Home › Software

Top 10 · Software

Top 10 SEO Tools

The plugins, research suites and crawlers people use to rank in Google and AI search, ranked by how many users each one says it has.

Yoast SEO13+ million customers 2

Rank Math4 million+ users 3

Mangools2.8 million+ users

Quick answer

Yoast SEO is the most widely used SEO tool, with 13+ million customers using its WordPress plugin, followed by Rank Math with 4 million+ users. For keyword and competitor research, Mangools (2.8 million+ users), Serpstat (1.1 million+) and SE Ranking (1 million+) are the largest by users, while Semrush and Ahrefs offer the biggest databases, with 43 trillion backlinks and 100B indexed pages respectively. Screaming Frog is the go-to crawler for technical audits.

How it's ranked: Users or customers each vendor says it has, as published on its own website (read November 13, 2026). Semrush publishes no count on its site, so its figure is the 82,000+ customers in its 2021 S-1 filing as reported by Wikipedia. Ahrefs, Screaming Frog and Conductor publish no exact count and are ranked last. Counts are each company's own claims and are measured differently (free plugin users, registered users, paying customers), so treat them as a guide to reach, not an audit.

Yoast SEO

Yoast BV · SEO plugin for WordPress

13+ million customers

The default on-page SEO plugin for WordPress.

Yoast SEO is the most widely used tool on this list: its homepage invites you to join 13+ million happy Yoast customers. It is a WordPress plugin rather than a research suite, so it works inside your site and checks each page as you write it. Real-time content analysis scores your SEO health, and Yoast adds schema aggregation and an automatic llms.txt file to help AI tools discover your content. The free plugin covers the basics. Yoast SEO Premium costs $118.80 a year (ex. VAT) and adds AI-generated titles, descriptions and content suggestions, proactive redirect suggestions when you move or delete a page, internal linking suggestions that help avoid orphaned content, and support by email and 24/7 chat. It fits bloggers and small businesses on WordPress who want clear, practical advice on every post without learning a separate tool.

Best forWordPress site owners who want on-page SEO guidance as they write

Skip it ifYou need keyword, backlink or competitor research

Source: yoast.com/

Rank Math

Rank Math · SEO plugin for WordPress

4 million+ users

The feature-packed Yoast alternative.

Rank Math is the second big WordPress SEO plugin, with 4 Million+ happy users according to its homepage, and a 4.8 overall satisfaction rating based on 7,520 reviews. It pitches itself as the most powerful way to get SEO tools for WordPress added to your website. It is modular: 15+ built-in modules can be switched on and configured as you need them, so a simple blog and a large store can use the same plugin differently. Its SEO analysis checks your site against 30 known factors, and it adds schema markup, keyword ranking tracking and Google Search Console integration inside the WordPress dashboard. It works in both the Gutenberg and Classic editors, can import settings from other SEO plugins in one click, and now includes an AI Visibility Score that tracks sentiment across ChatGPT. There is a free download and a paid PRO version.

Best forWordPress users who want many SEO features in one free plugin

Skip it ifYour site is not on WordPress

Source: rankmath.com/

Mangools

Mangools · Beginner-friendly SEO tool suite

2.8 million+ users

The friendliest suite for SEO beginners.

Mangools says it is trusted by more than 2.8M SEO pros, agencies and business owners, and it has been around since 2014. It is a bundle of five easy-to-use tools rather than one giant dashboard: KWFinder for keyword research, SERPChecker for analysing search results, SERPWatcher for rank tracking, LinkMiner for backlinks and SiteProfiler for checking any domain, plus a newer AI Search Watcher. Its data is smaller than the market leaders but still large: 2.5B+ keywords, 30M+ SERPs, 9.5 trillion backlinks and 65k+ city-level locations for local rank checks. Mangools also offers a long list of free tools, including a SERP Simulator, an SEO Content Optimizer and a SERP Volatility Checker, as well as an API and an MCP server. You can start with a free account, which makes it a gentle first step for people new to SEO.

Best forSmall businesses and bloggers who want simple keyword research

Skip it ifYou run a large agency that needs enterprise reporting

Source: mangools.com/

Serpstat

Serpstat · All-in-one SEO platform

1.1 million+ users

A full suite with deep keyword data.

