Ahrefs vs SE Ranking

Semrush

SEO PowerSuite

Semrush SEO Toolkit contains more than 20 tools and reports to assist you in every step of your website SEO.

SEO PowerSuite is a desktop toolkit with four tools for SEO tasks: Rank Tracker for keyword research and ranking monitoring across 500+ search engines, WebSite Auditor for technical and on-page audits, SEO SpyGlass for backlink analysis, and LinkAssistant for link building. It offers unlimited keyword/backlink tracking, white-label reporting, and integrates with Google Analytics and Search Console.

Wix is a website-building and business management platform that helps users create any type of website and expand the brand's online presence. Wix offers its users different ways to build sites; for those less tech-savvy, the Wix Editor is the way to go. It boasts a choice of various pre-designed templates that can be personalized with a drag-and-drop editor and various other AI capabilities, such as an automated text generator.

Content Marketer

Owner

I also like the customer service as they were very helpful with getting us started.

Ahrefs gives you the tools and data to make your brand discoverable: in search, AI, and beyond.

Activity Dashboard

AI/Machine Learning

Alerts/Escalation

Alerts/Notifications

Audit Management

Backlink Monitoring

Campaign Management

Competitive Analysis

Content Ideas

Content Management

Content Marketing

Conversion Tracking

Customer Journey Mapping

Dashboard

Data Import/Export

Data Visualization

For Marketing and Advertising

Keyword Rank Tracking

Keyword Research Tools

Keyword Tracking

Link Management

Localization Automation

Marketing Automation

Marketing Management

Mobile Keywords

Monitoring

Performance Metrics

Post Scheduling

Referral Tracking

Reporting/Analytics

Reporting & Statistics

Search/Filter

SEO Management

Website Analytics

Web Tracking

Web Traffic Reporting

By industry, Ahrefs reviewers are most commonly professionals in marketing and advertising (35%). The most frequent use case for Ahrefs cited by reviewers is SEO (84% of reviewers).

Users and use cases

Some users report that Ahrefs offers valuable features and data, and reviewers appreciate the free webmaster plan and trial. However, users say pricing is high, entry-level plans are limited, and recent changes have reduced cost-effectiveness.

Value for money

The Ahrefs integrations most frequently cited by reviewers are: Google Search Console (a SEO product rated 4.8 out of 5 for its integration with Ahrefs) and Google Analytics 360 (a web analytics product, 4.7).

Integrations

Ahrefs is an SEO program with key features that include SEO management, backlink monitoring, competitive analysis, keyword research tools, keyword rank tracking, and more.

Ahrefs

Web-based

Moz Pro

Screaming Frog SEO Spider

Majestic

SE Ranking

SpyFu

Surfer

BrightEdge

AccuRanker

Ahrefs Free

Starter

Lite

Standard

Advanced 

Enterprise

Limited or absent free trial

Founder

The only downside is that you can't use it without a paid subscription.

Last thing I dislike their pricing and trial version price.

58% of reviewers feel negative about Ahrefs’ free trial options. Reviewers indicate disappointment that there is no meaningful free trial or free access to core features, unlike some competitors. Users say the lack of a trial makes it hard to evaluate the tool before committing to a paid plan, and some mention concerns about being charged unexpectedly or facing restrictive credit systems. Several reviewers feel this approach limits accessibility for new users or those wanting to test the platform’s value before making a financial commitment.

High and restrictive pricing

MarksOps Associate

It is too bulky, there are unnecessary features for small businesses for which they should have more plans, more tiers of pricing. Despite liking it we didn't continue with it because it is too expensive, ROI was not good.

Digital Marketing Executive

The keyword research tool doesn't show the data well enough and the tool is really expensive even Its smallest membership comes with a high price and limited features.

76% of reviewers feel negative about Ahrefs’ pricing. Users say the cost is prohibitive for small businesses, individuals, and agencies with limited budgets. Reviewers report that even entry-level plans are expensive and often come with feature limitations or usage caps, requiring costly upgrades for full access. Some users mention frustration with frequent price increases, complex tier structures, and the need to pay for features they don’t use. Many feel the pricing model makes it difficult to justify ongoing subscriptions, especially when compared to alternative tools.

