Bing Splits AI Training From AI Search Grounding
Microsoft's new controls will let you block AI training and still appear in AI answers, but the dates matter as much as the settings.
Microsoft has announced new AI content controls for Bing, per Search Engine Roundtable. They let you block AI training and still stay eligible for Bing search results.
The controls split two uses of your pages: training AI models, and helping build AI answers. Most site owners should grasp that split first.
Krishna Madhavan, Principal Product Manager at Microsoft Bing, calls them “newer, simpler, and clearer preferences.” Judge that for yourself.
The three settings below show what that means in practice.
Three settings, and they behave differently
- AI Training controls whether your content can train AI models.
- AI Grounding controls whether your content can help generate AI answers, the second use above.
- Limited Grounding lets Microsoft’s own AI products use your content, while third-party grounding services are excluded.
Read that last one twice.
Picture a publisher that blocks training but still lets Copilot cite its articles. Those two settings allow exactly that split.
Blocking grounding works the other way. It can reduce your visibility in AI experiences.
Does blocking training cost you anything in regular Bing results? The report says traditional Bing rankings aren’t affected.
The dates to calendar
The timeline’s more important than the toggles. Here are the four dates from the source. I’d read them before you touch a single setting.
- December 15, 2026: temporary grounding controls appear in Bing Webmaster Tools for eligible sites that still use the older NoArchive or NoCache directives.
- February 1, 2027: Microsoft starts honoring the new preferences as it crawls pages.
- March 1, 2027: the deadline for sites on the old directives to set the new preferences if they want to keep their restrictions.
- September 30, 2027: the temporary grounding preferences expire.
If you’re on NoArchive or NoCache and want to keep those restrictions, March 1 is the date to watch. Are you still on either one?
The source frames that deadline as the point for keeping your restrictions.
But if you rely on the old directives, treat it as a hard date and put it in your calendar now.
What the source doesn’t settle
Microsoft’s joining peers with a shared AI training preference in robots.txt, and it also adds page-level training preferences and a separate grounding preference on top of that.
Though the report names Google, OpenAI and Anthropic as on board, it leaves out what each one has committed to.
I couldn’t confirm from this report which company honors which signal. I’d hold off on guessing. So read each company’s own documentation before you assume anything.
Why it matters
My take is that this split is useful. It turns one blunt choice into two, and that’s worth having.
If your pages already earn citations, blocking grounding can reduce your visibility in AI experiences. Do you know which ones Bing cites today?
That said, before you change anything, open the AI Performance report in Bing Webmaster Tools. That’s where you see citations, cited URLs and grounding queries.
I’d work in this order:
- Open the AI Performance report.
- Decide on training first.
- Leave grounding alone until your own Bing numbers say otherwise.
Either way, your own numbers should settle the grounding question, not mine.
Common Questions
Can I block AI training on Bing and still show up in AI answers?
Yes. Bing treats AI Training and AI Grounding as separate settings, so you can block one and allow the other.
When do the new Bing AI controls start working?
The new preferences take effect as Microsoft crawls pages, from February 1, 2027. Sites on NoArchive or NoCache have until March 1, 2027 to set their preferences if they want to keep restrictions.
Will blocking grounding hurt my regular Bing rankings?
The report says regular rankings are unaffected. Blocking grounding can still lower your AI visibility, though.
