With the upheaval in today’s SEO market, you need tried and true strategies, workflows, and tools. Getting the #1 placement on Google is harder than ever. If you don’t rise to the top, you are missing out on attracting qualified visitors, increasing sales, and establishing yourself as an authority. To flip this script, you’ll want to look into the best SEO tools on the market. Some are even cheaper to use than you realized.
In this article, we’ll cover the best SEO tools available today, both free and paid, and explain how to use them to grow your organic traffic.
How SEO Tools Can Help
SEO is a vast ocean of terms, tools, and techniques. Getting comfortable with all the basics takes a lot of immersion. Thankfully, using the right SEO tools can make it much easier to implement fundamental and advanced SEO techniques into your overall strategy.
With these tools, you can execute an SEO strategy covering essential tasks within each type of SEO. These SEO essentials often include:
- Research Better Strategies: This is all the groundwork you do before touching your website. Competitor Research, Keyword Research, and Search Engine Result Page (SERP) Analysis fall into this category.
- On-page SEO: Content-related tasks that start to employ your hard-won research. Creating quality SEO Content and optimizing page titles, meta descriptions, SEO links, and heading tags cover a good chunk of on-page work. But we have a more detailed on-page SEO checklist.
- Off-page SEO: Optimization efforts outside your website, like getting backlinks and social media mentions that improve your website’s visibility, reputation, and authority online. However, it is crucial to make sure to do it the right way.
- Technical SEO: Improving a website’s technical elements, including page speed, mobile SEO, and Core Web Vitals. It also involves implementing Schema markup through your site, usually with the help of a plugin.
- SEO Reporting: Accurately track progress and learn the proper lessons from the data you collect so you can iterate on all the above steps.
Below, we’ve provided a comprehensive list of all the best SEO tools you can use to accomplish these tasks and more. We’ve also taken the time to let you know the tasks each SEO tool is best suited for so you can combine them for maximum SEO results.
The Best SEO Tools
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The Best SEO Tools Listed In Order
1. Semrush
Semrush is easily one of the most recognizable SEO tools today. It has created an imposing suite of tools to help you understand what is happening on Google. They are one of the only SEO platforms that truly gets near to being an all-in-one SEO toolkit (no SEO Pro uses only one tool, even for the sake of principle). Some high-level features include its keyword magic tool for keyword research, routine rank tracking, content analysis, and competitor analysis. They even go above and beyond to impress us with their Semrush WordPress Plugin and the ever-popular SEOquake browser extension.
With Position Tracking, you can see how all your keywords are performing on a day-to-day basis. Track up to 5 projects (unique websites) in the Pro plan and each one’s keyword positions. Know precisely which changes you push are moving the dial.
What We Like About Semrush
- Tool Versatility: Semrush is a Swiss army knife with tools for content marketing, social media, and advertising, making it a comprehensive suite for digital marketing needs.
- SEO Tracking: It offers expert ability to track and report on every aspect of your SEO campaigns, including position tracking, providing deep insights into performance and your competitors.
- AI Writing Tools: Semrush offers an AI writing assistant that uses AI to optimize your on-page SEO content in real time. It also has other AI-powered free SEO tools and an AI app, ContentShake, for a more robust SEO writing solution that rivals top AI writing tools.
- Content Analysis: Semrush scores content on difficulty, voice, keywords/NPL and compares it with competing content, offering a competitive edge in content creation.
- Competitor Research: It allows users to look at competitor domains to see SEO trends and PPC strategies and compare them against their own properties.
What Could Be Improved
- Expensive Solution: Though not the most expensive SEO tool on the market, Semrush charges a lot for access to its vast search data.
- Strict Account Sharing Rules: Stricter than Netflix, we’ve repeatedly been kicked out of Semrush sessions because cookies expired or we switched browsers. Semrush actively prevents account-sharing and forces adding paid users to the account.
Who is Semrush Best For?
Semrush is a powerful SEO platform best suited for those serious about their SEO campaigns and willing to invest time into learning how to use it effectively. This SEO software is ideal for SEO professionals and agencies needing an industry-leading SEO tool. While Semrush is not cheap, those with mid-sized to large budgets will find it a valuable investment.
