Will checking robots.txt periodically stop all scraping bans?

No — it dodges dynamic blocks, but not rate limits or CAPTCHAs. Pair with delays.

Why do small ecommerce sites update robots.txt mid-scrape?

Traffic spikes trigger auto-panics in platforms like Shopify. They lock /products to protect pricing.

For one-offs, yes — but $40+ adds up. Better: official APIs or polite scraping with checks.

Scraped 300 electronics pages for a price tracker. Hit page 188, dead silence. Robots.txt changed overnight, serving 403s. Fun times.

DevTools Feed Apr 03, 2026 4 min read 10 views

Refresh robots.txt every 5 minutes in long scrapers to catch mid-run blocks 𝕏
Small ecommerce sites dynamically ban via robots.txt on traffic spikes — proxies cost extra 𝕏
Ignore tutorials skipping periodic checks; they're setting you up for IP bans 𝕏

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#price tracker #robots.txt #scraping proxies #web scraping

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Originally reported by dev.to