Whether you do SEO or have just dabbled in it, there seems a good chance that you have come across SEMrush and Ahrefs. These two mainstay SEO tools serve a lot of the same functions – such as keyword research and site analytics. But which is better?

Today, we pit these two SEO heavyweight champions against each other: SEMrush vs Ahrefs. So if you are in the market for a new SEO tool in 2025, read on.

Quick Spoiler: There is no universally best tool, but we’ll help you navigate which one suits your objectives, preferences and budget. Ready to geek out? SEMrush vs Ahrefs – let’s go!

Why Does This Comparison Matter?

Quite simply, choosing the right tools is important for SEO strategy. You’ll get the results you want, delivered to your preferences, at a cost that you are comfortable with:

  • Campaign consistency: Picking the right tool means faster insights, smarter strategy, and better client results.
  • Built for your budget: Both these platforms require an investment; so you want to know what you’re paying for.
  • Fit for your workflow: You decide which of the two platforms fits better with your work processes and how you like to get SEO projects done.

Check out this video about “SEMrush vs Ahrefs: Which SEO Tool Should You Choose in 2025?”

Overview

Before we ring the bell for round one of SEMrush vs Ahrefs, let’s start with providing an overview of each SEO tool, including the company, brand, customer base and reputation:

SEMrush

SEMrush has grown to become a powerhouse of digital marketing. But it hasn’t always been that way. The Boston-based company was founded in 2008 as a pure SEO tool. Since then, it has grown into a comprehensive suite covering PPC, content marketing, social media management, and competitive research. The brand positions itself as an “all-in-one marketing toolkit,” and that isn’t too far from the truth.

Accessible for agencies, freelancers, and large brands alike, SEMrush may be particularly well-suited for marketers juggling multi-channel campaigns. It can integrate with Google Ads, as well as Amazon, allowing users to optimise listings. SEMrush now has over 10 million users across the world, and we particularly like its data depth, broad feature set, competitor analysis and powerful integrations. Favoured by PPC nerds such as ourselves, but respected in the SEO community as a viable everyday tool, SEMrush is a robust, enterprise-level solution that is worth considering.

Ahrefs

Ahrefs is a slightly newer phenomenon than its big rival. Founded in Singapore in South East Asia, the solution presents you with sleek, SEO-focused software and “no-fluff, just data” approach. What started as a backlink analysis tool quickly grew into a full-fledged SEO suite including keyword research, technical audits, and content discovery. It’s often the first tool that technical SEOs and content strategists reach for when they want quick, clean, and powerful insights.

The Ahrefs brand is developer-friendly straightforward, and a bit geeky – that’s why we love it! However, its clean layout and clear navigation mean you needn’t get buried in a mountain of website stats. Unlike SEMrush, Ahrefs keeps its scope laser-focused on organic search, which appeals to SEO specialists, rather than all-round marketing buffs.

In the SEO world, Ahrefs is considered one of the most accurate, user-friendly, and trusted tools around. Their educational content is top-tier (seriously, their YouTube channel is a masterclass), and their backlink database is one of the largest and fastest updated in the industry.

Quick Cheat Sheet

CategorySEMrushAhrefs
Best forFull-suite digital marketing (PPC, content, SEO)Deep dive SEO: backlinks, keyword data, audits
Starting price (mo)£85–102£99 (Lite) – £199 Standard -£359 Advanced
Free trial/free tier7-day trial; limited free accessNo free trial; free webmaster tools
StrengthsPPC, content planning, local SEO, agency toolsBacklinks, keyword database, clean UI
WeaknessesFeature overload, steeper learning curveCredit limits, fewer non-SEO tools

Keyword Research

When it comes to keyword research, Ahrefs and SEMrush take slightly different approaches. Which you prefer is likely to depend on your goals, the way you prefer working… and your geek level.

SEMrush – offers a suite of keyword tools, the most famous being the Keyword Magic Tool. It’s designed for marketers who want to go deep, fast. You can explore millions of keyword variations, filter by search intent (informational, transactional, etc.), SERP features (like featured snippets), and cluster keywords into topic groups. You also get search volume trends, difficulty scores, CPC data, and competitive density.