Read our ultimate Semrush review
Community Reviews and Ratings
Pricing
Semrush offers a free version for those starting in SEO and digital marketing. Paid plans for Semrush begin at $129.95 per month.
2. SE Ranking
SE Ranking is another all-in-one SEO tool designed to help website owners track and plan for their website’s search engine success. The tool is well-suited for newer SEO specialists or those on a smaller budget, as it offers affordable SEO features.
SE Ranking provides a variety of keyword research and analysis tools. This includes a keyword research tool that supplies data on search volume, competition, and other metrics to help users select the best keywords to target for their content. Additionally, the platform features a keyword position tracking function that enables users to monitor their website’s performance in search results over time.
The website audit tool provides users with an in-depth SEO audit analysis of their website’s performance in search engines. This includes analyzing factors such as on-page optimization, technical SEO, and backlinks to identify areas for improvement and give tailored suggestions for optimization.
What We Like About SE Ranking
- Website Audit: SE Ranking features a website audit tool that analyzes on-page optimization, technical SEO, and backlinks.
- Keyword Tools: It includes keyword research and analysis tools, with features for keyword position tracking and identifying optimal keywords for campaigns.
- Backlink Tool: It has a backlink analysis tool that identifies high-quality backlink opportunities based on websites competing on similar keywords.
- Great Value: SE Ranking is a significantly better value for beginning SEOs than more expensive tools like Ahrefs.
What Could Be Improved
- Bare Bones: SE Ranking has great feature coverage for beginner to intermediate users (or those in less competitive spaces) but starts to lack features and data for serious SEO professionals.
- Backlink Profiles: It doesn’t always show all backlinks pointing to a particular domain or page.
Who is SE Ranking Best For?
SE Ranking is a budget-friendly and user-friendly SEO tool ideal for small business owners, bloggers, and website owners seeking to optimize their site’s search engine ranking. It has an intuitive interface and comprehensive features, such as keyword research, site audits, and competitor analysis, making it an excellent choice for those new to SEO or with limited technical experience.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Pricing
SE Ranking’s paid plans start at $55 per month.
3. BrightLocal
BrightLocal is a bright spot on this list of best SEO tools if you run a small business and market to a local community. It takes all the guesswork out of Local SEO. BrightLocal is 100% geared to helping location-dependent businesses succeed with local search terms, map results, and “near-me” requests, as well as managing your business’s reputation and citations (citations in local SEO are good).
The local rank tracking reports are top-notch. They track the most important keywords for your business and show you how they perform based on different locations searches can come from in your area. Search results may differ if someone uses your keyword in other parts of your city, for instance. It shows this information using a grid-like heat map overtop of a map of your service area/general location.
What We Like About BrightLocal
- Local Tracking: BrightLocal provides local rank tracking reports to monitor how your business ranks in Local SERPs, which is crucial for local visibility.
- Review Monitoring: It monitors reviews and offers tools to showcase the best ones on your website.
- White-label Reports: BrightLocal allows you to build white-label reports, ideal for agencies offering local SEO services to clients.
- Citation Building: It lets you create local citations for your business that you get to keep even if you leave the service.
What Could Be Improved
- Expensive Citation Builder: Building citations (local listing profiles) can be costly since it is an add-on cost. But for those in competitive locations, Brightlocal does make this process easy and lets you create a lot of them. It’s worth it in some cases more than others.
Who is Bringlocal Best For?
BrightLocal is an ideal tool for businesses that rely on local search results, including brick-and-mortar stores and service-based businesses serving a specific geographic region. It is designed to scale, with pricing plans available for companies with a single location and those with multiple locations or franchises globally. With features like local search rankings, reputation management, and citation building, BrightLocal is a valuable tool for any business looking to improve its local search visibility and attract more customers.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Pricing
BrightLocal allows businesses to manage local SEO with plans starting at $39 per month.
4. SEO PowerSuite
SEO PowerSuite combines a variety of essential SEO tools in one comprehensive app, making it a lucrative package of SEO tools. It’s known for its in-depth site audits, backlink analysis, rank tracking, and powerful keyword research capabilities. The suite includes four major tools: Rank Tracker, Website Auditor, SEO SpyGlass, and LinkAssistant, each designed to tackle different aspects of SEO more efficiently. SEO PoweSuite runs as a program on your desktop or laptop and differs from many SaaS (online) SEO tools.
The Rank Tracker tool allows you to monitor your website’s rankings across different search engines and regions, providing insights into your SEO progress. It also lets you dig into competitor websites and rankings to see what’s working on other sites.
What We Like About SEO PowerSuite
- Comprehensive Toolset: SEO PowerSuite has tools for in-depth site audits, backlink analysis, rank tracking, and keyword research.
- Desktop Software: Unlike many SEO tools, SEO PowerSuite is desktop software offering robust performance and data privacy.
- Cost-Effective: It offers a competitive pricing model, making it accessible for freelancers, small businesses, and large agencies.
- Regular Updates: SEO PowerSuite is known for its frequent updates, ensuring the software stays current with the latest SEO trends and practices.
What Could Be Improved
- Resource Intensive: As desktop software, it can be resource-intensive, requiring a capable machine for optimal performance. Most computers will work and have no issues.
- User Interface: Users note that its app UI is sometimes complicated when using or finding certain items. But with experience, this becomes largely a non-issue.
Who is SEO PowerSuite Best For?
SEO PowerSuite is best suited for SEO professionals and agencies who need a comprehensive set of tools to tackle every aspect of SEO. It is also an excellent choice for businesses of all sizes looking for a cost-effective SEO solution that provides deep insights into their website’s performance.
Community Reviews and Ratings
SEO PowerSuite users enjoy using the software. They think that it is unique that it’s desktop run software instead of in the cloud. That makes it cost-efficient, which most users enjoy.
Pricing
SEO PowerSuite offers a free version with basic features suitable for those just starting with SEO. Paid plans for SEO PowerSuite begin at $299 per year, allowing access to all its tools and most features.
5. SEObility
SEObility is excellent for every essential SEO task, including website auditing, keyword analysis, on-page optimization, and link building. It also offers features for analyzing and monitoring backlinks and tracking search engine rankings. It’s one of the best beginner SEO tools you can get (similar to Ubersuggest) in that it will help anyone learn the basics of SEO without busting budgets. It even has a generous free tier that we couldn’t recommend enough.
What We Like About SEObility
- Crawl Limits: SEObility offers a free plan that crawls up to 1000 pages of one tracked website and tracks ten keywords.
- Mobile/Desktop Tracking: Tracks mobile and desktop keywords, CPC, and competitors on its paid plan.
- Backlink Monitoring: Monitors backlinks on the paid plan, guiding your link-building strategies with actionable insights.
- Page Health: Monitors the health of your pages through on-page checks available in the free plan.
This tool has the basics down pat—especially for keyword tracking and the number of pages crawled.
What Could Be Improved
- Data Quality: A common issue for budget SEO tools is the amount and quality of search data they provide users. SEObility has noticeably lower-quality data than Semrush or Ahrefs, but that can be a trade-off that’s worth it for beginners or those needing low-cost tools.
Who is SEObility Best For?
SEObility is an excellent tool for beginners just starting with SEO and web admins who have never optimized their websites for search engines. It has excellent tools for you to learn the trade.
Community Reviews and Ratings
While some find it user-friendly and practical, others criticize its limited features, occasional bugs, and lack of advanced reporting options compared to competitors.
Pricing
SEObility includes a free version to help you get started with SEO. For more comprehensive features, paid plans start at $200 per month.
6. Rank Math
Rank Math is the most feature-rich WordPress SEO plugin that helps website owners with a wide range of SEO tasks—directly from their website’s dashboard. According to W3Techs, WordPress is used on 43.2% of all websites. This makes WordPress and a plugin like Rank Math something that SEO professionals should be familiar with. Rank Math is designed to be very user-friendly and brings all sorts of tools into your content creation workflows.
