Does signing your agent open the door?
On 25 Oct 2026 we opened the sign-up page of every product we list as a signed and as an unsigned agent. 5 of the 13 sign-up pages that stopped an unsigned agent opened for the same agent signed.
What each visitor met.
Our signed agent opened 130 of 151 sign-up pages. Unsigned, the same server opened 123.
| Answer | Our agent, signed | Same server, unsigned | Cloudflare Browser Rendering |
|---|---|---|---|
| Page opened | 130 | 123 | 137 |
| Challenged | 5 | 10 | 2 |
| Turned away | 4 | 3 | 1 |
| Kept off by robots.txt | 11 | 12 | 11 |
| No answer | 1 | 3 | 0 |
- Our agent, signed: our agent from our server, every request signed.
- Same server, unsigned: the same request from the same server, unsigned, with Chrome's user agent.
- Cloudflare Browser Rendering: Cloudflare's own signed agent, from Cloudflare's network.
- Stopped all three: 2 (GitHub and PandaDoc).
Where the signature changed the answer.
Both requests came from the same server to the same page. Only the signature and the user agent differed.
Opened signed, stopped unsigned (5)
BoxUnsigned: challenged. In front: Cloudflare.
CanvaUnsigned: challenged. In front: Cloudflare.
KitUnsigned: challenged. In front: Cloudflare.
Perplexity APIUnsigned: challenged. In front: Cloudflare.
WebflowUnsigned: turned away. In front: Cloudflare.
Opened unsigned, stopped signed (1)
SlackSigned: turned away. In front: None named.
Cloudflare's own agent also opened 6 pages that stopped our server both ways: Airtable, beehiiv, Carrd, Freshdesk, Salesforce and Trello. It comes from Cloudflare's network, so its address may count as well as its signature.
By what stands in front.
The bot manager or network each answer named, and how many of its pages stopped each visitor. Each site sets its own checks.
| In front | Pages | Signed stopped | Unsigned stopped | Cloudflare's agent stopped |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cloudflare | 74 | 2 | 7 | 0 |
| Vercel | 18 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| CloudFront | 14 | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Akamai | 4 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| DataDome | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| HUMAN | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
On our own site, the rule decides.
Our test on agentdrives.com (Free plan), 24 Oct 2026: 3 challenge rules, 4 kinds of visitor, 13 requests. Bot Fight Mode and the AI bot policies were off.
| Rule | Challenged when | Our agent, signed | Unsigned, our user agent | Unsigned, a Chrome user agent | Cloudflare Browser Rendering |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Challenge everyone | Every request | Challenged | Challenged | Challenged | Challenged |
| Challenge all but known bots and agents | not cf.client.bot | Through | Challenged | Challenged | Through |
| Challenge all but AI assistants | cf.verified_bot_category ne "AI Assistant" | Through | Challenged | Challenged | Through |
- “Challenge everyone” challenged our signed agent like everyone else. Being known to Cloudflare doesn't get an agent past a rule with no exception in it.
- Each rule with an exception for known agents let it through: “Challenge all but known bots and agents” and “Challenge all but AI assistants”. Unsigned, every rule challenged it.
- An unsigned request from the same IPv4 address as our signed ones was challenged. The signature got our agent through, not its address.
- Wrike's sign-up page answered like the first rule on 24 Oct 2026: signed, 403, cf-mitigated: challenge; unsigned, 403, cf-mitigated: challenge. Wrike's drive
What a site owner sets.
On Cloudflare, these settings decide whether a signed agent gets in.
- Let in every bot and agent Cloudflare knows: add
and not cf.client.botto the challenge rule. developers.cloudflare.com - Let in only agents a person drives: add
and cf.verified_bot_category ne "AI Assistant". That category is “Automated AI bot driven by user action.” Cloudflare docs - Either exception lets in every agent of its kind. Cloudflare Browser Rendering got through both, like ours.
- Bot Fight Mode: You cannot bypass or skip Bot Fight Mode using WAF custom rules or Page Rules. Cloudflare docs
- Super Bot Fight Mode: set Verified bots to Allow, or skip it with a custom rule. Cloudflare docs
- AI bot policies: Each blocking option will block Verified bots classified with that behavior, plus additional unverified bots that fall under these classifications. Cloudflare files our agent under Agent. Cloudflare docs
- New domains since 15 Sep 2026: Training and Agent blocked on pages with ads; Search allowed. Cloudflare docs
- Other vendors' settings: Let signed agents past your bot check.
Signing, in short.
- A signed agent adds a signature to every request (Web Bot Auth). A site checks it against the public keys the agent's operator publishes. Web Bot Auth
- Cloudflare counts signed agents as verified bots: since 2026-07-01, with a Direct or Intermediary label. Cloudflare docs
- To be listed, the operator sends Cloudflare's bot submission form with “Request Signature” as its verification method. Cloudflare docs
- We sent ours on 1 Oct 2026. Cloudflare listed our agent on 24 Oct 2026 (classification: Agent).
- What changed for the products we drive since then: What changes when Cloudflare lists an AI agent.
Method and limits.
- One GET of each product's sign-up page per visitor, 24 Oct 2026 to 25 Oct 2026, about 10 seconds apart. Nothing was sent and no account was made.
- Page opened: the page came back. Challenged: a check page stood in front of it. Turned away: a 403 or a block page.
- Cloudflare Browser Rendering ran with JavaScript off, so a page that came back was let in before any check ran.
- A page whose robots.txt keeps crawlers off was not fetched. No answer: a redirect we didn't follow, or a rate limit.
- A site can answer differently on another day.
- Our own site's test sent one request per rule and visitor, and none of them tried to solve a challenge. Bot Fight Mode, Super Bot Fight Mode and the AI bot policies were not tested there.
See what an agent meets on your sign-up page.
Free: the check in front of your sign-up page, and how many things to fix.