Serpstat says it is trusted by 1.1M+ users. It is a full SEO platform covering keyword research, competitor analysis, rank tracking, site auditing, keyword clustering, a website traffic checker, and API and data solutions. Its database is one of the larger ones here: 8.62B keywords, 529B backlinks, 1.50B domains and 2.21B Google SERPs, with 5.6B keyword suggestions and coverage of 230 countries. That breadth makes it useful for checking competitors in smaller markets as well as big ones, and the keyword clustering tool helps group related searches into pages before you write. Serpstat also sells its data through an API, which suits agencies and developers who want to pull numbers into their own dashboards. You can try it for 7 days for free before choosing a paid plan.

Best forBudget-minded teams that want a full SEO suite and an API

Skip it ifYou only need a WordPress plugin

Source: serpstat.com/

SE Ranking

SER Acquisition Inc. · All-in-one SEO platform for agencies and businesses

1 million+ users

The agency favourite for rank tracking.

SE Ranking says over 1M SEO pros worldwide use it, and its homepage adds that it is trusted by 40,000+ agencies. It launched its first SEO tool in 2013 and now has a team of 150+ professionals, with office hubs in Kyiv, Wroclaw and Warsaw. The platform covers rank tracking across search engines, unlimited keyword and competitor research, site audits and reporting, with connections to Data Studio, Google Analytics and Google Search Console. Its data spans 188 country databases, 5.5B keywords and 2.2B domain profiles. A newer AI Visibility tool analyses how your brand appears across 5 major AI engines. Pricing is clear: the Core plan starts from $103.20 a month and Growth from $223.20 a month, and a separate API starts from $29 a month. It fits agencies and in-house teams that track many keywords and report to clients.

Best forAgencies that want accurate rank tracking and client reporting at a fair price

Skip it ifYou need the very largest backlink index

Source: seranking.com/about-us.html

Surfer

Surfer Sp. z o.o. · Content optimisation and AI search visibility

150,000+ brands and agencies

Best for content that ranks in search and AI.

Surfer says it is trusted by 150,000+ brands and agencies, and it has been showing what ranks since 2018 from its base in Wroclaw, Poland. It started as a content tool and still is one at heart: the Content Editor guides you as you write, Content Audit finds pages to improve and Topical Map plans clusters of articles. Its newest focus is AI search. Surfer tracks your visibility, position and sentiment in five AI engines, ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Mode and Google AI Overviews, compares you with competitors on mention rate and average position, and shows sources that name competitors but not you. AI visibility tracking costs from $82 a month, billed yearly, with daily checks. It also connects to Claude and ChatGPT through the Surfer MCP. It is rated 4.8/5 on G2 from 546 reviews.

Best forContent teams that want to write pages that rank and get cited by AI

Skip it ifYou need backlink research or technical crawling

Source: surfer.ai/

Semrush

Semrush Holdings · All-in-one SEO, content and marketing platform

82,000+ paying customers (2021 filing)

The biggest all-in-one marketing suite.

Semrush is the broadest platform here. Its own site does not publish a customer count, so this figure comes from its Wikipedia page: more than 82,000 customers, as reported in the company's S-1 filing in 2021. It was founded in 2008 by Oleg Shchegolev and Dmitri Melnikov and is based in Boston, Massachusetts. Its homepage lists huge data: 29 billion keywords, 43 trillion backlinks, 808 million domain profiles and 142 geo databases, plus 317 million+ LLM prompts monitored for AI visibility. Beyond classic SEO tools such as keyword research, backlink analysis, rank tracking and site audits, it covers traffic and market research, content, local listings, ads, PR and social media. You can try Semrush free for seven days. It ranks seventh only because its count is older and measures paying customers, not users.

Best forMarketing teams that want SEO, ads, content and social in one place

Skip it ifYou only need a single, simple tool

Source: en.wikipedia.org › Semrush

Ahrefs

Ahrefs · SEO and AI search research platform

No total count published (27,246 sign-ups in 7 days)

The backlink research heavyweight.