Rank Math is handy for two reasons. It analyzes content as you create it and gives you tools for directly optimizing your content. Many SEO plugins can explore content and make SEO suggestions, but Rank Math allows you to change your site directly. It can suggest specific changes (like titles) in real-time with Content AI. It can ensure your site is appropriately formatted for SEO (like schema, sitemaps, internal link suggestions, redirects/404 monitoring, and so much more).
For a complete overview of its incredible features, see our extensive review of the Rank Math plugin.
What We Like About Rank Math
- SEO Setup: Rank Math’s onboarding flow quickly sets up essential SEO configurations like metadata and analytics, simplifying initial SEO efforts.
- Content Indexing: Automatically submits new and updated content for indexing to major search engines.
- SEO Dashboard: Creates a powerful SEO dashboard in your website backend to monitor search traffic, keywords, and content optimization sitewide.
- Content AI: Rank Math’s Content AI analyzes key content aspects against SERP needs (using NPL) for specific keywords.
What Could Be Improved
- Self-Hosted Analytics: Google Analytics data and tracking SERP rankings using your own server resources could cause your site to slow down, especially on cheaper shared hosting plans. These aren’t necessarily essential features to have directly on your website and, with other tools, are hosted on a dedicated SaaS tool.
Who is Rank Math Best For?
Rank Math is a must-have tool for anyone serious about SEO and uses WordPress as their CMS. It integrates seamlessly with Divi, the most powerful WordPress theme, enabling you to create custom websites with an optimal SEO structure. Additionally, Rank Math offers a free version of its plugin, making it an ideal choice for website owners just starting with SEO and wanting to get started immediately. If you have a WordPress website but no SEO tool, stop reading this and install it now.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Users praise Rank Math’s ease of use, rich features, affordability, and excellent customer support. Many reviewers say this WordPress plugin is a good free option for SEO compared to others.
Pricing
Rank Math has a free plugin available for WordPress users. Those needing advanced SEO features can opt for paid plans starting at $78.96 per year.
7. Surfer SEO
Surfer SEO is an AI content tool that helps you create high-ranking SEO content. Its purpose is to help content creators with SEO mindfulness so you aren’t spinning your wheels, creating content that no one sees. It does this in stages by helping you with keyword research and then analyzing the SERPs of those keywords. After that, you start building your content with its content planner. Writers can then begin writing their content and auditing other content with it. They create a seamless process from research to publishing that will help you rank.
Surfer SEO is all about creating a workable content creation workflow with an SEO-first approach. We love that you can create content briefs (for editors assigning out a lot of work) and analyze all your content against vital SEO /keyword metrics.
What We Like About Surfer SEO
- Content Workflow: It facilitates a content creation workflow that spans from research to publishing.
- Success Reports: Surfer SEO reports the success derived from content created within its platform.
- Integration Suite: It integrates seamlessly with Semrush, Jasper AI, WordPress, and Google Docs for a comprehensive content strategy.
What Could Be Improved
- High Pricing: Surfer’s main issue for many people is its pricing. Even for content writers who spend most of their time working on articles, Surfer would be the second tool they’d need after a dedicated keyword research tool. This makes Surfer’s pricing really high, considering most users will have a second tool that is more essential.
Who is Surfer Best For?
Surfer SEO is an ideal tool for websites with a large content volume. It is designed to streamline the SEO workflow for content creation, making it a valuable time-saving tool for individuals and teams alike.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Users appreciate Surfer’s ability to optimize content for specific keywords, generate content outlines, and track progress. Some reviewers mention occasional pricing concerns and the learning curve, but the sentiment is positive overall.
Pricing
Surfer SEO specializes in content optimization, with plans starting at $89 per month.
8. Mangools
Mangools is a suite of branded SEO tools with names that are almost more popular than the company that offers them all (KWFinder and SERPWatch come to mind). It’s another all-in-one SEO platform that helps users research, create, and track all SEO efforts.
Mangools keyword research tool (KWFinder) provides users with data on search volume, domain authority, keyword difficulty, and other metrics to help them identify the best keywords to target for their content. It’s one of the easiest-to-look-at keyword tools out there and gives you everything you need to know. You can even see what keywords competitor websites are ranking for and what position they rank at.
What We Like About Mangools
- Daily Research: Mangools provides a daily keyword research allotment with suggestions and insights into what competitors are using.