Comprehensive content strategy tools

Marketing Program Manager

Using tools like Content Explorer, we can see what other people are already doing in the form of content, which gives us new ideas for our own.

95% of reviewers feel positive about Ahrefs’ content strategy capabilities. Reviewers appreciate the Content Explorer and content gap features, which help them discover trending topics, identify gaps in their own content, and generate ideas based on what performs well in their niche. Users say these tools guide their content planning, support outreach efforts, and provide actionable insights for creating relevant, high-quality material. Some users indicate that the resources and tutorials further enhance their ability to develop effective strategies, making it easier to attract and engage their target audience.

Robust competitor analysis capabilities

Their new features, such as Ahrefs Content Gap and Ahrefs Site Explorer, have made keyword research and competitor research even easier.

IT Assistant

Definitely the best of this platform are the varied and complete tools it has to analyze your competitors and improve your marketing strategy.

94% of reviewers feel positive about Ahrefs’ competitor analysis features. Reviewers indicate that tools like Site Explorer and content gap analysis allow them to track competitors’ keywords, backlinks, and top-performing content. Users say these insights help them benchmark their own performance, discover new keyword opportunities, and adapt strategies based on what works for others in their industry. Some reviewers find that the platform’s detailed reports and fast data retrieval make it easier to stay ahead in competitive markets and refine their digital marketing efforts.

In-depth backlink analysis features

Director

The most like thing about Ahrefs is its backlinks analysis it gives very accurate and useful data that helps us to take a major decision on our marketing strategy.

94% of reviewers feel positive about Ahrefs’ backlink analysis. Users think the platform’s extensive backlink database and monitoring tools are essential for understanding their own and competitors’ link profiles. Reviewers appreciate being able to identify high-quality backlinks, track referring domains, and analyze link-building opportunities. They say these insights help them improve SEO performance, develop outreach campaigns, and address technical issues like broken links. Some users report that the accuracy and depth of backlink data make it a valuable resource for both strategy and day-to-day SEO management.

E-Commerce Manager

The features of rank tracking are extraordinary as our marketing team can track our positions in the retail keywords easily with an easy navigation.

Consultant

This costed webmasters agency business because some agencies had a process where they evaluated traffic based on Ahrefs and would not accept any alternative way. And now in 2025 they no longer track any positions that rank at over 10th place in Google, because the forced pagination in Google API would make their costs also prohibitive.

The pricing model is not great on value of money to a mid sized retail team, and customer service takes too much time to answer an important security question about user access.

Senior Digital Marketing Team Lead

The tool is easy to use because of its good navigation, and it works well for team collaboration when sharing insights with colleagues. Although the value for money can be a challenge for smaller businesses, the quality of data and stability of the platform make it a strong choice for serious SEO  Work.

The keyword search has been pretty good as an ideation tool, but I worry that now that they don't access 2+ pages of SERP they will no longer have the data to provide matching queries and related queries that were so great for my process.

Chief Marketing manager

THe Best seo tool i have ever used, their features like website keywords checker, keyword explorer make me find my relavant keywords easily without spending so  much time on the internet searching

I also use it to research competitors, find out what content they are ranking for in Google and then producing my own content with a view to outranking the competition and driving traffic to my clients websites.

Developer

I use free SEO analysis tools, and it's amazing that they provide feedback and highlight what should be improved.

Head of Operations

Some of the functionalities are behind extra paywalls, which is understandable, but every plan allows you only 500 credits per user for viewing any individual keyword, website audit, etc., regardless of your pricing plan.

Their Keyword explorer feature is best for me, I am able to find the best keywords without spending so much time on Google keyword planner or search engines.

Ahrefs offers incredible amounts of SEO data and analytics tools, which are essential for the planning and execution of our marketing strategy.

Ahrefs helps me analyze SEO problems on my website.

The tool also gives me keyword suggestions that people also search for.

Some reports are powerful but not explained clearly, which can slow down work for new users.

