Large language models (LLMs) are changing SEO as we know it. Studies are projecting LLM traffic to skyrocket from 0.25% of all search volume in 2024 to 10% by the end of 2025.

For technical documentation, this trend will upend how customers find information and ultimately reach success with a product.

If you want people to discover information about your product, it’s no longer enough to think about optimizing in the traditional sense of Google.

We’ll share how the landscape for documentation SEO has evolved with AI and what you need to know and do to stay ahead.

Minimum SEO requirements for traditional search

Before diving into AI SEO, here’s a refresher on non-negotiable elements for traditional SEO:

• Clean HTML structure – Proper title tags, headings, and content segmentation.
• Properly formatted metadata – For descriptions, canonical tags, and Open Graph data.
• Performant rendering – Fast-loading images, efficient JavaScript, and a snappy overall experience.
• Automated sitemaps – Keeping search engines up to date with new and changed content.

Documentation SEO starts with nailing these fundamentals. While a fast, mobile-friendly site with clean metadata used to be considered top-tier, today it's just the baseline. Modern documentation platforms like Mintlify provide these optimizations out-of-the-box.

The next phase is about structuring technical content not just for search engines, but for LLMs that surface answers directly.

The evolution of information discovery

In order to understand why traditional SEO is no longer sufficient, you need to consider how users find and consume documentation.

Traditionally, users take three main paths:

1. Navigating through your docs hierarchy
2. Using your docs search functionality
3. Finding your content via search engines

These behaviors align with two user intents:

• Exploratory browsing: when prospects are evaluating your product or when new users are onboarding. They want to build a mental model of your product's capabilities and structure. For them, a clear information hierarchy with intuitive navigation is essential.
• Targeted search: when users have specific questions and want a fast answer. These users bypass navigation and go straight to search, whether in your docs, chatbot, or search engines.

The best systems, like Stripe docs, excel at supporting both intents through traditional paths, such as having a knowledge base for quick topical discovery as well as a robust search experience.

But AI is introducing a new path for users to achieve their intents.

Customers want faster, contextual answers

Instead of navigating through sections or searching for specific pages, users are turning to LLMs for immediate answers.

Rather than:

• "Let me browse to understand the system & product hierarchy" (exploratory)
• "Let me find the specific page about this issue" (targeted search)

Users can now directly ask their question and quickly get a contextualized answer, instead of stitching together information from different pages.

This shift in behavior is reflected in the adoption of Mintlify’s AI Chat feature. Since its launch in 2024, AI Chat has quickly become the obviously preferred method for users to ask questions from our customers’ docs.

This trend also aligns with broader changes across the tech ecosystem. Developers primarily turn to AI-powered tools like ChatGPT or Cursor/Windsurf rather than traditional content repositories like Stack Overflow.

While comprehensive wikis will always have their place, their value increasingly lies in how their content fuels AI responses. That’s why it’s critical to make it easier for AI intermediaries to draw from content repositories such as your documentation.

Optimizing your docs for LLMs

Beyond traditional SEO requirements, your documentation needs to be optimized for AI systems to better understand, navigate, and present your product to users.

That’s why we've shipped a suite of releases to make docs LLM-friendly, all automatically hosted for every customer:

• /llms.txt - A structured index of your docs, helping general-purpose LLMs navigate efficiently (like a sitemap for AI).
• /llms-full.txt - A single markdown file containing all docs, enabling AI tools to load complete context in one link.
• .md support - Automatic markdown versions of all pages, making it faster to load individual pages into AI tools.
• ⌘ + c shortcut - Copy markdown source of any page using command + c.

The landscape is evolving and no one knows what will stick—but standards are forming quickly.

For example, Mintlify created /llms-full.txt in collaboration with our customer Anthropic. Because we automatically hosted it for all customers, widespread adoption followed—leading to its incorporation into the official llmstxt.org spec.

As AI reshapes how information is consumed, we’re reimagining the role of documentation, shifting from passive repository to active participants in this new ecosystem.

Adapting is everything

While the landscape shifts are still unfolding, one thing is clear: documentation must be accessible across all channels, whether through traditional SEO or new AI-driven methods.

As the way people consume information evolves, agility is everything. Companies that optimize for next-generation information retrieval will reap benefits across the board, from brand visibility to customer support and success.

If you’re interested in staying ahead of the curve, get in touch.