Ahrefs does not publish a total customer count, so it is ranked with the tools that give no number. Its homepage does show how fast it grows: 27246 users joined Ahrefs in the last 7 days when we checked, and it says marketers at 44% of the Fortune 500 use it. Ahrefs is best known for link and competitor data. It has 100B pages in its web index, AhrefsBot crawls 8B pages daily, and its keyword database holds 28.7B keywords filtered from 110B discovered, across 217+ countries and locations. The core tools are Site Explorer, Keywords Explorer, Site Audit, Rank Tracker and Content Explorer, joined by Brand Radar and Prompt Tracking for AI search, free Web Analytics, an AI assistant called Ask Ahrefs, and an SEO API and MCP. It suits SEO professionals who want the deepest backlink research.

Best forSEO specialists who live in backlink and competitor data

Skip it ifYou want the cheapest tool for a small site

Source: ahrefs.com/

Screaming Frog SEO Spider

Screaming Frog · Desktop website crawler for technical SEO audits

No count published ("thousands of users")

The technical SEO auditor everyone keeps.

Screaming Frog says its SEO Spider is trusted by thousands of SEOs and agencies worldwide but gives no exact count, so it ranks with the tools that publish no number. It is a different kind of tool from the suites above: a desktop website crawler for Windows, macOS and Linux that scans your own site the way a search engine does and flags over 300 SEO issues. It finds broken links and redirects, analyses titles and meta data, spots duplicate content, generates XML sitemaps and renders JavaScript, and it connects to Google Analytics, Search Console and PageSpeed Insights. The free version crawls 500 URLs, and a paid licence, listed at €245 per year, removes that limit. Brands it names as users include Apple, Google, Disney, Amazon and NASA. It is made by Screaming Frog, a UK search marketing agency.

Best forTechnical SEOs auditing sites for broken links, redirects and duplicates

Skip it ifYou want keyword or backlink research

Source: www.screamingfrog.co.uk/seo-spider/

Conductor

Conductor · Enterprise SEO and AI search (AEO) platform

No count published ("hundreds of brands")

The enterprise pick for AI search.

Conductor's About page says hundreds of brands trust it but gives no exact count, so it is ranked last with the tools that publish no number. It calls itself the enterprise platform for AI and search visibility, and its homepage leans hard on AI search, or answer engine optimisation (AEO). The platform is split into four products: Conductor Intelligence, Conductor Creator, Conductor Monitoring and Conductor AgentStack, all running on 10+ years of proprietary search data in one data engine. It offers a ready-made Content Agent and Technical Agent, an MCP Server and Data API for developers, and versions of Conductor inside ChatGPT, Claude and Copilot. Customer results on its homepage include a +2x increase in AI search citations and +125% search engine traffic. It is built for big companies with large websites and dedicated SEO teams, not for small sites.

Best forLarge enterprises managing SEO and AI search across big sites

Skip it ifYou are a small business or solo marketer

Source: www.conductor.com/about/

Questions people ask

What is the best SEO tool?

By reach, Yoast SEO is the biggest, with 13+ million customers. For research, Semrush (29 billion keywords, 43 trillion backlinks) and Ahrefs (100B pages in its web index) have the largest databases.

What is the best SEO plugin for WordPress?

Yoast SEO, with 13+ million customers, and Rank Math, with 4 million+ users. Both have free versions; Yoast SEO Premium costs $118.80 a year (ex. VAT).

Is there a free SEO tool?

Yes. Yoast SEO and Rank Math have free WordPress plugins, Screaming Frog crawls 500 URLs for free, Mangools offers a free account and free tools, and Semrush and Serpstat have 7-day free trials.

Which SEO tools track visibility in AI search?

Surfer tracks ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Mode and Google AI Overviews from $82 a month billed yearly. Semrush, Ahrefs, SE Ranking, Mangools and Conductor also offer AI visibility tracking.

How were these tools ranked?

By the number of users or customers each vendor publishes on its own website, read November 13, 2026. Semrush's count comes from its 2021 S-1 filing via Wikipedia. Tools with no published count are ranked last.

How we ranked

Users or customers each vendor says it has, as published on its own website (read November 13, 2026). Semrush publishes no count on its site, so its figure is the 82,000+ customers in its 2021 S-1 filing as reported by Wikipedia. Ahrefs, Screaming Frog and Conductor publish no exact count and are ranked last. Counts are each company's own claims and are measured differently (free plugin users, registered users, paying customers), so treat them as a guide to reach, not an audit. Every number on this page comes from the source linked under each pick, and every photo shows the actual product. Brands can't pay to be on this list.

List source: yoast.com/ · Updated 2026-11-13