Overview
JavaScript is Kenya's most common secondary barrier
| Value | |
|---|---|
| WAF | 93.3% |
| Antibot | 22.4% |
| CAPTCHA | 23.3% |
| JavaScript | 42.7% |
| Rate Limiting | 14.3% |
| TLS | 19% |
WAF covers 93.3% of Kenya's 1,108 surveyed sites. JavaScript leads non-WAF barriers at 42.7%. CAPTCHA (23.3%) and Antibot (22.4%) are within one percentage point of each other in the secondary barrier profile.
Barrier Landscape
JavaScript tops Kenya's active secondary defences
| Value | |
|---|---|
| WAF | 93.3% |
| Antibot | 22.4% |
| CAPTCHA | 23.3% |
| JavaScript | 42.7% |
| Rate Limiting | 14.3% |
| TLS | 19% |
| Has robots.txt | 79.5% |
| Blocks AI crawlers | 13.1% |
WAF stands at 93.3% across Kenya's 1,108 surveyed sites. JavaScript leads non-WAF barriers at 42.7%. CAPTCHA (23.3%) and Antibot (22.4%) are the closest-paired secondary barriers in Kenya's profile.
Two-barrier sites are Kenya's most common configuration
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| 0 barriers | 4.2% |
| 1 barrier | 28.9% |
| 2 barriers | 34.5% |
| 3 barriers | 18.1% |
| 4 barriers | 9.2% |
| 5 barriers | 4.4% |
| 6 barriers | 0.6% |
4.2% of Kenya's sites deploy no detectable barrier. Two barriers is the modal outcome at 34.5%. Sites stacking three or more account for 32.3% — a substantial high-barrier segment.
Most Kenya sites are Simple to access
| Mean recommended tier | |
|---|---|
| All sites | 1.7 |
Kenya's median browser tier is 2 — fewer than half of its 1,108 sites (44.2%) fall at Tier 1. The mean of 1.73 reflects a broad Tier 2 block at 42.1%, with Tiers 3–5 accounting for 13.7%.
Most Kenya sites are Simple or Easy to access
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| 1 - Simple | 44.2% |
| 2 - Easy | 42.1% |
| 3 - Moderate | 10.5% |
| 4 - Complex | 2.6% |
| 5 - Advanced | 0.6% |
Kenya's Tier 1 share of 44.2% and Tier 2 share of 42.1% are closer than in most surveyed markets, giving a combined 86.3%. Tier 3 accounts for 10.5%, Tier 4 for 2.6%, Tier 5 for 0.6%.
robots.txt
AI crawlers top Kenya's robots.txt bot categories
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| AI crawlers | 15% |
| SEO / search indexing | 11.5% |
| SEO audit tools | 13.3% |
| Commercial scrapers | 8.1% |
| Social / content scrapers | 5.8% |
| Archive / research crawlers | 4.1% |
| Monitoring / uptime bots | 0.5% |
AI crawlers are mentioned by 15.0% of Kenya's 1,108 sites — the most of any category. SEO audit tools rank second at 13.3%, ahead of SEO / search indexing at 11.5%. All figures include sites with no robots.txt.
Uniform rules are Kenya's most common robots.txt posture
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| Uniform per-agent rules (no path mixing) | 40.8% |
| Path-level mixed rules for same agent | 33% |
| Allow-only (no disallow rules) | 2.8% |
| Mixed AI posture (block some, allow others) | 2.2% |
| Blanket Disallow: / | 2.7% |
Uniform per-agent rules account for 40.8% of all 1,108 Kenya sites. Path-mixed rules follow at 33.0% — a 7.8-point gap. Blanket Disallow: / covers 2.7%. The remaining 20.5% have no robots.txt.
GPTBot faces the most Disallow rules in Kenya's robots.txt
| Disallowed | Allowed (whitelisted) | |
|---|---|---|
| GPTBot | 10.6% | 2.1% |
| CCBot | 8.5% | 1.3% |
| ClaudeBot | 7.8% | 1% |
| Google-Extended | 7.9% | 1.5% |
| Bytespider | 7.2% | 0.4% |
| meta-externalagent | 2.6% | — |
| ChatGPT-User | 5.7% | 2.4% |
| PerplexityBot | 5.7% | 1.8% |
| Applebot-Extended | 4.7% | 0.5% |
| OAI-SearchBot | 4.1% | 1.8% |
| anthropic-ai | 5.1% | 0.5% |
GPTBot is named in a Disallow rule by 10.6% of Kenya's 1,108 sites. CCBot follows at 8.5%. ChatGPT-User holds the highest explicit Allow rate at 2.4%, ahead of OAI-SearchBot and PerplexityBot, both at 1.8%.