Ahrefs – keeps things clean and focused with Keywords Explorer. Its strength lies in showing realistic keyword difficulty, click-through rates, andparent topic suggestions, so you can target broader themes, not just isolated terms. It sources data from multiple search engines (Google, YouTube, Amazon, Bing), which is a bonus if you’re branching out beyond the Googleverse.

Effectiveness

  • SEMrush is ideal for PPC campaigns, content marketers, and anyone doing large-scale keyword mapping.
  • Ahrefs is perfect for SEOs focused on ranking organically with high-quality content and understanding true keyword potential.

Limitations

SEMrush’s free plan is restricted (only 10 searches/day). Lower-tier paid plans cap projects and keyword reports to some extent.

Ahrefs ditched its free tools and now offers a Lite plan starting at £99 per month, with access to 500 keyword reports/month – still limited for power users.

Backlink Analysis

When it comes to backlink analysis, SEMrush vs Ahrefs is a close call. Both flex some serious SEO muscle, but they go about it a little differently.

SEMrush – is also no slouch, with Backlink Analytics and Backlink Audit tools let you dissect your link profile and spy on competitors. You can filter by authority score, type of link, country, and even identify toxic links to disavow. It’s especially handy for agencies managing multiple domains and running ongoing audits.

Ahrefs – has built its reputation on being the backlink boss. Its Site Explorer tool is famously robust, with one of the largest and fastest-updating backlink databases on the planet. You can check referring domains, anchor text distribution, dofollow vs nofollow links, lost/gained links, and see new backlinks daily. The best part? It gives incredible context – like the estimated traffic of linking pages, which helps you judge link quality, not just quantity.

Effectiveness

  • SEMrush is stronger on link auditing and cleanup, and integrates well with broader marketing tools.
  • Ahrefs is the clear winner for raw backlink data, speed, and historical insight.

Limitations

SEMrush offers more generous trial options but caps backlink reports and projects depending on your plan. Still, its integrated toxic link tools are a big win, helping you to root out links that could actually harm your SEO.

Ahrefs’ lower-tier plans (starting at £99/month) limit the number of reports and domains you can analyse per month. There is no free plan that includes backlink analysis, and the data export limits can be restrictive.

Site Audits and Technical SEO

Ultimately, you can rely on both Ahrefs and SEMrush for this side of SEO. They both offer ways to crawl your site to deliver site audits and technical SEO.

SEMrush – has rightly been applauded for its Site Audit tool, and as a starting point, it actually offers it for free. It’s thorough, but also beginner-friendly. The Site Audit tool can look at over 140+ SEO issues, including broken links, duplicate content, slow-loading pages, Core Web Vitals, and more. At the end, it gives the site a health score, and explains issues. A nice touch is that it prioritises fixes based on impact.

Ahrefs – while known primarily for backlinks, has stepped up with a strong Site Audit tool. It offers a visual, JavaScript-rendering crawler that gets to the bottom of performance, HTML tags, internal linking, and hreflang issues. If this isn’t your first rodeo, you may prefer what Ahrefs has to offer – it gives you seasoned SEOs who want granularcontrol (if that term sounds ambiguous or annoying, it basically means a high level of detail and specificity); offering crawling rules, log files, and complex redirect chains.

Effectiveness

  • SEMrush is more user-friendly and comprehensive for marketers and agencies.
  • Ahrefs is more tailored for technical SEOs who want detailed crawl control and deep diagnostics.

Limitations

SEMrush’s audit limits depend on your plan – starting at 100 pages for free users and 100,000 pages/month for Pro users. More pricey memberships have higher limits.

Ahrefs includes site audits in all plans but limits the number of crawl credits, which can run out fast for large sites.

On-page SEO

On-page SEO is a not-so-secret sauce for ranking success. How does SEMrush vs Ahrefs play out for this essential box-ticking exercise?

