Semrush Alternatives: 10 Cheaper SEO Tools, With Prices Checked in October 2026

Semrush's cheapest SEO plan costs $139.95 a month in October 2026 ($117.33 billed yearly), and tracking your brand in AI search starts on the $199 Starter plan. Every tool below is cheaper than that, and every price in this guide was checked on the vendor's own pricing page, FAQ or knowledge base on October 26, 2026.

If what you actually use Semrush for is finding topics for articles you then never have time to write, the answer is different: skip to Outrank, which writes and publishes the articles instead of listing them.

#What Semrush costs in October 2026 (and what happened to Pro and Guru)

Before comparing alternatives, here is the bill you are trying to shrink. These are the plans on Semrush's pricing page, with US prices from Semrush's plan comparison and knowledge base:

Looking for Semrush Pro or Guru pricing? Those names are gone from the pricing page, and the old /pricing/seo/ address now redirects to the plans above. Semrush's knowledge base still lists the SEO Toolkit as Pro ($139.95), Guru ($249.95) and Business ($499.95). The new SEO plan has the same price and limits as Pro (5 sites, 500 tracked keywords, 100,000 audited pages a month), so if you were on Pro, only the name changed. Guru covered 15 sites and 1,500 tracked keywords.

Three costs the table hides:

• Seats. Each extra user costs $45 a month on SEO and Starter, $80 on Pro+ and $100 on Advanced, according to Semrush's user management guide.
• AI search tracking. The SEO plan doesn't track how ChatGPT or Google's AI answers mention you. That starts at $199.
• The free plan and trial. Semrush has a real free plan (one demo project and 10 reports a day across its main tools) and a 7-day free trial on every paid plan, so test an alternative before you cancel anything.

So the honest benchmark for "cheaper than Semrush" is $117 to $140 a month for one user, five sites and 500 tracked keywords. What you get for that is breadth: per its stats page, Semrush had 29.2 billion keywords and 43 trillion backlinks in its database on October 26, 2026, plus paid search, traffic and AI data in one login. If you want to know whether its estimates are worth the premium for your site, our guide to how accurate Semrush is shows how to check them against Search Console in 15 minutes.

#Semrush alternatives compared: price, data and features

Click a column header to sort, or type in the filter box (for example "free" or "daily"). Database sizes are each vendor's own published figure. They are counted differently, so compare them loosely.

The pattern is clear once the prices sit side by side: SE Ranking and Ahrefs Lite cost about the same as Semrush and compete on limits and data, while Serpstat, SpyFu, Mangools, Ubersuggest and KeySearch cut the bill by half or more in exchange for smaller limits.

#Which Semrush alternative fits you?

Three questions: the job you use Semrush for, your budget and who uses the tool. The picker weighs the job most.

#Cheaper alternatives to Semrush, tool by tool

Ten tools that cost less than Semrush's $139.95 SEO plan, ordered by how much of Semrush's job each one covers.

#1. SE Ranking: the closest replacement for less money

Price: Core $129 a month, or $103.20 a month billed yearly. 14-day free trial, no card needed.

SE Ranking is the tool most SEOs name when you ask for "Semrush, but cheaper", and its 2026 plans make the case on limits. Core includes 10 projects, 2,000 keywords tracked daily, 250,000 audited pages a month, backlink and competitor research, and 100 AI prompts tracked daily across five AI assistants. That is four times the tracked keywords of Semrush's SEO plan, plus the AI tracking Semrush only sells from $199.

The catches: Core has one manager seat (extra seats from $16 a month), and its link index is smaller. SE Ranking's data page reports 5.5 billion keywords and 2.7 trillion backlinks, against Semrush's 43 trillion. Growth ($279, or $223.20 yearly) moves you to 30 projects, 3 seats and 5,000 daily keywords, which is more than an old Semrush Guru seat covered.

#2. Serpstat: every core module for $69

Price: Individual $69 a month, or $50 a month billed yearly ($600 upfront). Team $129 ($100 yearly), Team x2 $209 ($169), Agency $499 ($410). 7-day trial with a $1 card check that is refunded.

Many comparison posts quote Serpstat at $50. That is the yearly rate; month to month, Individual is $69. It still buys a lot: 5 projects, 100 searches a day, 10,000 keyword position checks a month, a 30,000-page site audit, backlink analysis and 50,000 export rows. Serpstat lists 8.92 billion keywords in its database stats.

The limits that matter: the 100-searches-a-day cap is tight if you research all day, and AI visibility tracking (1,500 checks), API access and the ChatGPT and Claude integration start on Team. The interface is dense, so budget an afternoon to learn it.

#3. Ahrefs: $11 cheaper, and picked for its link data

Price: Lite $129 a month, or $1,290 a year ($107.50 a month). Starter $29 a month. No free trial; Ahrefs Free covers sites you verify.

Ahrefs is Semrush's direct rival, not a budget pick. Lite costs $10.95 a month less than Semrush's SEO plan and gives you 750 tracked keywords updated weekly (Semrush updates its 500 daily), 5 projects for sites you don't own, 1,000 credits per user, six months of history and 150 AI prompt checks a month. Extra users cost $40 a month each.

The reason to switch is data. Ahrefs' big data page lists 29 billion filtered keywords and 35 trillion backlink records, and its Site Explorer is the tool many link builders trust most. Starter ($29, renewed monthly, 200 credits) is a cheap way to run occasional keyword and competitor lookups. Our Ahrefs alternatives guide covers the other direction, and Semrush vs Ahrefs for keyword research compares the two research tools head to head.

#4. Moz Pro: Domain Authority and link data from $49

Price: Starter $49 a month for one site ($470 a year). Standard $99 a month, or $79 a month billed yearly. Free 7-day trial on the Medium plan only.

Moz Pro Standard covers 3 tracked sites, 300 tracked keywords and 150 AI prompts tracked weekly across three models (GPT, Gemini and Google AI Mode). Moz owns Domain Authority, still the most quoted third-party authority score, and its Link Explorer reports 45.5 trillion links.

Moz is built around links and authority metrics rather than paid search or market data, and each extra seat costs $49 a month. If you are weighing Moz against Ahrefs specifically, we compared Moz DA and Ahrefs DR in detail.

#5. SpyFu: competitors' SEO and PPC keywords for $39

Price: Basic $39 a month, or $29 a month billed yearly. Pro + AI $119 a month ($89 yearly). 30-day money-back guarantee.

SpyFu does the job Semrush first became known for: showing which keywords a competitor ranks for and bids on. Its homepage claims 13.1 billion keywords and 7.2 trillion indexed search results. Basic includes 10,000-row results and exports, more than 10 years of history, 5,000 weekly tracked rankings and a site audit of 50,000 pages a month with 1,000 AI fixes. Older comparisons that say SpyFu has no audit are out of date.

AI brand monitoring and the ChatGPT integration start on Pro + AI, and rank updates are weekly, so SpyFu suits competitor research more than daily client reporting.

#6. Mangools: the easiest keyword tool to learn

Price: Basic $61 a month, or $37.70 a month billed yearly ($452.40). Premium $81 ($52.70 yearly). Free account with 5 lookups a day. Full refund within 48 hours of paying.

Mangools bundles KWFinder (keyword research), SERPChecker, SERPWatcher (rank tracking), LinkMiner, SiteProfiler and AI Search Watcher. KWFinder draws on 2.5 billion related keywords and about 65,000 locations, which makes it good for local long-tail research. LinkMiner uses Majestic's index.

Basic allows 100 keyword lookups a day and 200 tracked keywords. There is no technical site audit, so pair it with a crawler. One pricing note: Mangools is testing its prices. We were shown the plans above, bundled with AI Search Watcher, but its plan data also lists an SEO-only Basic at $49 ($29.90 yearly) that some visitors may see instead. We compared it directly in Ahrefs vs KWFinder.

#7. Ubersuggest: $29 a month, or a one-time lifetime price

Price: Individual $29 a month, Business $49, Enterprise $99. Lifetime licences cost $290, $490 and $990 once. One 7-day free trial on monthly plans.

Ubersuggest is Neil Patel's all-rounder, and its own pricing page puts it at $29 to $99 a month against $139 to $499 for Semrush. Individual gives you 150 reports a day, one project, 125 tracked keywords updated weekly, a 1,000-page weekly site audit, 2,000 backlink rows and AI search visibility for 10 prompts a month. It claims more than 2.2 billion keywords.