I want to use the paid features, but the subscription price is too high for me.

Ahrefs is very strong in rank tracking and competitor research.

Marketing Manager

Sometimes it does produce slow results also and has a slow learning curve.

Business Development

Ahrefs has a great combination of accurate data and useful, intuitive features which makes it highly valuable for SEO and market research.

Managing Director

It's a treasure trove of incredible digital marketing data - particularly for SEO, PPC and social research.

The primary benefit for me is that it gives me access to data I wouldn't otherwise have access to.

Director of Technical Operations

Most of the metrics you're interested can be seen on a single screen and if you want, you can dive into them to get more detail.

Marketing Manager and Business Development

What stands out most to me about Ahrefs is the way information is presented.

I have been extensively using the keyword research tool though, to produce writing prompts.

Project Lead

If you compare it to other industry leading tools, they seem to vastly under report the amount of traffic a keyword receives.

Marketing Exec

We would need to manually go in and look up each keyword to figure out the performance on those keywords whereas some competitors allows us to register keywords and get automated reporting on its movement.

Link monitoring works flawlessly, ahrefs has its own indicator called DOMAIN Rating, which allows you to pre-assess the power of the linking domain

TLDR processes relying on Ahrefs need to be rebuilt now!

It help my business and project to run smother, Ahrefs also has rank tracker and backlinks features that important for SEO.

Some of the features were limited in use and other features were only available in much higher priced plans.

SEO Copywriter

I also really like Ahrefs content on their website and blogs, it's always very informative and I often share it with others keen to learn about SEO.

Technical SEO Manager

Firstly, the absence of a comprehensive mobile SERP (Search Engine Results Page) overview is somewhat limiting in an era where mobile search is on the rise.

Marketing and Sales Manager

The best part is it also fetches data from different search engines like Bing and YouTube too. And that's great if you are working on an IMC Campaign for your Brand.

Organisation of massive data into really simple to follow 'flows'.

Good tool for keyword research and keyword tracking

Good suite of tools that cover all of the most common SEO-related tasks.

Overall, a really happy experience. Once you get to learn it, it just is very helpful for any SEO task.

It sometimes struggles with more niche keywords.

Unfortunately as a sole trader it's a little pricey for me, though I would love to keep using the paid version.

You can add multiple domains once you verify the ownership and its free version gives you quality data.

There's so many opportunities to use this data set.

Co-Founder

Overall, Ahrefs is arguably the best SEO software out there for keyword research and competitor analysis as well as backlinks tracking.

Ranking data obtained from scraped SERPs consistently diverged from the data in Google Search Console (GSC) or real live Google searches.

The least favorite part on Ahrefs is that you cannot select a certain set of keywords and get reports on it (at least not with the plan we use).

The weekly Youtube trainings and Q and A's that they hold.

It offers detailed insights on your website improvement score along with the fixes suggestions and it's pretty accurate and useful.  

SEO Content Lead

The backlinks reporting features are particularly useful for understanding where backlink growth is coming from organically.

It helps me to identify On-page, Technical as well as Off-page errors.

Financial Controller

Ahrefs gives you a clear overview of your most import KPIs and explains them in plain English through its documentation.

Very happy overall with Ahrefs, it is a core component of my SEO toolkit.

Data Accuracy

Keyword Explorer

Keyword Research

Pricing

Bugs and Issues

Rank Tracker

Traffic Analysis

Competitor Analysis

Training and Learning Curve

Small Business

Mid-size Business

Large Enterprises

Freelancers

Customer service is also severely lacking.

Senior Consultant

is relatively easy to use and they are improving and adding new tools very often, which is great!The technical service is, simply, amazing.

SEO Director

The customer support team are very responsive and help us a ensure that we're able to manage our customer websites and performance efficiently.

SE Ranking provides a complete set of tools for keyword rank tracking, comprehensive website audit, competitor analysis, keyword suggestion and much more

Ahrefs vs SE Ranking Comparison (2026)

Ahrefs

SE Ranking

Overview

Video & Screenshots

Pricing

User reviews

Key features

Integrations

Alternatives