10 Best Ahrefs Alternatives of 2023 – Comparison Between Top Paid & Free SEO Tools

Looking for the top Ahrefs alternatives? Read on to find the top SEO tools like Ahrefs (free and paid).

In the realm of SEO, Ahrefs is one of the most famous tools used by many SEO marketers. No doubt, Ahrefs is a perfect tool for an SEO guy or a smart marketer.

But some might think it’s too expensive and is looking for cheaper/free alternatives. Some others might want different features and benefits. In this post, we will discuss the best alternatives to Ahrefs available.

When it comes to SEO tools, there are few as widely used and respected as Ahrefs. However, the cost of the tool can be prohibitive for smaller businesses or bloggers on a tight budget.

In this article, we’ll explore a few Ahrefs alternatives that offer similar functionality at a fraction of the price. Keep in mind that no single tool is perfect for everyone, so be sure to try out several before settling on one. Happy blogging!

What Is Ahrefs?

ahrefs academy

Ahrefs is a powerful tool for SEO professionals. It allows you to track your website’s ranking, research competitor websites, and find profitable keywords.

The site also offers a variety of other features that can help you improve your website’s visibility online. If you’re looking to improve your website’s SEO, Ahrefs is the tool for you.

Ahrefs is a service that offers its own SEO metrics, but it also has backlink data from other sources. It’s important to note that this data comes with the flexibility of being able to choose your preferred data source. This means you’re not limited to relying on Ahrefs’ data alone.

Features of Ahrefs

The following are some of Ahrefs’ features:

Site Explorer: This tool allows you to see your website’s ranking, as well as the ranking of any other website. You can also research competitor websites and find profitable keywords.

Backlink Checker: This tool lets you see which websites are linking to your website, as well as the quality of those links.

Content Explorer: This tool lets you find highly shared content on the web. It also shows you the keywords that these pages are ranking for, giving you information for creating useful content that can boost your rankings.

Keyword Magic Tool: Use this tool to get long-tail keywords that your competitors are ranking for. You can also see how difficult it will be to rank for these keywords.

Domain Comparison: This tool lets you compare up to five domains and see how they stack up against each other in terms of SEO metrics.

As you can see, Ahrefs is a powerful tool for SEO professionals. If you’re looking to improve your website’s visibility online, Ahrefs is the perfect tool for you.

Pricing of Ahrefs

The price of Ahrefs ranges from $99 to $999 per month, depending on the features you need.

Lite plan ($99/month) includes 7-day trial, Standard plan ($179/month) includes 14-day trial, Advanced plan ($399/month) includes 30 day trial, and Agency plan ($999/month) includes 60 day trial.

Pros & Cons of Ahrefs

Pros

1. Ahrefs is great for finding keywords and content opportunities.

2. Ahrefs makes it easy to track your success.

3. Ahrefs is great for gaining success with SEO.

4. Ahrefs has a great user interface.

5. Ahrefs is affordable.

6. Ahrefs is easy to use.

7. Ahrefs is reliable.

8. Ahrefs provides valuable insights into competitors’ strategies.

9. Ahrefs is constantly updated.

10. Ahrefs has a great support team.

Cons

  • Although Ahrefs is an outstanding tool for finding links, it can be a bit expensive.

Premium Alternatives of Ahrefs

1. SEMrush

semrush dashboard

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

Started in 2008, SEMrush has made a big name as a mainstream tool for every SEO professional. It does all that any other tool like Ahrefs will do. You get to conduct keyword research, tap competitors’ backlinks, and much more.

Every time you ask someone about the best alternative to Ahrefs, the most probable answer will be SEMrush.

semrush pricing as cheapest ahrefs alternative

Have a look at the pricing. Starts for as low as $99/mo only. That’s why I consider SEMrush as one of the cheapest alternatives to Ahrefs.

The primary purpose however remains the SEO audit and all related functions. The rest serves as a side dish for those with a tight budget and who cannot afford to spend on additional platforms. SEMrush has an incredible amount of functions, thanks to this tool we can:

  • Analyze domains, competitors, and do advanced keyword research Study the advertisements of others in search campaigns, displays
  • Analyze the cost of keywords, and spy on ads and landing pages
  • Schedule content on social media and track results
  • Create advanced automatic reports to send to customers or managers Manage teams and marketing campaigns with tasks and to-do lists… and dozens of microtools and secondary functions

The feature of advertising intelligence is even better than Ahrefs can work best to reveal the paid-keywords of any website.

