Getting started with Bot Fight Mode
Bot Fight Mode is a simple, free product that helps detect and mitigate bot traffic on your site. When enabled, the product:
- Identifies traffic matching patterns of known bots
- Issues computationally expensive challenges in response to these bots
- Notifies Bandwidth Alliance partners (if applicable) to disable bots
Bot Fight Mode is available to all Cloudflare customers, and you can enable Bot Fight Mode from Firewall > Tools.
To prevent configuration overlap, customers who purchased Bot Management will not see Bot Fight Mode.
Considerations
Bot Fight Mode uses the same underlying technology that powers our Bot Management product. Specifically, Bot Fight Mode:
- Protects entire sites without endpoint restrictions
- Cannot be customized, adjusted, or reconfigured via Firewall Rules
- Does not include access to advanced metrics, bot scores, or our Bot Analytics tool
Although Bot Fight Mode is designed to fight malicious actors on the Internet, it may challenge API or mobile app traffic. For more granular control, we recommend customers upgrade to Bot Management.
Analytics
For avid users of Firewall Events, we encourage you to monitor the performance of Bot Fight Mode. Any requests challenged by this product will be labeled Bot Fight Mode in the Service field. This allows you to observe, analyze, and follow trends in your bot traffic over time.