Where should I publish my RSL file?

Anywhere on your site at a stable URL, then associate it — most simply with a License: https://… line in robots.txt. RSL 1.0 does not define /.well-known/rsl.xml.

Which RSL version does the validator use?

RSL 1.0 (published 10 December 2025) with its published errata. A document in another namespace, such as an earlier draft, is reported as not RSL 1.0 rather than guessed at.

Does permits type="usage" with search allow AI training?

No. permits is an allow-list: listing search alone means every other usage, including ai-train, is not permitted.

Free tools

RSL validator

Enter a domain to find the RSL (Really Simple Licensing) licence it associates with its content and validate it against RSL 1.0 — then see, in plain terms, what it declares for search, AI indexing, AI input and AI training.

Runs the same real audit as the full report and opens it at this check — free, with no account or installation.

What this checks

Discovers the licence the way RSL 1.0 defines: a License line in robots.txt (the User-agent: * group overrides global lines), the homepage HTTP Link header, or a homepage <link rel="license" type="application/rsl+xml"> or inline script.
Retrieves the licence that applies to crawlers in general through the same safe-fetch scanner, and lists every other association it found.
Validates the RSL namespace, <rsl>/<content>/<license> structure, the usage, user and geo vocabularies, payment, reporting and legal terms, max-age and lastmod.
Summarises each licence for search, ai-index, ai-input and ai-train as permitted, prohibited, not permitted (outside an allow-list) or unspecified — with prohibitions taking precedence, as RSL requires.
Checks the legacy /.well-known/rsl.xml location only when nothing else is declared, and says so.

Worked example

Official RSL template (rslstandard.org)

license.xml

<rsl xmlns="https://rslstandard.org/rsl">
  <content url="/">
    <license>
      <prohibits type="usage">ai-train ai-input</prohibits>
    </license>
  </content>
</rsl>

What the report shows

Example results
Conformance	Conforms to RSL 1.0 Core
search	unspecified
ai-input	prohibited
ai-train	prohibited
Payment	freeno <payment> element

How to read the result

Permitted: An allow-list (permits type="usage") includes it and no prohibition applies.
Not permitted: An allow-list exists and leaves it out.
Prohibited: A prohibition names it directly, or through ai-all or all.
Unspecified: The licence has no usage terms for it.

What this does not tell you

RSL is a machine-readable declaration, not enforcement; no crawler is required to read it.
CrawlPact never obtains licences, executes payments, contacts licence servers or decrypts content.
One licence is evaluated per scan — the one that applies to crawlers in general; others are listed, not retrieved. The XML parser rejects DTDs and is bounded in size and depth.

See limitations andmethodology.

Questions

Where should I publish my RSL file?: Anywhere on your site at a stable URL, then associate it — most simply with a License: https://… line in robots.txt. RSL 1.0 does not define /.well-known/rsl.xml.
Which RSL version does the validator use?: RSL 1.0 (published 10 December 2025) with its published errata. A document in another namespace, such as an earlier draft, is reported as not RSL 1.0 rather than guessed at.
Does permits type="usage" with search allow AI training?: No. permits is an allow-list: listing search alone means every other usage, including ai-train, is not permitted.

Sources

Want the complete picture — and to know when it changes?

This check is one section of the full audit, which also covers every other policy signal and a Policy Health Score. Save the domain from the report to monitor it.

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