The lifetime deal is the unusual part. It pays for itself in ten months against the monthly plan, but lifetime purchases are final and non-refundable, so use the trial first. There is no API.

#8. KeySearch: the cheapest paid tool that covers the basics

Price: Starter $24 a month ($20 billed yearly), Pro $48 ($40 billed yearly). 7-day free trial.

KeySearch Starter gives you 200 keyword searches a day, 80 tracked keywords, 2,000 audited pages a month and 5,000 AI credits for its content assistant. Pro raises that to 500 searches, 200 tracked keywords and 5,000 audited pages.

The database is smaller than Semrush's and there is no paid search data or team workflow. For a blogger picking low-competition keywords for one site, that rarely matters, and it costs about a sixth of Semrush.

#9. SEO PowerSuite: unlimited projects for a yearly licence

Price: Professional €349 a year (€29.10 a month). Enterprise €599 a year, and a new MAX tier at €899. Free version available. The pricing page only shows euros.

SEO PowerSuite is four desktop apps: Rank Tracker, WebSite Auditor, SEO SpyGlass and LinkAssistant. Professional includes unlimited projects, unlimited tracked keywords, full-site crawls, unlimited backlink checks and Google AI Overview tracking, on a database of 216 million keywords and 6.5 trillion backlinks. Because it runs on your computer, nothing is priced per project or per keyword.

That is also the limitation: there is no shared cloud dashboard, so it suits one person running many sites better than a team. Agencies weighing it against cloud suites should read our SEO software for agencies roundup.

#10. Seobility: audits and monitoring, with a free plan

Price: Premium $69.90 a month, or $671.04 a year ($55.92 a month). Professional $109.90, Agency $239.90. Prices exclude VAT. 14-day trial on monthly plans. Free Basic plan.

Seobility Premium crawls up to 25,000 pages per project across 3 projects and tracks 300 keywords. It is strongest as an always-on technical crawler with issue lists you can hand to a developer, and weakest at keyword and competitor research. The free plan (1 project, 100 pages per crawl, 10 tracked keywords) is enough to watch a small site.

#Other sites like Semrush: not cheaper, but better at one thing

Most lists of sites like Semrush mix tools that replace it with tools that do one of its jobs better. These three don't save you money on research, but each wins at a specific job.

#Similarweb: traffic and market data

Similarweb estimates a site's total traffic and where it comes from, across every channel, not only organic search. Its self-serve plans start at $199 a month ($125 billed yearly) for Competitive Intelligence, which has no SEO tools. The plan that adds keyword research, a rank tracker, site audit, backlinks and 150 tracked AI prompts costs $399 a month ($333 billed yearly). The 7-day trial needs a card. If you mostly used Semrush's traffic reports, it is the stronger tool; our guide to checking a website's traffic shows how far the free estimates go first.

#Surfer: content optimization

If you mostly used Semrush's content tools, Surfer is the specialist. Standard costs $119 a month or $99 billed yearly and Pro $219 or $182, per Surfer's AI tracker page, and a Discovery plan costs $49 a month billed yearly. Plans include its Content Editor and AI writing assistant, and Standard tracks 25 AI prompts in ChatGPT weekly. It is a content tool, not a research suite, so it sits next to a research tool rather than replacing one.

#Outrank: when the job is content that ranks

Price: $99 a month or $999 a year. 3-day free trial.

We built Outrank, so weigh this one accordingly. Outrank is not a Semrush replacement for audits, rank tracking or ad research, and it has no backlink index. It fits one situation: you pay for Semrush to find keywords for articles, and the articles never get written.

The $99 plan does the keyword research, writes 30 long-form articles a month and publishes them to WordPress, Webflow, Shopify, Wix, Framer, Notion, Ghost or a webhook. It also places links to your site inside relevant articles on other sites through our exchange, with a 15-backlinks-a-month guarantee. Across the 4,348 sites we wrote for in the 90 days to October 2026, the median target keyword had a difficulty of 14, and on our results page the median site reached 2.04 times its pre-Outrank Google clicks after seven months. Pair it with free Search Console for tracking.

#Free Semrush alternatives

No free tool replaces Semrush, but these cover most of what a one-site owner opens it for. Tick them off as you set them up; your progress is saved in this browser.

