TEN7 AI Readiness Index

All 68 checks

AI assistants now answer the questions a search box used to. They can only quote, cite or recommend what they can actually find, read and trust — and most sites were never built with that in mind. This is the full list of what that takes: every check in the TEN7 AI Readiness Index, the same list a Quick scan or a Full scan of your own site is measured against.

They're grouped into eight dimensions and weighted to 100 points, so a fix that matters more counts for more. Dimensions 1, 3 and 5 alone carry 62.0 of the 100 points — access, extraction and entity identity decide whether anything else is worth doing. The Quick scan checks the 13 marked below on a single page, free — the Full scan runs all 68 across your site, also free. Open any row for why it matters.

1 · Retrievability and rights · 20%

10 checks
Expand Check Question
AR-1.1 Can AI crawlers reach your site? Quick scan

Your robots.txt file tells crawlers what they may read. A line left behind by a previous site or a copied template can quietly shut out the assistants people now use to find you.
AR-1.2 Does your CDN let AI crawlers through? Quick scan

Even when robots.txt says yes, a firewall or bot-protection rule can turn assistants away before they reach your pages. We sent a request as each one and recorded what came back.
AR-1.3 Is your page readable without a security challenge? Quick scan

A CAPTCHA or bot check on an ordinary page stops an assistant at the door. These belong on forms and logins, not on pages anyone can read.
AR-1.4 Have you stated what AI may do with your content? Quick scan

There is now a machine-readable way to say whether AI may search, quote or train on your material. Having a position — any position — is the point.
AR-1.5 Can a person read your AI policy? Quick scan

A few plain sentences in robots.txt saying what you permit. Journalists and lawyers read this file, and right now most sites say nothing.
AR-1.6 RSL licensing document published and referenced

Part of the Full scan.
AR-1.7 RSL terms propagated to feeds and schema

Part of the Full scan.
AR-1.8 Web Bot Auth verification configured

Part of the Full scan.
AR-1.9 Correct X-Robots-Tag on non-HTML resources

Part of the Full scan.
AR-1.10 Are you allowing assistants to quote you? Quick scan

Some sites carry old settings that tell search engines not to show excerpts. Those same settings stop an assistant quoting your page in an answer.

2 · Crawl and index hygiene · 12%

8 checks
Expand Check Question
AR-2.1 Missing pages return 404 or 410

Part of the Full scan.
AR-2.2 Redirects resolve in a single hop

Part of the Full scan.
AR-2.3 Does this page declare its real address? Quick scan

A canonical link tells a machine which URL is the true one. Without it the same content can be treated as several competing pages.
AR-2.4 Faceted, calendar, and parameterized URLs are controlled

Part of the Full scan.
AR-2.5 Sitemap lastmod reflects real content changes

Part of the Full scan.
AR-2.6 Sitemap index split by type, with media sitemaps

Part of the Full scan.
AR-2.7 Paginated series are coherently signalled

Part of the Full scan.
AR-2.8 IndexNow fires on publish and update

Part of the Full scan.

3 · Rendering and extraction · 20%

8 checks
Expand Check Question
AR-3.1 Primary content is present without JavaScript

Part of the Full scan.
AR-3.2 Progressive disclosure content ships in the initial HTML

Part of the Full scan.
AR-3.3 Is your page structured so a machine can follow it? Quick scan

Meaningful sections rather than an undifferentiated wall of containers. It is the difference between a document and a soup of boxes.
AR-3.4 Do your headings tell a clear story? Quick scan

One main heading, then sub-headings in order. Assistants use headings to work out what a page is about and which part answers a question.
AR-3.5 Real data tables with header cells

Part of the Full scan.
AR-3.6 Stable, human-readable anchor IDs on section headings

Part of the Full scan.
AR-3.7 Alt text on content images, empty alt on decorative

Part of the Full scan.
AR-3.8 Key facts exist as HTML text, not only in images or PDFs

Part of the Full scan.