SEMrush – offers a dedicated On Page SEO Checker and the SEO Content Template, both of which help optimise your content using real-time SERP data. You’ll get suggestions on target keywords, semantically related terms, backlink opportunities, readability, and technical fixes like title tags and meta descriptions. It also tells you what your top-ranking competitors are doing. For content, an SEO Writing Assistant, available as a Google Docs or WordPress plugin, can score your content for tone, readability, and keyword usage.

Ahrefs – might not be as feature-rich as SEMrush for on-page optimisation, but provides plenty of solid content insights through Site Audit and Content Explorer. You can spot thin content, missing tags, or keyword cannibalisation issues. In terms of real-time editing tools or writing guidance – this isn’t Ahrefs’s thing, really. It does data and raw information a lot better.

Effectiveness

  • SEMrush is perfect for marketers, content writers, and agencies who want AI-driven, actionable guidance.
  • Ahrefs is best for experienced SEOs who want to pair their own expertise with clean, accurate data.

Limitations

SEMrush’s on-page tools are available from the Pro plan up, with limitations on pages tracked and keyword suggestions per project.

Ahrefs lacks a true on-page suite – so there’s less limitation, but also fewer built-in tools. However, in many cases, SEO specialists won’t need more tools in order to optimise a website.

PPC

Search engine marketing isn’t just about organic search. What comes on top of organic results? Paid search.

If you’re running paid search campaigns, knowing what your competitors are bidding on (and how well it’s working) can be absolute gold. That’s where SEMrush and Ahrefs come in – but only one of them really rolls out the red carpet for PPC pros.

SEMrush – is a PPC nerd’s dream. Its Advertising Research tool lets you do competitor analysis, spying on Google Ads, seeing the keywords they’re bidding on, ad copy history, CPC estimates, traffic volume, and landing pages. You can even view the ad evolution over time. Then there is Keyword Magic Tool and PPC Keyword Tool for building ad groups and syncing to Google Ads.

Ahrefs – is more limited for PPC. You can see CPC and paid search data in the Keywords Explorer and Site Explorer, but it lacks dedicated PPC tools.  And this is for the simple reason that Ahrefs is more focused on organic SEO.

Effectiveness

SEMrush is the obvious winner For PPC campaigns, with its in-depth, actionable tools.

Ahrefs offers light PPC data; helpful for context, but not enough to build or optimise real campaigns.

Limitations

SEMrush offers PPC tools from the Pro plan up, with limits on keywords, ad copies, and domains tracked.

Ahrefs doesn’t offer PPC-specific tools. You’re limited to whatever data pops up incidentally.

Collaboration Tools

Teamwork does make the dream work. Collaboration tools can make or break your workflow. So, how do Ahrefs and SEMrush stack up?

SEMrush – very much built with collaboration in mind. Each project can act as a shared workspace where your team can monitor rankings, run audits, assign tasks, and track performance. Tools such as SEO Writing Assistant allow collaboration on live documents, with real-time optimisation tips. Plus, you can integrate with Google Docs, Google Data Studio, Trello, and even Google Search Console.

Ahrefs – is more solo-orientated. Don’t get us wrong, it’s a hugely powerful solution, but it isn’t built for team collaboration ‘out of the box’. You can share reports and export data, sure, but there are no live commenting features, shared workspaces, or integrations with project management tools.

Effectiveness

  • SEMrush wins for collaboration hands down. It’s structured for agencies, teams, and marketers juggling multiple moving parts.
  • Ahrefs is great for lone-wolf SEOs but lacks built-in team tools.

Limitations

SEMrush allows multiple users and permission controls, but only on higher-tier plans. The entry-level plan is single-user only.

Team sharing tools on Ahrefs, and the platform also limits user seats according to each plan.

Why Not Get Started?

  • Map your needs
  • Test both tools
  • Start simple, and upgrade when you’re getting ROI
  • Don’t shy away from working with a consultant to speed things up

If you’d like us to ‘hold your hand’ for a while on SEMrush or Ahrefs, we’re game! Get in touch with our friendly Nerds today.