I wanted to show you all the features of SEMRush. But for that, I have written a detailed SEMrush review on this blog.

However, I will show my favorite tools from the SEMrush panel.

Keyword Magic Tool

If you love experimenting with keywords, you are going to love the way the keyword magic tool works in SEMrush.

ahrefs keyword research alternative
  • The tool tells you about the relevant long-tail keywords when you type any seed keyword to start
  • The estimated cost per click (in case you choose to advertise on that keyword) and the Keyword difficulty is there to see the real potential of the keyword.
  • The keyword magic tool further has a data-set called “results”. This is actually the number of indexed pages on Google for a particular keyword.
  • You can also use match-types to filter out non-relevant keywords. The default search is “broad match”. You can find more specific keywords with “phrase match”.

Organic Research

Organic research is yet another amazing feature of SEMrush. You can magically find out the most-profitable keywords of your competitors with this.

Simply type in a URL and you’ll get results like this.

organic search extension of semrush

The first screen is just like an overview and trend of organic keywords ranking. You get the real data right after you scroll the page.

detailed keyword research
  • Here you can give new heights to your competitive research attitude.
  • Find out the top organic keywords for a specific page on any website’s URL
  • Track the performance of that specific page on SERP. You get to know if the page’s rank is improving for a particular keyword or not.
  • Furthermore, the page might have some featured snippets in google. Or maybe is ranking in a knowledge graph. You get all that data here.

Pros & Cons of SEMRush

Pros

1. Semrush is generally easy to use.

2. Domain analysis is particularly easy to perform with Semrush — you get everything you need to see in one place, laid out clearly.

3. Although it provides a large quantity of data, Semrush’s interface is laid out in a logical fashion; and graphs and data visualisations make it easy to understand the metrics provided.

4. Semrush’s link-building functionality, which features CRM-style features to help you with outreach, is superb.

5. Semrush offers great value for money compared with other tools in its category.

6. The SEO reports that Semrush produces are thorough and easy to understand.

7. You can start using it in a matter of minutes.

8. The all-inclusive package is ideal for both beginners and experienced users.

9. Despite the amount of data available, Semrush doesn’t need much technical knowledge to get started with its basic functions, such as setting up alerts and dashboards.

10. It provides many features for free.

Cons

1. Semrush only provides data for one search engine, Google — some competing tools, notably Ahrefs, provide data from quite a few others.

2. All Semrush plans only come with one user account — and buying additional seats is expensive.

 

Editor’s Note

I have been using SEMrush for all my keyword research, link building, and competition analysis tasks. Not only as a blogger but also as a professional technical SEO analyst. Some of the tools that SEMrush offers are impressive and unique. It’s a bang for your bucks.

Get Started With SEMRush Today

2. Siteprofiler

siteprofiler dashboard

With Siteprofiler, you can replace Ahrefs for most tasks. Siteprofiler brings up the real SEO metrics for any site right in front of you in a very impressive and elegant manner.

A cool-looking dashboard shows you how many backlinks does a website has and what keywords it is ranking for.

As a perfect alternative to Ahrefs, SiteProfiler has a free trial for you to check all the functions. There are so many free tools like Ahrefs in the market, but Siteprofiler is such a perfect option for you to look for.

  • Get the detail of backlinks and the health of any website.
  • Find the best keywords for your blogs and tap on your competitor’s keywords to rank for
  • Look for sites similar to yours or your competitor’s

Pros & Cons of SiteProfiler

Pros

1. SiteProfiler is an easy-to-use tool that provides a variety of SEO metrics from Moz and Majestic.

2. SiteProfiler includes the Alexa Rank and Facebook popularity of a website, so you can get a complete picture.

3. The Backlinks section of SiteProfiler lets you see if your backlinking profile is working properly.

4. The Inbound Links section of SiteProfiler shows you all of the websites that are linking to your site.

5. The Competitive Analysis section of SiteProfiler compares your website to your top competitors.

6. The Link Opportunities section of SiteProfiler gives you ideas for new link-building opportunities.

7. The Domain Comparison section of SiteProfiler shows you your domain compared to your competitor’s.

8. The Widgetbox allows you to put a link or picture into a box for easy linking and sharing on social media websites like Facebook and Twitter.

Cons

1. No way to export to Google Docs

2. Can’t save searches, can only add new ones

Get Started With Siteprofiler Today

3. SEO Powersuite

seo-powersuite pricing plan

SEO PowerSuite is a set of valuable and feature-rich SEO tools that cover most of the operational needs of an SEO consultant.

