{
  "dataset": "protocols",
  "record": {
    "id": "pay-per-crawl",
    "name": "Pay Per Crawl",
    "full_name": "Cloudflare Pay Per Crawl",
    "layer": "licensing",
    "creator": "Cloudflare",
    "status": "live (beta, 2025)",
    "year": 2025,
    "one_liner": "Cloudflare's HTTP 402-based mechanism that lets publishers charge AI crawlers per request — allow free, set a price, or block — with Cloudflare as merchant of record.",
    "spec_url": "https://blog.cloudflare.com/introducing-pay-per-crawl/",
    "snippet": "HTTP/1.1 402 Payment Required\\ncrawler-price: USD 0.01   →   crawler retries with: crawler-exact-price: USD 0.01",
    "abbreviation": "Pay Per Crawl",
    "also_known_as": [
      "Cloudflare Pay Per Crawl",
      "pay-per-crawl"
    ],
    "canonical_spec_url": "https://developers.cloudflare.com/ai-crawl-control/features/pay-per-crawl/",
    "entity_uri": "https://blog.cloudflare.com/introducing-pay-per-crawl/",
    "taxonomy_layer": "licensing",
    "sub_layer": "per-crawl-paywall",
    "protocol_type": "settlement",
    "central_problem": "Lets a publisher charge AI crawlers for each request to their content — flipping unpaid scraping into a metered, monetizable transaction over HTTP 402.",
    "maintainer": "Cloudflare (Pay Per Crawl / AI Crawl Control)",
    "governance_body": "vendor (Cloudflare)",
    "license": {
      "value": null,
      "verify_status": "verify-against-primary-at-build",
      "source_hint": "https://developers.cloudflare.com/ai-crawl-control/features/pay-per-crawl/",
      "note": "Cloudflare product/feature, not an open-licensed spec; confirm terms against Cloudflare docs at build."
    },
    "maturity_tag": "emerging",
    "current_spec_version": {
      "value": null,
      "verify_status": "verify-against-primary-at-build",
      "source_hint": "https://developers.cloudflare.com/ai-crawl-control/features/pay-per-crawl/",
      "note": "Product feature, not a numbered spec; confirm current beta/GA status at build."
    },
    "spec_date": {
      "value": null,
      "verify_status": "verify-against-primary-at-build",
      "source_hint": "https://blog.cloudflare.com/introducing-pay-per-crawl/",
      "note": "Confirm any spec/feature revision date at build."
    },
    "launch_date": "2025-07-01",
    "last_verified": "2026-06-15",
    "transport": "HTTP 402 Payment Required + crawler-price / crawler-exact-price headers (Cloudflare network)",
    "core_mechanism": "When a configured AI crawler requests content, Cloudflare can return HTTP 402 Payment Required with a crawler-price header; a crawler that agrees retries with a crawler-exact-price header, and Cloudflare — acting as merchant of record — aggregates billing, charges the crawler, and pays the publisher. Publishers can allow free, charge a flat per-request rate, or block.",
    "discovery_endpoint": "HTTP 402 response with crawler-price header (per-request; Cloudflare-managed)",
    "settlement_type": "credits (Cloudflare as merchant of record; per-request billing)",
    "adoption_metric": {
      "value": null,
      "verify_status": "verify-against-primary-at-build",
      "source_hint": "https://blog.cloudflare.com/introducing-pay-per-crawl/",
      "note": "Launched as a private beta in July 2025; no audited adoption figure asserted. Confirm GA/scale at build."
    },
    "notable_adopters": [
      {
        "value": "Cloudflare (operator / merchant of record)",
        "source": "https://blog.cloudflare.com/introducing-pay-per-crawl/"
      }
    ],
    "relationships": [
      {
        "predicate": "verified_by",
        "target": "web-bot-auth",
        "note": "Pay Per Crawl -verified_by-> Web Bot Auth (research §2 seed triple, inverse of 'Web Bot Auth verifies pay-per-crawl'): charging the right crawler depends on cryptographically verifying which agent is real."
      },
      {
        "predicate": "competes_with",
        "target": "rsl",
        "note": "Pay Per Crawl and RSL both price/gate AI access in the licensing layer; RSL is an open licensing spec, Pay Per Crawl is a Cloudflare-operated paywall."
      },
      {
        "predicate": "built_on",
        "target": "x402",
        "note": "Pay Per Crawl uses the HTTP 402 Payment Required pattern that x402 also revives."
      }
    ],
    "ideal_use_case": "A publisher behind Cloudflare who wants to monetize AI crawling per request without building payment infrastructure.",
    "when_to_use": "When you are on Cloudflare and want to charge AI crawlers per request (or block them) with Cloudflare handling billing and settlement.",
    "when_not_to_use": "When you want an open, vendor-neutral licensing declaration (use RSL) or you are not behind Cloudflare's network.",
    "code_example": "# Cloudflare returns to an AI crawler:\nHTTP/1.1 402 Payment Required\ncrawler-price: USD 0.01\n\n# Crawler agrees and retries:\nGET /article HTTP/1.1\ncrawler-exact-price: USD 0.01",
    "source": "Launch (private beta, July 1 2025), HTTP 402 + crawler-price/crawler-exact-price headers, Cloudflare as merchant of record: https://blog.cloudflare.com/introducing-pay-per-crawl/ . Seed triple (Web Bot Auth verifies pay-per-crawl): research §2.",
    "agent_readiness_link": "access-economics",
    "layer_legacy": "content"
  }
}