The honest AEO tool. Human-first.

v4.0

Free AEO Readiness Checker

Audit any page for whether AI engines can read it — and whether what they read is worth citing.

Every fix we recommend helps human visitors first. AI engines and search engines benefit because humans do. Supports e-commerce stores built with Shopify, Magento, WooCommerce, and PrestaShop, as well as WordPress sites and static HTML pages.

We don't collect, store, or log the URLs you check. Your data stays in your browser.

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Enter a URL above to check its AEO signals

Checks 18 AEO signals across content, schema, technical SEO, and content quality

What is Answer Engine Optimization (AEO)?

Answer Engine Optimization is the practice of structuring your web pages so that AI engines — ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, Google's AI Overviews, and Bing Copilot — can fetch, parse, and find your content useful when answering user questions.

Here's the honest version: nobody can guarantee AI citation. AI engines are probabilistic systems that return different answers to different users for the same query. What you can do is make sure the foundations are in place — your site is fetchable, your HTML is parseable, and your content is clear, factual, and well-written.

Those foundations aren't new. They're the same fundamentals that have always made websites work for humans, search engines, and now AI agents. The only honest AEO work is human-readability work with a different label on the box.

AEO doesn't replace SEO. It builds on it. A page that's already SEO-friendly and well-written for humans has a head start. This tool checks whether your foundations are in place — and flags what's infrastructure (must-fix), what's industry convention (helpful, not proven to influence AI citations), and what's optional based on your page type.

Our Approach: Human-First

Every check in this tool is grounded in one principle: changes that help your site convert and serve real visitors are the same changes that help AI engines and search engines understand it.

A clear FAQ section with good answers helps a confused visitor decide to buy — whether or not it has FAQ schema markup. A short intro paragraph that answers the page's main question in two sentences helps a visitor who's in a hurry — and happens to give an AI retriever exactly what it needs. A clean comparison table helps a buyer choose — and gives an LLM a structured reference.

Better conversion is human-centric. AEO and SEO are downstream of that.

We don't recommend anything that helps bots at the expense of humans. If a fix is purely for bots, we say so plainly.

What This Tool Checks

The tool automatically detects whether your page is a content page or an e-commerce product page, and runs the right set of checks accordingly. Every check is grouped into one of three layers, in order of priority:

Tier 1 — Infrastructure (Must-Fix)

These checks have a direct, causal effect on whether AI engines can read your page at all. If these fail, no amount of good content matters — the bots can't get to it.

Includes: AI bot crawlability (OAI-SearchBot, PerplexityBot, ClaudeBot, Google-Extended in robots.txt), canonical tag presence, XML sitemap reachability (with Sitemap: directive and sitemap_index variants), and server response. Tier 1 carries 60% of your overall score, and any Tier 1 failure caps your grade at B regardless of how well you do elsewhere.

Tier 2 — Content & Convention (Industry Guidance)

These checks reflect well-established best practices for human readability and conversion. Following them tends to align with what AI engines and search engines find useful — but the causal link to AI citations isn't proven, and we don't pretend otherwise.

Includes: answer-first content blocks, question-based headings, concise answer paragraphs, structured lists and tables, content depth, schema markup (Article, Organization, Product), heading hierarchy, meta descriptions, Open Graph tags, image alt text, and content-to-code ratio. Tier 2 carries 40% of your score.

Good to Know — Page-Type Specific

Not every AEO signal applies to every page. HowTo schema matters for tutorial pages but not service pages. Article schema matters for blog posts but not homepages. We show these separately as "Good to Know" items — they don't affect your score, so your developer doesn't chase fixes that don't apply to your page type.

For Content Pages vs E-Commerce Pages

We run 16 scored checks on content pages (WordPress, static HTML, CMS-driven sites). For e-commerce pages on Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, or PrestaShop, we automatically switch to 22 e-commerce-specific checks covering Product schema, Offer data, reviews, pricing markup, and product content quality. The tier structure applies to both modes.

Every failed check returns a page-specific fix recommendation — not generic advice, but what's actually missing on your page, why it helps human visitors, and how to address it.

