. Open the AI view and review ImagesiftBot requests in Indexing.
