User-agent: *
# Disallow WordPress core folders
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /wp-includes/
Disallow: /wp-content/plugins/
Disallow: /wp-content/cache/
Disallow: /wp-content/themes/

# Allow AJAX for front-end functionality
Allow: /wp-admin/admin-ajax.php

# Disallow unnecessary WordPress files
Disallow: /readme.html
Disallow: /license.txt
Disallow: /cgi-bin/

# Disallow dynamic URLs with query strings for /news/ and other archives
Disallow: /news/?*
Disallow: /category/?*
Disallow: /tag/?*
Disallow: /stories/?*

# Disallow common filtered parameters (used in bots' crawl patterns)
Disallow: /*?countries=
Disallow: /*?category=
Disallow: /*?post_tag=
Disallow: /*?s=          # Search pages
Disallow: /author/       # Optional: block author archives

# Disallow encoded array-style filter parameters
Disallow: /*?*category%5B
Disallow: /*?*post_tag%5B
Disallow: /*?*countries%5B

# Sitemap reference
Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml