System requirements

RankKit SEO runs on any standard WordPress site. The core requirements are short. A few features need something extra, such as pretty permalinks or a newer WordPress version, and this page lists them so you know before you start.

Minimum requirements

Requirement	Version
WordPress	6.5 or newer (tested up to 7.1)
PHP	7.4 or newer
User role to set it up	Administrator

These apply to both RankKit SEO and RankKit SEO Pro.

Feature-specific requirements

Feature	Needs
/llms.txt, Markdown pages (/any-page.md), /locations.kml and the IndexNow key file	Pretty permalinks (Settings → Permalinks set to anything except Plain)
Connecting claude.ai or ChatGPT by URL	Pretty permalinks, and a site that is public and served over HTTPS. Local sites work with Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor and VS Code instead.
Claude Desktop connection snippet	Node.js on the computer running Claude Desktop
WordPress Abilities API registration	WordPress 6.9 or newer
The WordPress AI (Settings → Connectors) AI provider	WordPress 7.0 or newer
WooCommerce SEO settings	WooCommerce active (the WooCommerce settings tab only appears then)
Multilingual SEO	WPML, Polylang or TranslatePress active (the Languages settings tab only appears then)
AI features	Your own key for an AI provider, or a local model server. See Add your AI provider key.
Search Console and GA4 reports	A Google Cloud project you create, or a service account. See Connect Google.

Scheduled tasks (WP-Cron)

Some features run in the background through WordPress's scheduler, WP-Cron. If WP-Cron is disabled on your site, make sure a real cron job calls it, or these tasks won't run:

• IndexNow pings for new and updated posts (sent about 60 seconds after publishing).
• Daily housekeeping: pruning old Change Log entries, expired agent tokens and old logs.
• Optional weekly tasks you turn on, such as the weekly page speed test.
• Pro: scheduled audits, the email report schedule, rank tracker updates, daily index status checks and the broken link checker.

Outgoing connections

RankKit SEO only connects to outside services you set up or ask for: your AI provider, Google (Search Console, Analytics and PageSpeed Insights), IndexNow when it's on, and pages you ask it to read (competitor analysis, importing schema from a URL). The site audit also makes a few requests to your own home page. Your server must be allowed to make outgoing HTTPS requests for these to work.

Note IndexNow is skipped on sites whose WordPress environment type is local or development, so test sites don't ping search engines.

Page caching and CDNs

RankKit SEO works with page caching. One thing to know: AI crawler tracking only counts visits that WordPress handles. Visits served entirely by a page cache or CDN are not seen, so the numbers can be lower than the real crawl volume.

FAQ

Do I need an AI key or a Google account to use RankKit SEO?

No. Titles, meta, schema, sitemaps, redirects, the site audit and the other core features work without either. AI and Google reports are optional extras you can add later.

Why do I need pretty permalinks?

Files like /llms.txt, Markdown pages and the /.well-known/ addresses that claude.ai and ChatGPT use to sign in are served through WordPress rewrite rules, which plain permalinks don't support.

Can I use RankKit SEO on a local development site?

Yes. Everything works locally except features that need your site to be reachable from the internet, such as connecting claude.ai or ChatGPT by URL. IndexNow pings are skipped on local and development environments.