- SERP Analysis: It offers SERP analysis to understand ranking content and the data contributing to those rankings.
- Competitor Insight: Mangools allows users to examine competitor websites for their SEO strategy and implementation stages.
What Could Be Improved
- Missing Data for Small Niches: As expected from budget SEO tools, smaller niches/topics may be underserved in the data Mangools can supply. But for many everyday and mainstream niches and topics, Mangools suffices.
Who is Mangools Best For?
Mangools is a trusted platform among organic search strategists. Although not as well-known as Semrush or Ahrefs, Mangools offers a comprehensive set of tools that provides a great all-in-one solution for reliable SEO tools. With a price point comparable to other budget-friendly options like SE Ranking and SEObility, Mangools is an affordable option for beginners looking for reliable SEO tools.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Users mention its affordability, ease of use, and comprehensive suite of SEO tools. Many reviewers appreciate the value for money and the ability to handle various SEO tasks within one platform. Some reviewers say competitor analysis has limitations compared to advanced tools, but overall, their views are positive.
Pricing
Mangools provides a suite of SEO tools (including KWFinder) with paid plans starting at $29 per month.
9. Wincher
Wincher is an SEO tool specializing in keyword tracking and analysis that helps increase organic traffic. It makes it easy to find the right new keywords for your content. It makes it especially clear when it finds a keyword with decent search volume but low competition (the dream scenario). You can also use it to track the performance of those keywords using an intuitive interface.
With features like keyword research, keyword gap analysis, position tracking, and site audits, Wincher helps improve search engine rankings and increases your qualitative traffic.
What We Like About Wincher
- Rank Tracking: Wincher allows position tracking of SERP rankings based on the keywords you’d like to track.
- Keyword Discovery: It helps discover new keywords and important details like difficulty and overall traffic to that keyword.
- Keyword Alerts: Provides reports and alerts to monitor keyword positions actively.
- WordPress Integration: Features a WordPress plugin that connects your website with Wincher for streamlined SEO management.
- Yoast Integration: Bringing Wincher data into Yoast makes the SEO plugin much more compelling.
What Could Be Improved
- Limited Features in Starter Plan: Wincher can be affordable, but it comes at the expense of multiple features. The start plan excludes access to keyword gap analysis, preferred page tracking, and “share of voice” data. To get these features, a user would have to more than triple their monthly payment.
Who is Wincher Best For?
Wincher is an excellent tool for beginner search engine marketers seeking a more comprehensive solution for analyzing keywords and tracking their content’s position. Its simple interface and focused feature set make it an excellent option for entry-level SEO or content marketers.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Wincher SEO enjoys a strong reputation among users for its simplicity, affordability, and focus on local SEO. It’s a good option for agencies and businesses seeking a user-friendly tool for managing local SEO campaigns.
Pricing
Wincher helps track search engine rankings with plans beginning at $19 per month.
10. Link Whisper
Link Whisper is a WordPress plugin and Shopify app for internal link building. Internal linking is an essential practice for SEO as it helps search engines crawl your website and understand what your content is about (by relating it with other linked content). But it is hard to stay on top of, especially for large websites with tons of content—we know the struggle! Link Whisper makes managing internal links much easier since it can automatically apply links to your old content based on new content you publish (this is a huge time saver if set up correctly).
What We Like About Link Whisper
- Internal Suggestions: Link Whisper suggests advanced internal linking opportunities within the page/post editor.
- Search Console Connection: Can link with Google Search Console to import basic performance stats, supplementing Google Analytics plugins.
- Linking Campaigns: Enables automated internal linking campaigns automatically linking specific keywords to a chosen page.
What Could Be Improved
- Anchor Text Quality: It’s often a good practice to change up anchor link text when internal linking. This often makes things sound more natural and gives search engines a better idea of the actual content of the page. If all your internal links to a page have the same anchor text, you could be missing out on important quality. Variation with anchor text is possible with Link Whisper but could be more rigid than ideal.
Who is Link Whisper Best For?