If you are considering purchasing the paid version, this guide and review can be very useful since we see the main features of its 4 software and what can support us in carrying out our SEO services.

SEO PowerSuite consists of 4 cross-platform desktop software (run on Windows, Mac, and Linux) to be used on the desk (by installing them on your PC or on VPS):

  • Rank Tracker
  • WebSite Auditor
  • SEO SpyGlass
  • LinkAssistant

More about SEO PowerSuite

All the software are freemium and include a limited free version which, however, allows access to multiple features and without any time limit

Simple to use and effective, SEO PowerSuite is an excellent SEO tool with the best value for money on the market (the Rank Tracker alone is well worth the price of the whole suite).

Pros & Cons of SEO PowerSuite 

Pros

Keyword Research: SEO PowerSuite helps you find keywords that your competitors are not targeting. It does this through the use of the Google Adwords Keyword Tool, which is an entirely free tool that anyone can sign up for.

Competitor Research: With competitor analysis, SEO PowerSuite allows you to see what keywords they rank for and how much their domain authority scores are to help give you perspective on how well you’re doing against them.

Technical Site Audit: With the “Technical Site Audit” tab, SEO PowerSuite provides a laundry list of issues with your site’s code. These are issues that are causing your site to do worse in search results if not fixed, items like duplicate meta tags or broken redirects. It also offers a bunch of simple solutions and resources to help you with the most common SEO problems and how to fix them.

Backlink Analysis: SEO PowerSuite’s “Backlinks Analysis” tab is an easy way to see who backlinks the sites that are ranking for your targeted keywords, with stats on the links they have and how much traffic those pages get.

Competitor Backlink Analysis: This tab is a helpful way to see who the top-ranked sites for your targeted keywords are linking out to and which sites link back to all of them (that’s a sign that those sites probably have great content).

Checks Your Site For Technical Issues And Suggest Fixes: This tab scans your site for common errors and issues, like whether there are any broken links, duplicate meta tags or a lack of keywords on a page. It also scours your site’s code looking for other issues that may be hurting your SEO.

Cons

1. One of them is that the projects that I am working on often do not show up, so I have to go through my computer files manually.

2. Another con is that it sometimes gets confused with HTML codes, so when I want to publish something, it publishes for me in the wrong format.

Get Started With SEO PowerSuite Today

4. MorningScore

morningscore is an ahrefs alternative

Morningscore is yet another SEO tool for webmasters that tracks your website’s performance in search engines. The smart algorithm of Morningscore automatically scrapes all your website pages indexed on Google. And then the tool fetches its position in the search results.

pricing of morningscore- SEO tools

The pricing plans at MorningScore are cheaper than that of Ahrefs. On the other hand, you may not find as many features as Ahrefs has in its full SEO suite.

Unlike most rank-tracking tools, MorningScore is different. It’s not a complete replacement for Ahrefs but can definitely prove to be a great alternative to a few features that Ahrefs offer.

overview video of morningscore

There are a few reasons why rank tracking is an important factor of SEO strategy execution-

  • You can not rely only on the search console to tell you about major spikes or downfalls in your search rankings.
  • When you have an SEO agency to win the game, you require a tool like Ahrefs to monitor the game.
  • To understand the need for improvements when SERP positions are declining consistently.

Pros & Cons of MorningScore

Pros

1. MorningScore is easy to use- the user interface is very simple and easy to navigate, which makes it perfect for people who are not familiar with SEO tools.

2. MorningScore has some great recommendations for improving your ranking- unlike other SEO tools, MorningStar provides specific recommendations for how you can improve your website’s ranking.

3. MorningScore has a lot of tools- MorningStar offers a wide variety of tools, which makes it an excellent value for the price.

4. MorningScore is affordable- MorningStar is one of the more affordable SEO tools on the market.

5. MorningScore is up-to-date with the latest trends- MorningStar is constantly updated with the latest trends in SEO, so you can be sure that you’re using the most effective tools.

6. MorningScore has a great user interface- the user interface is very intuitive and easy to use, which makes it perfect for people who are not familiar with SEO tools.

Cons

There are a few cons of MorningScore.

  • For one, it can be difficult to share access with stakeholders, as the user management upgrade has only recently been added.
  • Additionally, recalculating Morningscore on filtering by keyword would be very helpful.

Get Started With MorningScore Today

5. Moz

moz pro

Moz Pro offers a complete set of SEO tools that helps improve search engine rankings and visibility. Use proven SEO metrics such as Domain Authority and Page Authority that provide quality data to do the job more effectively.