4 · Alternate representations · 8%

6 checks
Expand Check Question
AR-4.1 Do you publish a guide for AI assistants? Quick scan

A file at /llms.txt listing your most important pages. It is early and cheap, and it forces a useful conversation about what actually matters on your site.
AR-4.2 /llms-full.txt where full-text inclusion is appropriate

Part of the Full scan.
AR-4.3 Markdown companion for every canonical page

Part of the Full scan.
AR-4.4 link rel=alternate advertises the Markdown version

Part of the Full scan.
AR-4.5 Accept: text/markdown content negotiation

Part of the Full scan.
AR-4.6 Alternate representations are edge-cached

Part of the Full scan.

5 · Structured data and the entity graph · 22%

12 checks
Expand Check Question
AR-5.1 JSON-LD is generated from mapped fields, not hardcoded

Part of the Full scan.
AR-5.2 Can a machine tell what your organisation is? Quick scan

Structured data that links together — your organisation, your site, this page — rather than a scattering of disconnected labels.
AR-5.3 Can a machine be certain it is you? Quick scan

Links from your markup to authoritative records like Wikidata or ROR. Without one, an assistant is guessing which organisation of your name it has found.
AR-5.4 BreadcrumbList on every page below the homepage

Part of the Full scan.
AR-5.5 Vertical-specific schema types

Part of the Full scan.
AR-5.6 FAQPage and QAPage on genuine question-and-answer content

Part of the Full scan.
AR-5.7 HowTo on procedural content

Part of the Full scan.
AR-5.8 speakable on summaries and ledes

Part of the Full scan.
AR-5.9 isAccessibleForFree, about, and mentions with entity references

Part of the Full scan.
AR-5.10 Product, Offer, and Service with real prices

Part of the Full scan.
AR-5.11 SearchAction on the WebSite node

Part of the Full scan.
AR-5.12 Schema validation runs in CI

Part of the Full scan.

6 · Authorship, provenance, freshness · 10%

8 checks
Expand Check Question
AR-6.1 Author entity pages with credentials

Part of the Full scan.
AR-6.2 Bylines linked to author entities

Part of the Full scan.
AR-6.3 reviewedBy on YMYL content

Part of the Full scan.
AR-6.4 datePublished and dateModified are accurate

Part of the Full scan.
AR-6.5 citation markup on primary-source references

Part of the Full scan.
AR-6.6 C2PA Content Credentials on original assets

Part of the Full scan.
AR-6.7 Editorial policy page referenced via publishingPrinciples

Part of the Full scan.
AR-6.8 Can a machine find out who you are? Quick scan

Founding date, leadership, address, contact details, legal identifiers. Thin About pages are the most common weakness we see.

7 · Agent interfaces · 5%

9 checks
Expand Check Question
AR-7.1 NLWeb endpoint over the site's schema.org data

Part of the Full scan.
AR-7.2 NLWeb exposed as an MCP server with an ask method

Part of the Full scan.
AR-7.3 Domain MCP server over real content APIs

Part of the Full scan.
AR-7.4 OpenAPI specification for public APIs

Part of the Full scan.
AR-7.5 /.well-known/ discovery entries for agent capabilities

Part of the Full scan.
AR-7.6 Form fields carry label, name, and autocomplete

Part of the Full scan.
AR-7.7 No captchas on browse, search, or filter interactions

Part of the Full scan.
AR-7.8 Critical flows complete without JS-only interactions

Part of the Full scan.
AR-7.9 Stable selectors on critical-flow elements

Part of the Full scan.

8 · Measurement and instrumentation · 3%

7 checks
Expand Check Question
AR-8.1 GA4 channel group for AI assistant referrers

Part of the Full scan.
AR-8.2 Server-side tagging captures stripped referrers

Part of the Full scan.
AR-8.3 Access log retention with a queryable store

Part of the Full scan.
AR-8.4 Scheduled AI crawler activity report

Part of the Full scan.
AR-8.5 Fixed prompt panel run monthly across models

Part of the Full scan.
AR-8.6 Extraction-fidelity baseline captured

Part of the Full scan.
AR-8.7 Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools verified

Part of the Full scan.

Want to see where your own site lands? Run the Quick scan.