Multiple Kenya sectors all name at least one bot to restrict
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| Computer & Video Games | 100% |
| Consumer Electronics | 100% |
| Design | 100% |
| Retail | 100% |
| Visual Art | 100% |
| Adult | 90% |
| Comics & Animation | 90% |
| Entertainment | 90% |
| Foreign Language | 90% |
| General | 90% |
| Mass Media | 90% |
| Medical Devices | 90% |
| Newspapers | 90% |
| Online Services | 90% |
| Printing | 90% |
Five sectors — Computer & Video Games, Consumer Electronics, Design, Retail, and Visual Art — each show a 100% named-bot Disallow rate: every site in those sectors names at least one bot to restrict. Ten further sectors sit at 90%.
Kenya's leading sectors explicitly allow crawlers
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| Airlines | 70% |
| Photography | 70% |
| Publishing | 70% |
| Retail | 70% |
| Science | 70% |
| Telecom | 70% |
| Architecture | 60% |
| Automotive | 60% |
| Foreign Language | 60% |
| Graphic Design | 60% |
| IT Services | 60% |
| Investment | 60% |
| Public Policy | 60% |
| Software & Dev | 60% |
| Training & Cert. | 60% |
Airlines, Photography, Publishing, Retail, Science, and Telecom each show a 70% explicit bot Allow rate — the highest in Kenya's survey. Nine further sectors follow at 60%. Retail appears in both the block and allow rankings.
Industry Patterns
Furniture and Jewellery & Luxury are Kenya's hardest sectors to access
| WAF | Antibot | CAPTCHA | JavaScript | Rate Limit | TLS | robots.txt | Blocks AI | Tier | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Furniture | 100% | 40% | 10% | 30% | 20% | 40% | 60% | 0% | Tier 3 |
| Jewellery & Luxury | 100% | 10% | 10% | 30% | 30% | 60% | 60% | 10% | Tier 3 |
| Real Estate | 100% | 10% | 10% | 60% | 60% | 20% | 50% | 20% | Tier 3 |
| Hospitality | 90% | 30% | 0% | 60% | 20% | 40% | 60% | 10% | Tier 3 |
| Equipment & Supplies | 90% | 30% | 20% | 50% | 20% | 10% | 70% | 20% | Tier 3 |
| Retail | 100% | 10% | 0% | 70% | 10% | 10% | 100% | 50% | Tier 2 |
| Human Resources | 100% | 80% | 60% | 50% | 40% | 20% | 70% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Beauty & Cosmetics | 80% | 30% | 20% | 30% | 40% | 40% | 80% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Computer Hardware | 90% | 20% | 0% | 30% | 20% | 20% | 70% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Consumer Electronics | 80% | 10% | 20% | 60% | 10% | 50% | 100% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Customer Services | 100% | 10% | 20% | 50% | 30% | 20% | 50% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Insurance | 90% | 30% | 20% | 40% | 20% | 10% | 80% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Medical Devices | 90% | 10% | 10% | 40% | 10% | 10% | 100% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Restaurants | 90% | 40% | 20% | 50% | 30% | 10% | 60% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Automotive | 100% | 20% | 0% | 40% | 40% | 30% | 70% | 20% | Tier 2 |
Furniture and Jewellery & Luxury share mean tier 2.80 — the highest in Kenya — and both carry a median tier of 3. Real Estate follows at 2.70. Industries ranked by mean recommended browser tier.
Banking is Kenya's most accessible sector
| WAF | Antibot | CAPTCHA | JavaScript | Rate Limit | TLS | robots.txt | Blocks AI | Tier | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Food & Beverages | 100% | 50% | 30% | 50% | 30% | 0% | 80% | 30% | Tier 2 |
| Apparel & Fashion | 100% | 20% | 30% | 60% | 20% | 30% | 80% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Maritime | 90% | 10% | 10% | 40% | 10% | 30% | 90% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Sporting Goods | 90% | 10% | 20% | 50% | 30% | 30% | 60% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Wholesalers | 90% | 10% | 40% | 60% | 30% | 30% | 80% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Ceramics & Pottery | 90% | 0% | 30% | 40% | 0% | 0% | 80% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Crafts | 100% | 30% | 20% | 60% | 30% | 10% | 60% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Design | 100% | 20% | 30% | 40% | 20% | 30% | 100% | 30% | Tier 2 |
| Import & Export | 100% | 30% | 30% | 50% | 0% | 30% | 80% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Mail & Delivery | 70% | 40% | 10% | 10% | 0% | 20% | 80% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Pharmaceuticals | 100% | 40% | 20% | 50% | 30% | 20% | 70% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Reference | 90% | 60% | 30% | 40% | 20% | 10% | 60% | 40% | Tier 2 |
| Transport & Logistics | 70% | 40% | 10% | 10% | 0% | 20% | 80% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Wine & Spirits | 100% | 50% | 20% | 50% | 30% | 0% | 80% | 30% | Tier 2 |
| Banking | 100% | 50% | 10% | 30% | 10% | 20% | 80% | 0% | Tier 2 |
Banking records a mean browser tier of 1.90 — the lowest among Kenya's bottom-15 industries. Nine sectors share a mean tier of 2.00, including Design, Import & Export, and Pharmaceuticals.