Description
Soleil AI Counter detects and counts visits from known AI-related user agents in WordPress.
The plugin is designed as a neutral AI access meter. It does not judge whether AI access is good or bad. It records detected access facts so site administrators can review them and make their own decisions.
Soleil AI Counter can be useful for sites that want to understand AI-related crawler activity, whether they want to welcome AI access, limit AI access, or simply observe what is happening.
Important limitations:
- Detection is based on User-Agent strings.
- User-Agent values can be spoofed.
- Counts do not guarantee citation, training, indexing, ranking, or inclusion in any AI service.
- Browser, page, CDN, and server caching may affect when WordPress records a request.
- The Free version is designed to avoid storing personally identifying visitor information.
- The Free version does not send data to external services.
- If Soleil AI Counter Pro is active, the Free version pauses its own tracking and UI to avoid duplicate processing.
Features
- Detects supported AI-related User-Agent strings.
- Shows today’s detected AI-related accesses.
- Shows detected accesses from the past 7 days.
- Shows cumulative detected accesses.
- Shows totals by supported bot.
- Shows the latest detected access time and bot name.
- Shows each supported bot’s latest detected time.
- Adds a WordPress admin page under Tools.
- Adds a dashboard widget.
- Provides a simple
[soleil_ai_counter]shortcode. - Stores anonymous aggregate counts locally in WordPress options.
Supported AI Bots
The Free version includes these default User-Agent fragments:
- GPTBot
- OAI-SearchBot
- ChatGPT-User
- ClaudeBot
- Claude-SearchBot
- PerplexityBot
The list can be filtered by developers with soleil_ai_counter_bot_patterns.
Privacy
Soleil AI Counter Free is designed to store aggregate count data only.
By default, it does not store:
- IP addresses
- Cookies
- Visitor identifiers
- Referrer URLs
- Raw User-Agent logs
The plugin reads the request User-Agent during a WordPress page request to classify known AI-related bots. If a supported bot is detected, the plugin increments local aggregate counters.
No data is sent to external services by the plugin.
Cache limitations
Soleil AI Counter runs inside WordPress. If a request is served entirely by a CDN, web server cache, page cache, or hosting cache before WordPress runs, the plugin may not count that request.
Counts may differ from server logs, CDN logs, analytics tools, or AI service reporting. The plugin is not a complete access log.
Installation
- Upload the
soleil-ai-counterfolder to the/wp-content/plugins/directory. - Activate the plugin through the WordPress Plugins screen.
- Open
Tools > Soleil AI Counter. - Review the detected aggregate counts.
- Optionally add
[soleil_ai_counter]to a post, page, or widget area that supports shortcodes.
FAQ
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Does this prove that my content was cited or used by an AI service?
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No. The plugin only counts requests with known AI-related User-Agent strings. It does not prove citation, training, indexing, ranking, or inclusion in any AI service.
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Can bots fake their User-Agent?
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Yes. User-Agent values can be spoofed, so counts should be treated as approximate detected activity.
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Does the plugin store IP addresses?
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No. The Free version is designed not to store IP addresses.
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Does the plugin send data to an external service?
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No. The plugin stores aggregate counts locally in WordPress options and does not send data to external services.
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Why do counts differ from server logs or analytics tools?
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Soleil AI Counter records requests that reach WordPress and match supported User-Agent fragments. Browser, page, CDN, and server caching may affect whether a request reaches WordPress.
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What happens if Soleil AI Counter Pro is active?
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The Free version detects the Pro plugin and pauses its own tracking, admin UI, dashboard widget, and shortcode registration. It does not automatically deactivate either plugin.
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Can I customize the supported bot list?
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Developers can filter the list with
soleil_ai_counter_bot_patterns.
Reviews
There are no reviews for this plugin.
Contributors & Developers
“Soleil AI Counter” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.
Contributors
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Interested in development?
Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.
Changelog
1.0.0
- Initial Free version prepared for WordPress.org distribution.
- Added aggregate AI-related User-Agent detection counts.
- Added Tools admin page.
- Added dashboard widget.
- Added
[soleil_ai_counter]shortcode. - Added uninstall cleanup for Free aggregate data.