Semrush vs. Ahrefs: Which Toolkit Is Right for Your Business?
If you are in the market for a comprehensive, all-in-one SEO and digital marketing platform, chances are you have heard about two of the most popular options: Semrush and Ahrefs. But which one has the best price point and tools?
Fortunately, there’s a clear winner: Semrush. In both quality and performance, Semrush stands out as the top platform.
We took a deep dive into both platforms, gauging their performance in areas like:
- Subscription levels offered
- Price points
- Tool features
- Integrations offered
In addition, below, we have created a side-by-side comparison of these two platforms so you can see for yourself what we discovered. Keep reading to get all of the Semrush vs. Ahrefs data you could want.
Semrush Overview
Semrush is a 360-degree digital marketing toolkit. It can help you boost your positive online visibility, hone in on your competitors’ tactics, polish your content (and optimize it for search engines), and create irresistible digital marketing campaigns.
You can manage virtually every aspect of digital marketing from the Semrush platform. That includes SEO, content marketing, social media management and marketing, PPC advertising, site auditing, keyword research, competitive research, public relations management, market insight, reputation management, and campaign management.
Semrush also has the Agency Partners Platform to help agencies manage client relationships, and it offers a curated App Center with many more digital marketing tools.
Ahrefs Overview
Ahrefs is an SEO and marketing toolkit for digital marketers and businesses. It can assist you in doing your keyword research, site auditing, rank tracking, link building, and competitor analysis.
Tool Comparison
Having a comprehensive SEO toolkit is essential to securing qualified prospects and converting them into customers. Check out the main differences and similarities between the Semrush and Ahrefs toolkits.
SEO/Domain Analytics
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
| Data for the top 100 positions is available to all subscribers. Complete access to historical data for those on the Guru plan and above Compare data by country Keyword gap analysis for URLs, subdomains, and subfolders, including PLA keywords Advertising research—PPC keywords, ads history, competitors, top subdomains, and position changes. | Data for the top 100 positions is available to all subscribers. Complete access to historical data for those on the Guru plan and above Compare data by country Keyword gap analysis for URLs, subdomains, and subfolders, including PLA keywords Advertising research—PPC keywords, ads history, competitors, top subdomains, and position changes. |
Keyword Research
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
| 22.3 billion keywords and 20 million ideas for a single keyword. Filter keywords by broad match, exact match, related, language, phrase match questions, and group. Keyword analysis—search volume, keyword density, click potential, SERP features, competition, and search intent. Most accurate keyword density and keyword volume metrics. | 7 billion keywords. Keyword ideas for Google, YouTube, Amazon, Bing, Yahoo, Yandex, Baidu, Daum, Naver, and Seznam. Keyword analysis/data includes keyword density, volume, return rate, CPC, parent topic, clicks, global volume, and traffic share. Keyword ideas for questions, Also Rank For, Having the Same Term, and Search Suggestions (autocomplete) |
Link Building
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
| Analyze backlinks by type (follow, nofollow, redirect, text, form, frame, image, gov, edu, UGC, sponsor, and content). Monitor backlinks, including monitoring for lost backlinks. Integrates with Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and Majestic Google Data Studio connector. | Backlink analysis by type (follow, nofollow, redirect, gov, edu, UGC, sponsored, content, with redirect chain, and without redirect chain). 3 backlink indexes—live, recent (live and lost backlinks for 3-4 months), and historical. Ability to hide all disavowed links from Ahrefs reports. |
Reporting
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
| Create customized branded and white-label PDF reports. Data integration via Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and Google Business Profile. Google Data Studio Connector is available to Guru subscribers and above. | No dedicated reporting tool. Google Data Studio connector is available to Advanced and Enterprise subscribers. Users are capable of generating PDF reports. |
Marketing Intelligence and Competitive Analysis
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
| Quick and instant market overview, including growth trends and market share. Performance analysis available on any competitor’s website, including audience behavior insights and top-performing pages. Monitor your competitors’ blog production and ad campaigns | No dedicated tool. |
Content Marketing
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
Spot trending topics and target them before your competition. Automatically generate SEO content briefs. Content and optimization analysis based on your top 10 keyword competitors. Content marketplace for outsourcing articles from vetted vendors. | Analyze topic popularity over time Identify top authors for a topic. Analyze results by page, author, website, or language. Identify republished or updated pages. Audit content via SEO WordPress plugin. |
Agency Solutions
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
| Agency Partners service connects you with potential clients. Agency partners get listed on the Agency Partner Platform and receive a dedicated landing page. Special Semrush Agency Partner badge to use in marketing materials. Find new leads with Bid Finder and email notifications. White-label, individual client portals to share reports, tasks, and analytics securely. | SEO Agency Directory listings available to Enterprise subscribers. |
Cost and Other Considerations
Pricing
One great thing about Semrush is that they offer price points to fit your business needs. In fact, if you don’t see a plan level that fits your brand’s goals, you can even request a custom plan quote from Semrush.
