Playwright is a bot in the headless browsers category, operated by Microsoft.
Playwright is an open source browser automation framework from Microsoft. It drives Chromium, Firefox and WebKit for end to end tests, and is also widely used for scraping.
Headless browsers run a full browser engine without a screen. They are used for testing, rendering and scraping sites that need JavaScript. Most scrapers that evade simple checks run in a headless browser, so client side detection matters more than the user agent here.
Anyone can copy a user agent string. Transfon Security also checks where each request comes from, so a request that claims to be a known crawler but comes from the wrong network is treated as a fake, not as the real crawler.
Playwright does not read robots.txt. The rules below record your policy, but they will not stop it. To actually block Playwright, use a WAF rule as shown in the next section.
User-agent: Playwright Disallow: /
User-agent: Playwright Disallow: /private/ Disallow: /search
User-agent: Playwright Allow: /blog/ Disallow: /
User-agent: Playwright Allow: / User-agent: * Disallow: /
User-agent: Playwright group, Playwright ignores your User-agent: * rules, so repeat any that should still apply.Playwright from Playwright's user agent; check Microsoft's own documentation if it publishes a different robots.txt name.Treat robots.txt as a statement of your policy, and enforce it where requests arrive.
Playwright is a common tool for scrapers. Real readers never use it, so block it on article pages and keep it out of ad requests.
Transfon Security for publishersTraffic from Playwright on landing pages is automated. It inflates clicks and visits, so filter it from campaign data and raise it with the ad network.
Transfon Security for advertisersPrice scrapers, stock checkers and card testing scripts often run on Playwright. Block it on product, cart and checkout pages.
Transfon Security for e-commercePlaywright is normal for API clients but not for your web app. Allow it only on API routes that need a key, and rate limit it there.
Transfon Security for SaaS and APIsPlaywright ignores robots.txt, so it has to be stopped when the request arrives. Transfon Security shows Playwright by name in the Top Bots report, so you can see how often it visits and which pages it reads. Block or allow it with a User Agent rule, or slow it down with a rate limit decision rule.
Transfon Security
Playwright is a bot in the headless browsers category, operated by Microsoft. Playwright is an open source browser automation framework from Microsoft. It drives Chromium, Firefox and WebKit for end to end tests, and is also widely used for scraping.
No. Playwright does not follow robots.txt, so a Disallow rule will not stop it. Block it by user agent at your server, CDN or WAF instead.
Block requests whose user agent contains "Playwright" at your server, CDN or WAF, because Playwright does not read robots.txt. In Transfon Security that is one User Agent block rule.
No. robots.txt is voluntary, so Playwright may not follow it, and anyone can send Playwright's user agent, so a fake Playwright ignores your rule. Enforce the rule where requests arrive, at your WAF, and check the source network.
Headless browsers run a full browser engine without a screen. They are used for testing, rendering and scraping sites that need JavaScript. Most scrapers that evade simple checks run in a headless browser, so client side detection matters more than the user agent here.
Transfon Security identifies every bot in this directory in your traffic reports, flags fake search crawlers, and lets you allow, block or rate limit each bot.
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