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SEO tool comparisons, tested and cited

Honest head-to-head comparisons of the SEO tools people actually shortlist — real pricing, one scoring rubric, every figure sourced. Including where our own tool loses.

100 articlesOne scoring rubric for every toolEvery price dated and sourced

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Tool comparisons

Semrush vs Ahrefs: which one should you actually pay for?

A side-by-side of Semrush and Ahrefs on price, keyword data, backlinks, site audits and AI search — plus the expensive mistake most buyers make choosing between them.

9 min read

Tool comparisons

Ahrefs vs Moz: data depth against a gentler learning curve

Ahrefs and Moz Pro compared on price, link index quality, rank tracking and local SEO — and an honest look at who is genuinely better off with the cheaper option.

6 min read

Tool comparisons

Semrush vs Moz: breadth against simplicity

Semrush and Moz Pro compared on pricing, feature breadth, local SEO and learning curve — with a clear read on which team profile each one actually suits.

6 min read

Tool comparisons

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Head-to-head breakdowns of the SEO platforms people actually shortlist, scored on one rubric.

AI search & GEO

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Getting cited by ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and AI Overviews — and how that differs from ranking.

Free vs paid

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Exactly how far the free tools get you, and the point where paying starts to pay back.

WordPress SEO

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Plugin comparisons and the parts of WordPress SEO that plugins cannot fix for you.

Technical SEO

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Crawling, indexing, rendering, Core Web Vitals, structured data and log files.

Content & on-page

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Content optimisation tools, briefs, internal linking and on-page scoring — what moves rankings.

Channel strategy

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SEO against every other way of buying attention: ads, social, email, affiliates.

RankBrain AI

Is RankBrain AI a good fit for your workflow?

If you have findings to implement and access to your site’s code, an editor-based workflow may help you turn those findings into changes you can review. If your main need is backlink research, historical rank tracking or client reporting, a dedicated data tool may be a better fit.

RankBrain AI connects SEO guidance to Claude Code, Cursor or Codex in your editor. With the relevant file access and tools configured, your assistant can inspect templates and propose code changes. You review the diff, test it and decide what to ship. This is implementation support, not a guarantee of rankings or a replacement for specialist datasets.

A good fit: you use an AI coding assistant and want SEO guidance alongside the files you maintain. Not a good fit: you need a managed service or a standalone backlink and historical ranking database.

Do it yourself — free

You own the site and the repo, so you already have what you need. Point your AI coding tool at the codebase, work through the fixes in this article, and pay nobody. Most of what is written here is method, and the method is free.

Consider RankBrain AI — $5/month

The hosted corpus gives your assistant a shared reference for SEO implementation. Check its advice against current documentation and your own tests. Flat $5/month, no seats, 3-day trial. Use the trial to see whether it helps with a real task in your workflow.

Check my site free See how it works

We make this, so weigh the comparisons accordingly — and check them against the capability tables, where we sit on the same rubric as everyone else. We have no backlink index and no historical rank data, and we say so there.