Link Whisper is ideal for large WordPress and Shopify websites, particularly those with a hub and spoke or pillar/cluster content strategy. It benefits websites that publish a large content volume and must stay on top of internal linking. With features like automated link suggestions and in-content linking, Link Whisper is a valuable tool for improving search engine rankings and driving traffic to your site.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Only a few reliable tools are doing the same thing (Internal Link Juicer is another) as this plugin, so users appreciate that it exists. Some have trouble with its automated link settings, which can be overzealous when applying internal links across a website.
Pricing
Link Whisper offers a free plugin for basic internal linking capabilities. Paid plans are available starting at $97 per year.
11. Moz Pro
Moz Pro is another all-purpose SEO tool designed to help website owners and digital marketers increase their traffic from organic search results. It has long been celebrated as one of the best SEO tools and has been running since 2004! Moz has a tremendous reputation in the SEO world, making their Pro tool something you should consider. If you’re a local business, MozLocal is also worth checking out, even though we are not directly reviewing its features here.
Moz Pro is excellent at tracking page positions inside SERPs for defined keywords. It helps you know what contributes to SERP boosts or fallen positions with tailored SEO Insights. And its competitor research tools (including MozBar) help you keep up with competitor changes.
What We Like About Moz Pro
- Keyword Optimization: Offers extensive keyword research and analysis tools to refine website content.
- Site Audits: Features a site audit tool that spots technical SEO issues, including broken links and missing meta-tags.
- Backlink Monitoring: Includes a backlink analysis tool to oversee backlinks and assist in disavowing low-quality backlinks.
- Rank Tracking: Allows tracking of search engine rankings for chosen keywords, aiding in evaluating SEO strategies and advancements.
What Could Be Improved
- Dated UI: Moz has been around for a long time and has a solid reputation. However, their UI is stuck in the past and isn’t always the easiest.
- Quality Lag: Moz used to be among the gold standard of SEO tools (along with Ahrefs), but with the rise of competition (like Semrush), they’ve fallen behind. So, they have less quality data than other tools on this list.
Who is Moz Best For?
Moz Pro is an all-in-one SEO tool ideal for any serious SEO professional looking to streamline their SEO workflow. It provides a comprehensive solution for improving search engine rankings and increasing traffic. Use it for keyword research, site audits, and backlink analysis. While the monthly pricing is higher than many budget SEO tools, it’s comparable to other industry leaders like Semrush and Ahrefs.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Moz Pro is often regarded as a powerful, insightful, and valuable tool for large enterprises. Others express concerns about its complexity, pricing, and potential learning curve for beginners.
Pricing
Moz Pro, a comprehensive SEO toolkit, has plans starting at $99 per month.
12. WooRank
WooRank is an SEO tool that offers a range of features to help website owners and digital marketers improve their search engine rankings and drive more traffic to their sites. It’s a mid-tier total-SEO platform that does a whole lot well.
WooRank’s competitor analysis tracks competitor keywords, technical specs, and position changes. All these help you better understand your competitors and how to outrank them.
What We Like About WooRank
- Keyword Tracking: WooRank enables users to track keywords with its keyword tracking tool, monitoring their website’s search engine rankings for those keywords.
- Site Crawl: The site crawl tool from WooRank can crawl pages to pinpoint technical SEO issues that might negatively impact the website’s rankings.
- Competitor Analysis: It allows users to compare their website performance against competitors, identifying areas where improvements are necessary.
What Could Be Improved
- Expensive for a 2nd Class Tool: Other tools offer more data for keywords and rank tracking. This is okay, but WooRank’s pricing might be a little high for the quality they bring. However, their automated recommendations are a helpful feature that many other tools don’t have.
Who is WooRank Best For
WooRank is an ideal tool for website owners and marketers who want to improve their website’s SEO quality and ranking position across multiple keywords. With features like site audits, keyword tracking, and competitor analysis, WooRank provides a comprehensive solution for improving search engine rankings and driving more traffic to your site. While it is priced slightly higher than other tools in this article, it can be an excellent fit for those looking for more advanced features.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Many reviewers appreciate its focus on on-page SEO and its ability to track progress over time. Others express concerns about limited features compared to competitors, lack of in-depth technical SEO analysis, and potential bugs.
