IndexNow keys: yours, ours, and how to get one

IndexNow is trustless by design: before an engine accepts a "please index this page" submission, it checks that a small text file really exists on the domain the page lives on. That file contains a key — 32 letters and digits — and serving it is the proof that whoever is submitting also controls the domain. The key is not a password and it's not secret; it's public on purpose, because the URL check is the security.

On our platform: already handled

Every domain you manage here serves the key file automatically — open https://yourdomain.com/961862855e284e0589044c29f622393f.txt and you'll see it. You never need to generate, host, or submit anything yourself; publishing a bio page or for-sale page is enough. If you're an administrator and ever need to rotate the key (for example after a security review), it's a single field in Admin → Settings → SEO fast-indexing (IndexNow), and every domain picks up the new file at once — no redeploy, no per-domain work.

For websites you host elsewhere: get your own key

If you also run your own site outside this platform and want it indexed fast, you can join IndexNow yourself in three steps. It's free — no account required.

1. Create a key. Any random 32-character hex string works — openssl rand -hex 16 in a terminal, an online generator, or Bing's own key generator on the Bing IndexNow getting-started page. Example: a1b2c3d4e5f60718293a4b5c6d7e8f90.
2. Host the key file. Put a plain-text file named yourkey.txt (that's the key plus .txt) in your site's root folder, so that https://yoursite.com/yourkey.txt returns exactly the key. On most setups that's a one-file upload to the same folder as your homepage.
3. Submit URLs. Tell the shared endpoint what to index — one URL is enough to test:
   https://api.indexnow.org/indexnow?url=https://yoursite.com/&key=YOUR_KEY
   A 200 or 202 response means accepted. Sites can also send batches and can ping automatically whenever a page changes — the IndexNow documentation has the full details, and plugins exist for WordPress, Shopify, and most site builders.

Can I use my own key on a domain I manage here?

Not currently — the platform serves its own key on every managed domain, and one domain serves one key. That's all the engines need, though: submissions from the platform carry our key, the file checks out, and your pages get indexed. If your organization requires your own key on a managed domain for compliance reasons, contact support and we'll look at the options.

One key, many sites

A key isn't tied to one domain — the same key file can be hosted on several sites you control, which is exactly why one key works across every domain on this platform. What matters to the engines is only: does /{key}.txt on that domain return the key that the submission used?