What the free stack can't do: show competitors' full keyword lists at scale, track hundreds of keywords daily, or report across client sites. Once you need those, the cheapest paid step up is KeySearch or Ubersuggest. Our walk-throughs of tracking Google rankings for free and Bing's AI Performance report show how far the free tools go.

#How much does switching from Semrush save?

Pick your Semrush plan and the tool you're considering. Guru is included for people still on the old plan; Semrush no longer shows a yearly price for it, so it is counted at the monthly rate either way.

At the defaults, moving from Semrush's SEO plan to SE Ranking Core saves about $131 a year on monthly billing, while KeySearch saves about $1,390. The bigger the plan you're on, the more seats and AI add-ons matter, so run the numbers for your whole team before switching.

#When Semrush is still worth paying for

Semrush earns its price when you use the breadth: SEO plus Google Ads research, traffic and market data, local listings, content tools and AI visibility in one login, shared with a team. An agency that reports on all of that for clients often spends less on one Semrush seat than on three narrower tools plus the time to stitch them together.

A quick test: list what you did in Semrush in the last four weeks. If it was mostly keyword research and rank tracking, a tool from the cheaper list will save you $50 to $100 a month. If it was a bit of everything, every week, stay and move to yearly billing instead, which takes the SEO plan from $139.95 to $117.33 a month.

#FAQ

#What is the best alternative to Semrush?

SE Ranking is the best all-round alternative in October 2026. Core costs $129 a month ($103.20 billed yearly) and covers rank tracking for 2,000 keywords a day, keyword and competitor research, backlinks, site audits and AI prompt tracking. Choose Ahrefs instead if backlink data is your priority.

#What are the cheaper alternatives to Semrush?

Every tool in this list costs less than Semrush's $139.95 SEO plan. The cheapest that still cover research, rank tracking and audits are KeySearch ($24 a month), Ubersuggest ($29), SpyFu ($39, or $29 billed yearly) and Serpstat ($69, or $50 billed yearly). SE Ranking ($129) is the cheaper option with similar limits.

#Is there a free alternative to Semrush?

No single free tool replaces it, but a free stack covers a small site: Google Search Console for your real rankings and clicks, Bing Webmaster Tools for keyword and backlink research, Ahrefs Free for your own site's links and audits, and Semrush's own free plan for 10 reports a day. Add Google Keyword Planner for volume ranges.

#What are some sites like Semrush?

The closest sites like Semrush are SE Ranking, Ahrefs, Moz Pro and Serpstat, which all combine keyword research, rank tracking, backlinks and audits. SpyFu is closest for competitor and PPC keywords, Similarweb for traffic and market data, and Mangools, Ubersuggest and KeySearch are simpler, cheaper tools for one site.

#Which tools are similar to Semrush but cheaper?

SE Ranking is the most similar tool at a lower price, followed by Serpstat, which has the same core modules for $69 a month. Ubersuggest and KeySearch work like a lighter Semrush for $24 to $29 a month, with smaller limits and fewer tracked keywords.

#What happened to Semrush Pro and Guru?

Semrush's pricing page no longer uses those names. It now sells SEO ($139.95), Starter ($199), Pro+ ($299) and Advanced (custom). The SEO plan has the same price and limits as the old Pro. Its knowledge base still lists Guru at $249.95 and Business at $499.95 as SEO Toolkit plans.

#Is Ahrefs cheaper than Semrush?

Only slightly. Ahrefs Lite costs $129 a month against $139.95 for Semrush's SEO plan, and it tracks 750 keywords weekly where Semrush tracks 500 daily. Ahrefs Starter at $29 is much cheaper but limited to lighter keyword and competitor lookups.

#Does Semrush have a free plan or a free trial?

Both. The free plan gives one demo project and 10 reports a day across its main tools, and every paid plan has a 7-day free trial, according to Semrush's pricing page and knowledge base in October 2026.

#Can Outrank replace Semrush?

Not for research. Outrank has no rank tracker, site audit or backlink index. It replaces the part of the job where keyword research turns into published articles: for $99 a month it writes and publishes 30 articles and builds backlinks. Many customers keep Search Console or a cheaper research tool next to it.

#Is Semrush worth it in 2026?

Semrush is worth it if you use several of its toolkits every week, especially paid search research, traffic data and team reporting. If you mainly do keyword research and rank tracking for a few sites, SE Ranking, Serpstat or KeySearch do that job for 8% to 83% less.