Pricing
WooRank offers plans starting at €89.99 per month for detailed SEO insights.
13. Clearscope
Clearscope is an SEO content optimization tool that uses AI and natural language processing (NPL) to help content creators optimize content for search engines. Search engines attempt to catalog the whole internet and rely on NPL to understand its content semantically. Clearscope analyzes your content with similar methods to ensure it aligns with what search engines expect (based on keywords and search intent). This can happen in the SaaS application or on your site via their plugin for those with WordPress websites.
Its content analysis is very actionable, often giving you explicit grades, comparison metrics, and other scores to tell you where your content is across several essential areas.
What We Like About Clearscope
- Page Analysis: Clearscope analyzes the top-ranking pages for a specific search term, providing deep insights into what makes them successful.
- Relevant Keywords: Identifies the most relevant keywords, phrases, and topics related to the search query.
- Content Suggestions: Offers content suggestions based on analyzing top-ranking pages and identifying keywords and topics.
What Could Be Improved
- Very High Price: Clearscope is priced very high and makes considering other similar tools (like Surfer and ContentPace) more attractive.
Who is Clearscope Best For?
Clearscope is an ideal tool for content-focused SEO professionals writing or editing content that needs to rank. While its price tag may be hefty for some, Clearscope is a valuable tool for optimizing content for search engines and driving more traffic to your site. Other tools like Scalenut, Dashword, and ContentPace may also be worth considering for those seeking more affordable alternatives.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Users say that Clearscope is very easy to use and gives them suggestions they would have never thought of themselves. It’s a great product that serves large businesses and writing teams well.
Pricing
Clearscope, designed for content optimization, offers plans starting at $199 per month.
14. Ahrefs
Ahrefs is last on our list but certainly far from the least. It is a premium all-in-one SEO tool that has been a market leader for many years. Ahrefs gives SEO experts every instrument needed to succeed in SEO. It can be daunting to new users, but that is because there is so much data inside the platform.
Ahref covers every type of SEO task, including backlink audits, URL position ranking, competitor research, keyword research, site audits, and more.
Ahref’s backlink profile is one of the best out there. It shows you a histo-graph of your backlinks and how many you’ve gotten in specific look-back timeframes (1 day, seven days, etc.). The profile also includes the number of referring domains (with a breakdown of crucial info about those domains). It also gives you high-level stats like URL rank, Domain Rank, and the number of organic keywords your site ranks for.
What We Like About Ahrefs
- Unlimited Projects: Ahrefs allows unlimited projects for sites verified with a site tag alongside five unverified projects under the Lite plan.
- Ranking Tracking: It tracks page rankings across defined keywords, separating desktop and mobile searches, including a ranking history.
- Keywords Research: Users can research using Ahrefs’ extensive keyword database with the Keywords Explorer tool.
- Plan Add-ons: Ahrefs provides the option to add plan add-ons for users who depend heavily on specific tools within its suite.
What Could Be Improved
- Price Hiking: Ahrefs has continually hiked its prices over the last few years. And in early 2024, they introduced a credit system (per feature) that made it much more expensive. This has priced out many users who have used it for years.
Who is Ahrefs Best For?
Ahrefs is a go-to tool for SEO experts. It offers reliable data and excellent filtering options to drill down to the data you need to rank for competitive topics. It’s a valuable investment for those looking to improve their SEO game. Along with Semrush, Ahrefs is a tried and tested solution that SEO professionals widely use.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Ahrefs has many adoring users who love its data (some of the best). It set the standard for SEO tools over the last decade. However, many users are leaving it because of pricing concerns.
Pricing
Ahrefs is well-known for backlink analysis, with plans starting at $99 per month.
