Bots have overtaken human web traffic

Published June 18, 2026

For the first time, automated traffic outnumbers human visitors across much of the web. For a campus, that means a growing share of the “people” reading your site are actually AI agents acting on a prospective student’s behalf.

Why it matters for higher ed

• Agents answer for you. When a student asks an assistant about programs or deadlines, it reads your site and answers, accurately or not.
• Your content needs to be legible to machines. Pages built only for human eyes can be misread, and the wrong answer gets passed along.
• You can get visibility. Knowing which agents visit, and what they ask about, turns a blind spot into something you can manage.