The program helps companies and individuals save time by simplifying workflows and dividing data for better strategy analysis and formulation.

The system automatically analyzes site errors, SEO opportunities, and provides usable insights, which allow users to customize their content and design accordingly. Keeps users updated on the situation using various tools such as auditing and assigns priorities to each based on their needs.

The complete set of tools simplifies complex analysis so that users can focus more on services rather than spending most of their time analyzing and solving problems.

moz pro site analysis tool

MOZ PRO – Features

  • Site audit: scan your site, discover SEO technical problems and you will receive suggestions and corrections to make to your site
  • Rank Detection: Track the performance of hundreds (or thousands) of your keywords driving traffic on over 170 search engines
  • Backlink analysis: view metrics on any site in seconds, including anchor text and domain authority
  • Keyword Research: Discover thousands of keywords to target along with keyword difficulty scores, competition research, and SERP analysis
  • Identify your weaknesses: easily add, manage, and create keyword lists in one place. Classify, prioritize and compare keywords and phrases to optimize your strategy and content
  • Compare visibility on mobile and desktop devices: customers have different search behaviors on desktops than on mobile devices: compare and optimize both with this program. Track desktop rankings on major search engines in over 200 countries
  • Fast Site Scan: The solution quickly scans large sites and tracks new and recurring problems over time. The colored graphs show the breakdown of the categories of problems, the new numbers, and the total numbers; allowing you to easily discover trends, opportunities and inform people about the overall SEO performance of the site.

Pros & Cons of Moz Pro

Pros

1. Moz is insanely easy to set up and use.

2. The reporting and information it provides a small business owner is great.

3. I work with clients that range from 200+ locations down to 1 location and this software is perfect for small business owners.

4. The reporting is quick and easy.

5. Clients love being able to login and see most everything in 2-3 clicks.

6. Moz has awesome customer service – they are always quick to help and resolve any issue.

7. The software is always being updated and improved – they are constantly working to make it better.

8. Moz has a great community of users who are always willing to help out.

9. The pricing is very reasonable.

10. Overall, I highly recommend Moz Pro for anyone who needs help with their SEO. It’s a great tool that will help you get the information you need to improve your website’s ranking.

Cons

Although Moz is a great tool, it does have its drawbacks.

  • One such drawback is that it can be expensive for larger businesses.
  • Another drawback is that some of the processes need to be done manually in order to clean up duplicates.

Get Started With Moz Pro Today

6. BuzzSumo

buzzsumo

BuzzSumo is a social media monitoring tool, that is, in part it can be used for free, useful for monitoring keywords, competitors, and trends. Once you have selected the topic of interest, you will get what has been most discussed and shared in recent months by the online community.

You can track conversations on the web and analyze your brand reputation or take cues from the main influencers to create your next successful content.

In addition, the list of results obtained shows only the first five, and to access the complete one, you need to switch to the paid service. However, I won’t miss the opportunity to point out the possibility to try it for free for 14 days.

Pros & Cons of BuzzSumo

Pros:

1. BuzzSumo is a versatile social media monitoring tool that can be used for a variety of purposes.

2. The interface is intuitive and easy to use, making it ideal for people who are not tech-savvy.

3. You can easily interact with influencers using BuzzSumo.

4. It has a detailed overview of the conversations that took place online on a certain topic.

5. The ability to see the most popular content on any given topic is a valuable feature of BuzzSumo.

6. It helps you track the performance of your content over time.

7. You can identify the key influencers in your field using BuzzSumo.

8. It is a free tool, which makes it accessible to everyone.

9. The ability to see the most popular content on any given topic is a valuable feature of BuzzSumo.

Cons:

Compared to Talkwalker, it has many more paid features, also being this tool of English origin, despite the setting of the filters for the desired language, the results are not always so accurate.

Get Started With BuzzSumo Today

7. Majestic SEO

majestic seo

A site that wants to appear in the top places of search engines cannot ignore having a quality backlink.

This means that the search engines not only take into account the quality and the stylistic level present on the website in question but above all they calculate the level of authority they have in their specific sector.

To have excellent Seo results it is essential to do an excellent link-building job and to do it in the best way you need to analyze the backlink profile of a site.

The best professionals who work in the SEO field know that it is important to analyze the competitors well and to do this they use various tools, among which one of the most valid is definitely Majestic SEO.

In particular, with the Majestic Site Explorer, it is possible to accurately analyze the backlinks of both your site and competitors.