How to Improve Your AEO Score

Work in priority order: infrastructure first (Tier 1), then content and conventions (Tier 2). Every recommendation below has a human benefit — that's why we recommend it.

Tier 1: Fix the Foundations

Unblock AI bots in robots.txt. AI engines can't cite content they can't read. Confirm OAI-SearchBot, PerplexityBot, ClaudeBot, and Google-Extended aren't blocked. Real users on assistive tech benefit too — accessible robots.txt rules are a sign of an accessible site overall.

Make sure your XML sitemap is reachable. Helps human visitors via better classical search visibility. AI engines and crawlers also use it.

Render content without requiring JavaScript. Visitors on slow connections, older devices, and assistive tech see your content faster. AI agents (which often don't execute JS fully) see it at all.

Serve over HTTPS with a valid certificate. A trust signal for visitors. Required by modern crawlers.

Tier 2: Write for Humans, Reap the Benefits

Lead with the answer. Write a 40-60 word declarative paragraph at the top of every important page that directly answers the page's primary question. Visitors who skim get their answer in seconds. AI retrievers get a clean summary chunk. Both audiences win.

Use question-based headings. "What are the best CMS options?" instead of "Our CMS Options." Visitors scanning the page can locate exactly the question they had. AI engines parse them well too.

Follow each question heading with a 15-60 word concise answer before expanding. Skim-readers get the takeaway; deep-readers continue. Same paragraph serves an LLM as a quotable chunk.

Build comparison tables and structured lists where relevant. Buyers comparing options need them to decide. LLMs parse semantic <table> elements cleanly. Don't add tables where prose is clearer — that hurts both audiences.

Write meta descriptions between 120-160 characters. Drives click-through from search results — a direct conversion benefit. AI engines may use them as page summaries.

Add image alt text on every image. Required for screen reader users. Helps SEO image search. AI agents use it for context. All three audiences benefit from one fix.

Be specific, not generic. Replace "fast performance" with "page loads in under 1.2 seconds on 4G." Replace "trusted by many" with "trusted by 200+ agencies since 2002." Specifics are what AI engines quote, and what visitors trust.

Add schema markup where it earns its keep. Schema helps Google show rich results, which lifts SERP click-through — that's the conversion benefit. It also acts as a verification layer for AI engines, confirming what your visible text already says. Worth doing for classical SEO; don't over-invest in it as an AEO-only play.

FAQ sections matter; FAQ schema is optional. A clear FAQ section with real answers helps confused visitors decide and converts hesitant buyers. The schema markup around it is a separate question — Google restricted FAQ rich results to gov/health sites in 2023, so don't expect rich results from it elsewhere. Build the FAQ for the human reader; add the schema only if it serves you.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is this tool really free?
Yes. No signup, no trial, no credit card. We built it as a lead-generation asset for our agency, Macronimous. Use it as often as you'd like.
Will this tool guarantee my site gets cited by ChatGPT or Perplexity?
No. Nobody can. AI citation is a probabilistic outcome from systems that return different answers to different users for the same query. What this tool does is check whether the foundations are in place: can an AI agent fetch your page, parse the HTML, and find clear, factual content. That's the floor, not the ceiling.
What's the right mindset for using this tool?
Treat every recommendation as a human-readability or conversion improvement first. If we suggest adding an intro paragraph that answers the page's main question, do it because a real visitor scanning the page will appreciate it — the AI benefit is a bonus. If we flag missing comparison tables, build them because customers comparing options need them. The strongest sites for AEO are the strongest sites for humans. We've never seen those two diverge.
Why does the tool include checks that aren't proven to affect AI citations?
Honesty. The Tier 1 checks have a clear causal effect — if OAI-SearchBot is blocked or your page is JavaScript-only, no AI agent can read you. The Tier 2 checks are industry conventions: heading hierarchy, schema, alt text, internal linking. We include them because they're cheap to fix and improve site quality and conversion. We don't pretend they guarantee citations. Every Tier 2 item is flagged as "industry guidance" rather than "must-fix."
What about schema markup? Doesn't AI need structured data?
Large language models read raw text as tokens — there's no schema parser inside the model. Schema is genuinely useful for Google's classical search (rich results, Knowledge Graph, voice assistants) and we recommend implementing it. Schema also acts as a verification layer: when your visible text and your JSON-LD say the same thing, AI engines have higher confidence in the data. But the claim that schema "ensures AI engines can parse your content" is a category error. The model already parses your sentence by reading the sentence.
Why does the tool downplay FAQ schema?
In 2023, Google restricted FAQ rich results to government and health sites only, and now actively discourages duplicate FAQ markup elsewhere. Adding FAQ schema to a marketing page no longer earns rich results and has no proven effect on AI citations. We flag it as informational, not as missing. The FAQ section itself is still valuable — visitors get answers, conversions improve. It's just the schema wrapper that's been quietly demoted by Google.
What actually works for AI visibility, then?
The research we've seen so far points to four things that move the needle: citations from credible sources, supporting claims with statistics, improving readability and fluency, and writing prose that's easier to understand. In other words — write well, cite your sources, be useful. The same fundamentals that have always worked. Specifics also matter: hard numbers, concrete versions ("PHP 8.3"), real case study results. Generic claims get ignored; specifics get quoted.
Does my brand need to be mentioned on other sites?
Yes — entity authority matters more in AI than in classical search. When AI engines see your brand mentioned alongside relevant topics on third-party sites (industry directories, partner blogs, podcast guest spots, conference listings), it builds a signal that you're an authoritative entity in that space. These don't need to be backlinks; unlinked brand mentions count too. This tool can't check off-page entity signals — but it's worth knowing they exist as you plan content and outreach.
Does AEO replace traditional SEO?
No. AEO builds on SEO. A page that ranks well in Google typically has a strong foundation for AEO too, because both reward the same human-readability traits.
What if my product or category page scores low?
Our tool automatically detects e-commerce pages on Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, and PrestaShop, and runs a dedicated set of e-commerce AEO checks instead of the content page checks. These cover Product schema, Offer data, reviews, pricing markup, and product content quality. Fix recommendations are tailored to e-commerce — not generic content advice.
Can I test staging or password-protected pages?
No — the tool fetches pages the same way an AI crawler would, so the URL must be publicly accessible. For staging sites, use the "Paste HTML" tab: copy the page source in your browser (right-click → View Page Source → Select All → Copy) and paste it in.
How often should I re-run this check?
After any significant content update, schema addition, or template change. For high-priority pages (service pages, top blog posts), a monthly re-check is sensible.
Does the tool work for non-English pages?
Most checks are language-agnostic (schema markup, meta tags, image alt coverage). The question-based heading check looks for English question words (what, how, why, etc.) — so it may under-report for non-English sites. We're planning multilingual support in a future update.
What happens to my email if I request a PDF or email report?
We send the report to the email you provide and keep a copy of the request for lead-follow-up purposes. We don't sell, share, or add your email to any mailing list without your explicit consent.
Why doesn't this tool offer site-wide analysis?
By design. AEO is inherently page-level — each page has its own content structure, schema, headings, and answer-first blocks. A sitewide average score blurs these differences and produces a number you can't act on. A blog post and a contact page have completely different AEO profiles, so averaging them together is misleading. We also don't want to put unnecessary load on your hosting server or ours — scanning 100 pages means 100 outbound requests, which can trigger rate limits, slow down your server, or get flagged by firewalls. The better approach: run your 5-10 highest-priority pages individually. That's how AEO improvement actually works — page by page.
Why do some checks show as "Good to Know" instead of affecting my score?
Not every AEO signal applies to every page. Speakable markup, HowTo schema, Article schema, and outbound authority links are real standards — but they're only relevant for specific page types. Rather than penalizing your homepage for not having BlogPosting schema, or your service page for missing HowTo markup, we separate these into a "Good to Know" section. Your score reflects only the universally relevant signals. This way, your developer focuses on what actually matters for your page, and nobody wastes time chasing checks that don't apply.
Can Macronimous help us make our site AEO-ready?
Yes. We've been doing SEO for 24+ years and now offer dedicated AEO Readiness services — auditing your site, restructuring content for both human readers and AI extraction, implementing schema where it earns its keep, and setting up the technical foundations AI engines need. If your score left you wondering where to start, we can take it from here. Learn about our AEO Readiness services →