Comparing the Best SEO Tools
There are so many SEO tools on the market right now. It’s almost impossible to choose between them—almost. Here’s what we found:
Top 3 SEO Tools: Feature Comparison
We’ve compared our top 3 SEO platforms with many of the significant features that matter. You’ll probably see at least one tool that meets your needs.
| Feature | 🥇 Semrush | 🥈 SE Ranking | 🥉 BrightLocal |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starting Price | $129.95/mo | $55/mo | $39/mo |
| Free Option | ✔️ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Keyword Research | ✔️ | ✔️ | ❌ |
| Rank Tracking | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| Content Analysis | ✔️ | ✔️ | ❌ |
| Competitor Analysis | ✔️ | ✔️ | ❌ |
| Local SEO | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| AI Writing Tool | ✔️ | ✔️ | ❌ |
| White-label Reports | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| Citation Building | ❌ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| Community Rating | 4.5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Read Reviews | 4.5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Read Reviews | 4.5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Read Reviews |
| Get Semrush | Get SE Ranking | Get BrightLocal |
Best SEO Tools: Price Comparison
Price is another huge factor when looking at tooling for SEO research and tasks. Here’s a high-level look at all our reference SEO tools and their pricing.
| Plugin | Starting Price | Free Option | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🥇 | Semrush | $119.95/mo | ✔️ | Visit |
| 🥈 | SE Ranking | $49/mo | ❌ | Visit |
| 🥉 | BrightLocal | $29/mo | ❌ | Visit |
| #4 | SEObility | Free | ✔️ | Visit |
| #5 | Rank Math Pro | Free, Pro $59/yr | ✔️ | Visit |
| #6 | Surfer SEO | $59/mo | ❌ | Visit |
| #7 | Mangools | $49/mo | ❌ | Visit |
| #8 | Wincher | $39/mo | ❌ | Visit |
| #9 | Link Whisper | $77/yr | ❌ | Visit |
| #10 | Moz Pro | $99/mo | ❌ | Visit |
| #11 | WooRank | $79.99/mo | ❌ | Visit |
| #12 | Clearscope | $170/mo | ❌ | Visit |
| #13 | Ahrefs | $99/mo | ✔️ | Visit |
What are the Best SEO Tools?
Semrush is the best all-in-one SEO tool. It offers all the essential features like keyword research, site audits, backlink analysis, rank tracking, on-page optimization, and competitive analysis. So, it is a safe bet to start with if you want to get serious about SEO.
SE Ranking is ideal for beginners looking for a more budget-friendly solution. BrightLocal is the best solution for Local SEO. It includes local search rank tracking, citation management, review monitoring, and more.
The right combination of these tools can significantly improve website search performance and drive more traffic and qualified conversions.
Need SEO tools you can use directly on your website? Check out the best SEO plugins for WordPress.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Before we wrap up, let’s answer some of your most common questions regarding SEO tools. Did we miss one? Leave a question below, and we will respond!
What are the best SEO tools?
What is the best free SEO tool?
What are the best SEO Tools for WordPress websites?
Who uses SEO tools?
- Business owners and marketers: SEO tools can help businesses and marketers improve their website's visibility in search results, attract more visitors, and generate more leads and sales.
- Website developers: SEO tools can help website developers identify and fix technical SEO issues, such as broken links and missing meta tags.
- SEO professionals: SEO professionals use SEO tools for auditing websites, analyzing keywords, optimizing pages, building links, and more.
How much do SEO tools cost?
Why do SEO tools cost so much?
Can I use SEO tools to track my website's rankings?
What are the advantages of using SEO tools?
Can you do SEO for free?
What are the best SEO tools for keyword research?
What are the best SEO tools for blogs?
What are the best SEO tools for beginners?
What are the best SEO tools for competitor site analysis?
Why is SEO important?
Featured Image via Sammby / shutterstock.com
Semrush
SE Ranking
BrightLocal
I keep hearing great things about Semrush, and it’s nice to see you and others agree on it as well. It’s also great to have a breakdown of each tool’s features and how they can contribute to an effective SEO strategy. Very helpful.
Thanks for the article, Christopher!
Gary
You’re welcome, Gary. Semrush is a bit pricy, but if you are in a position to use it, I’d say go for it.
My choice is Semrush, its really awesome. your article help to me for knew other tools for SEO.
Glad we could help out, we agree, Semrush is a game changer.
I really love Semrush + RankMath + LinkWhisper combo. I won’t be surprised (and will rather love it) if RankMath includes features from the other two in nearby future.
I agree, Gaurav. Rank Math is putting a lot of features out there. Excited to see what they keep cranking out.