Semrush
Semrush users are offered multiple tiers of registrations. There is a free subscription option along with four paid subscription packages, each designed with different goals and businesses in mind. If you want to test out the different subscription options, Pro and Guru have a free 7-day trial, and for Geekflare readers, we have a special extended 14-day Semrush trial.
Ahrefs
Ahrefs has four paid subscription packages that offer access to varied features. They don’t have any free subscription trials, but site owners are offered free limited access to the Site Explorer and Site Audit tools.
All users are constrained to 500 reports per month. Additional reports can be bought as needed.
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
| Free version Compare and analyze up to 10 competitor domains each day Do position tracking on up to 10 keywords Crawl 100 pages per month. Perform 10 keyword searches a day Create SEO content briefs, optimize your content. Get access to the whole Social Media Toolkit. | Lite Version 2,500 rows per report 5 unverified projects with 5 keyword lists Unlimited projects with verified ownership 750 tracked keywords Ability to crawl 100,000 pages per month in Site Audit |
| Pro Plan Great for freelancers, startup businesses, and small marketing teams. 5 projects at a time and 500 tracked keywords (daily updates) 250 keyword metrics updates per month 10,000 results in each report 3,000 reports per day. Access to SEO, Social, and PPC tools Site Audit limits: 100,000 crawled pages per month and 2,000 crawled pages per project | Standard Plan Created for SEO specialists and in-house marketing teams. 30,000 rows per report with 2,000 tracked keywords Crawling for 500,000 pages per month (Site Audit) 50 keyword lists and 6 months of historical data data Reports in Site Explorer and Alerts tools Content Explorer, Domain Comparison, and Batch Analysis access |
| Guru Plan Every Pro level feature 15 projects at a time 1,500 tracked keywords updated daily Multitargeting with a limit of 10 targets per project 1,000 keyword metrics updated monthly 30,000 results included in each report 5,000-report limit per day site Audit limits include: 300,000 crawled pages per month 800 content templates SEO content audit: 20,000 5 plagiarism checks per month | Advanced Plan This subscription is geared toward scaling businesses. This plan includes: All Standard subscriptions features 75,000 rows per report 50 unverified projects 5,000 tracked keywords 1.5M crawled pages per month (Site Audit) 100 keyword lists Access to 2 years of historical data reports in Site Explorer Dashboard folders Google Data Studio connector |
| Business Plan This plan includes: All Guru-level features 40 projects at a time 5,000 tracked keywords updated daily 50,000 results in each report 10,000 reports per day 5,000 keyword metrics updates per month Site Audit limits include: 1,000,000 crawled pages per month 100,000 crawled pages per project 2,000 content templates 10 plagiarism checks per month | Enterprise Plan This plan includes: All Advanced features 150,000 rows per report 100 unverified projects 10,000 tracked keywords 5M crawled pages per month 250 keyword lists Unlimited access to history: Backlink data to 2013Keyword ranking data to 2015 Access management, pay-by-invoice, and SEO Agency Directory listing |
Integrations
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
| Google Integrations: Google Analytics, Google Ads Google Search Console Google Business Profile Google Docs and Sheets Google Tag Manager Social: Facebook, Instagram, X (Twitter), LinkedIn YouTube, Pinterest Others: SurferSEO, WordPress, monday.com, Trello Majestic, Zapier | Google Data Studio connector available only to Advanced and Enterprise users. The Google Data Studio connector can be used from the following tools: Site Explorer Site Audit Rank Tracker |
Languages
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
|---|---|
| Maintains databases for 142 countries. In addition, the Semrush interface is available to users in the following languages: English Spanish German French Vietnamese Turkish Chinese Japanese Italian Portuguese (Brazil) Korean | Keyword data is maintained for 189 countries. The Ahrefs interface is available in the following languages: English Spanish German Portuguese Dutch Polish Russian Swedish Turkish French Italian Japanese |
Available Devices
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
| Android iPhone/iPad Web-based | Windows Mac Web-based |
Customer Support
| Semrush | Ahrefs |
| Email Phone Live Chat Help Center | Email Phone Live Chat Help Center |
Semrush: The Best SEO Tool for Your Money
Ultimately, you know your business best, and you’ll decide which tool fits your specific needs. However, if you’re looking for the most accurate, high-performance tool on the market, you can’t go wrong with Semrush.
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