The beauty of this tool is that it offers the professional to choose between two possibilities from the point of view of data analysis.

In fact, it can either collect the data that Majestic Seo has accumulated in its database in the last 90 days, or it can analyze the overall set of data.

In the first case, of course, the number of data is lower but it is decidedly more updated and in the second case it is exactly the opposite.

There are two types of metrics that Majestic SEO uses to analyze a site, namely Citation Flow and Trust Flow, which in a nutshell have the function of indicating the quantity and quality of the links received from the site.

These are very important aspects as they serve the professional to understand if whoever managed the site implemented SEO strategies appropriate to the project.

But a very important thing to underline is that these metrics are however related to a specific sector, in the sense that it is useless to compare the authoritativeness of your site with a mega portal like Wikipedia for example.

Instead, it is much more useful to analyze carefully the organic rivals, that is those sites that are on the front page with keywords similar to the sector or business you want to promote with your site.

In this way, you will be able to fully understand what kind of you need authority to dominate the SERPs that interest you.

Pros & Cons of Majestic SEO

Pros

-The link graph feature helps my team better analyze competition and saves us lots of time and money.

-Their historic index is one of the most comprehensive on the market compared to other link checker tools.

-The historic index feature is very helpful when conducting my link detox campaigns.

-Majestic SEO’s rank estimator is quite accurate, it can estimate a domain’s rank by analyzing about 10 links only!

-It has an amazing premium dashboard that updates you with all the changes in your rankings.

-Majestic SEO has an extensive backlink database which I use to find links to outreach too.

-I can download data or save it as PDFs which are convenient. The reports are also very nicely designed.

Cons

  • The pricing is a little bit expensive but with the features it offers, it’s definitely worth the price.

Overall, I’m really happy with Majestic SEO and would definitely recommend it to anyone looking for a good link checker tool.

Get Started With Majestic SEO Today

8. Advanced Web Ranking

Advanced web rankings- Ahrefs alternative

Known as the longest-standing rank tracker tool (since 2002 on the market), Advanced Web Ranking delivers accurate results on more than 3.000 search engines and no less than 170 countries. The rankings can be delivered for both mobile and desktop devices, at a national or even city level.

Designed for high volumes of data, it’s ideal for agencies, but can easily accommodate in-house SEOs and freelancers, as well. Besides unlimited seats, white-label reports, keywords tagging options, users can get competition intel such as market share, estimated visits, visibility score, etc.

Reports are easy to create and can be shared under different forms: permalinks, PDFs, CSVs, Google Data Studio, Google Docs, etc.

Pros & Cons of Advanced Web Ranking

Pros 

1. AWR is incredibly accurate and provides the most reliable data available.

2. AWR is constantly updated with the latest information and changes in the search engine algorithms.

3. AWR is fast and efficient, providing results in a matter of minutes.

4. AWR is easy to use, with a simple and user-friendly interface.

5. AWR offers a wide range of features and capabilities, including detailed reports and graphs.

6. AWR is affordable, with prices that are very competitive compared to other ranking tools.

7. AWR has an excellent customer service team, who are always available to help with any problems or queries.

Cons

  • It is not possible to schedule rankings and reports to be run on specific future dates.

Get Started With Advanced Web Ranking

Free Alternative To Ahrefs

SearchEngineReports

SearchEngineReports is among one of the top sites that are providing smart SEO tools. SER is the best alternative to Ahrefs as it is offering all the services free of cost with even better features and results.

You can conduct an analysis of your own as well as of competitors’ sites on this amazing platform. The backlink checker tool of this website provides you with a list of the top 100 backlinks pointing at your domain.

Plus, it also notifies you about the domain rating, the total number of do-follow links, no-follow links, referring domains, and referring IPs.

The top reasons for using this platform as an alternative to Ahrefs include:

  • It doesn’t charge a penny for any service
  • All tools provide 100% accurate results
  • You don’t have to go through the registration process
  • The results are displayed in a matter of seconds
  • There is no restriction on the number of times you can use its tools in a day

 
Quick Links

Conclusion- Ahrefs Alternatives in 2023

Ahrefs may be the best SEO tool on the market, but it does come with a hefty price tag. If you’re looking for an alternative that offers features like keyword research and backlink discovery at a lower cost, there are some good options available to you.

For example, SEMrush is another top-of-the line digital marketing platform that can help your company find success in today’s competitive marketplace. We hope this post has helped you understand how Ahrefs Alternatives work!