Until now, there was no good way to know how often your site is cited in ChatGPT or Claude answers. Cloudflare has opened beta registration for a reporting feature (AEO) that shows this number for free.
Ask Without the Brand Name, Then Count Who Gets Cited
Here is how Cloudflare described the measurement. It builds benchmarks by industry and category, then asks AI assistants the kinds of questions users would actually ask, without brand names. From the answers, it records which sites were cited, where they appeared, and how prominently. In the published dashboard example, Citation Rate, Prominence, and Mention Rate are shown separately for two providers, Anthropic and OpenAI.
Not Just Answer Citations: Real Crawling Traffic Too
A second axis, AI Operator Activity, is added to this. It shows real crawling and referral traffic by AI operator, such as OpenAI and Google.
| What it measures | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Citation benchmark | Which sites AI cites for questions without brand names (Citation, Prominence, Mention Rate) |
| AI Operator Activity | Real crawling and inbound traffic by operator, plus access failures such as 403 blocks and 404 errors |
The key is that it shows "how much AI mentions me" and "whether AI crawlers actually came to my site" together in the same dashboard.
AEO Tracking for Free?
1. Cloudflare already had this data. A large share of the world's traffic passes through Cloudflare's CDN, so AI crawler access logs were already in its hands. This announcement is closer to packaging that data as a product and releasing it for free.
2. It lines up exactly with the SEO industry's shift toward AEO. Several "AI visibility" startups that track AI answer citations instead of search engine rankings have appeared recently, and if Cloudflare releases the same feature for free, the barrier to entry in that market drops sharply. In fact, the announcement thread had reactions like "all the AI visibility startups are doomed."
3. Being free can itself be a basis for trust. Because it is based on its own CDN traffic, it can produce fairly accurate numbers without extra tracking scripts or paid crawling, which sets it apart from other startups.
Still Beta, and Free Isn't an Official Announcement Either
The news came not from Cloudflare's official account but from SEO consultant Glenn Gabe. He only said "I believe" it is free, and an official pricing policy has not been announced. The dashboard screens may also be sample data with a "Coming soon" badge. Also, the comments included skepticism about handing over more data, citing Cloudflare's past security incidents. Setting aside free and convenient, the trust question remains.
The Next Round After SEO: Do I Show Up in AI Answers?
This signals a move from the era of managing search rankings to the era of managing how often you are cited in AI assistant answers. You can check it out first through beta registration ("Register interest").
Related: Glenn Gabe's X post · Cloudflare official blog