# What is img2dataset? AI crawler guide

Canonical URL: https://trakkr.ai/bots/img2dataset
Published: 2026-06-11
Last updated: 2026-06-11

Learn what img2dataset is, who operates it, its verified user-agent, robots.txt posture, and how blocking it can affect AI search, citations, training, or agent visibility.

Open-source image dataset downloader token used to collect images for machine learning datasets.

## What is img2dataset?

img2dataset is an open-source tool that downloads images from the web and packages them into machine learning datasets. It identifies itself with the user-agent token img2dataset. The project is maintained on GitHub and is designed to help researchers and developers gather large collections of images for training computer vision models. Because it is a general-purpose downloader, its behavior can be customized by the person running it, including which sites it visits and how it handles robots.txt rules. The tool itself does not crawl the web independently; it only fetches URLs that a user provides.

## What it's for

If you operate a website, img2dataset may be used to download images from your pages for inclusion in public or private image datasets. This could mean your visual content ends up in training data for AI models without your direct knowledge. Blocking the bot can help prevent automated bulk downloading of your images, but since the tool is user-configured, a determined user could still fetch your content through other means.

## How to handle img2dataset

To prevent img2dataset from downloading images from your site, add a robots.txt rule that disallows the img2dataset user-agent. Because the tool's default behavior regarding robots.txt is not verified, there is no guarantee it will obey the rule.

## robots.txt rule

User-agent: img2dataset
Disallow: /

## Blocking cost

Blocking img2dataset may reduce the chance that your images are included in machine learning datasets, but it does not affect visibility in AI-powered search, answers, citations, or agent-based tools.

## Examples

- A researcher provides a list of image URLs from your site to img2dataset, and the tool downloads those images to create a training set for an object recognition model.
- A developer runs img2dataset with a custom configuration that respects robots.txt, and the tool skips your site if you have disallowed it.
- A data collector uses img2dataset without robots.txt compliance, and your images are downloaded even though you have blocked the bot.

## Related bots

- LAIONDownloader: Also tracked as a training crawler.
- VelenPublicWebCrawler: Also tracked as a training crawler.
- AI2Bot: Also tracked as a training crawler.
- GPTBot: Also tracked as a training crawler.
- cohere-training-data-crawler: Also tracked as a training crawler.
- Ai2Bot-Dolma: Also tracked as a training crawler.
- Applebot-Extended: Also tracked as a training crawler.
- CCBot: Also tracked as a training crawler.
- ClaudeBot: Also tracked as a training crawler.
- AI Training Opt-Out: img2dataset is a training crawler tied to this policy decision.
- Robots.txt: Robots.txt is the control file used to allow or block img2dataset.

## Frequently Asked Questions

### Does img2dataset always follow robots.txt?

The robots.txt compliance of img2dataset is unverified. It is up to the person running the tool to configure it to respect robots.txt rules, so there is no guarantee it will obey your disallow directives.

### Can I block img2dataset by IP address?

Since img2dataset runs on the user's own infrastructure, its IP address can vary. Blocking by IP is not practical unless you identify and block specific IPs that are abusing your site.

### Will blocking img2dataset affect my site's SEO?

No, img2dataset is not a search engine crawler. Blocking it will not impact your search rankings or visibility in search results.

### Is img2dataset associated with any specific company or AI model?

img2dataset is an independent open-source project hosted on GitHub. It is not tied to a particular company or AI model, though the datasets it creates may be used by various organizations.

### How can I tell if img2dataset has visited my site?

You can check your server logs for requests with the user-agent string img2dataset. However, the tool may be configured to use a different user-agent, so its visits might not always be identifiable.

## Data And Sources

- [img2dataset documentation](https://github.com/rom1504/img2dataset) - Primary source for img2dataset crawler details.