Best SEO Software 2021

SEMrush Free Plan Overview

The SEMrush free plan provides limited access to the major SEMrush tools. If you manage a small website or want to use the SEMrush platform before purchasing a subscription, then it's a valuable option worth testing.

SEMrush is an outstanding solution that millions of digital marketers use to drive more traffic to their websites. Read below to learn more about what's included in the SEMrush free plan, and how to get SEMrush for free. We've also linked to other SEMrush resources to help you learn about the tool.

Table of Contents

SEMrush Features

SEMrush is a suite of over 30 tools with numerous features. It's a platform that can support almost any digital marketing need related to online search. Here's the most valuable SEMrush features:

  • Keyword Research
  • Competitive Research
  • Keyword Position Tracking
  • Competitor Gap Analysis
  • Advertising Research
  • Topic Research
  • Backlink Audit
  • Site Audit
  • On Page SEO Checker

Is SEMrush Free?

It's not actively advertised, but SEMrush does offer a free plan that provides limited access to their tools. Examples of the limits are:

  • Keyword research only returns 10 keywords
  • Site audits can only crawl 100 pages
  • Detailed dashboards are not available
  • You can only make 10 SEMrush requests per day.

SEMrush Plans

The SEMrush pricing page shows three plans that are priced between $99 and $399 per month. It does not advertise SEMrush's free plan. Here's a comparison of the three for-purchase SEMrush plans.

SEMrush PlanPlan is Best ForKey Differences
SEMrush Pro PlanSmaller websites & freelancers
  • 500 keyword limit for keyword rank tracking.
  • No historical data – you can't see competitors' historical search activity.
  • No multitargeting – you need separate projects for each device.
SEMrush Guru PlanSMBs & smaller marketing agencies
  • Can track up to 1,500 keywords.
  • Includes historical competitor data since 2012.
  • No Product Listing Ads feature that is included in Business Plan.
SEMrush Business PlanLarge companies & agencies
  • Can track up to 5,000 keywords.
  • Access to the Product Listing Ads feature.
  • Includes SEMrush API access.
  • Integrates with Google Data Studio for data analysis.

How to Get a Free SEMrush Account

Getting the free version of SEMrush is easy. First, visit the SEMrush website and click the Sign Up button in the top right of the screen.

SEMrush Homepage

Next, when prompted to choose a plan, click "Skip Trial". You can see this link in the bottom of the image below.

SEMrush Skip Trial

That's it! You now have a free SEMrush account that provides limited access to its tools.

SEMrush Free Plan Overview

The SEMrush free plan only provides limited access to the SEMrush platform. Examples of the limits include only being able to see the top 10 keywords during keyword research, and only being able to crawl 100 pages with the Site Audit tool. At the same time, SEMrush does give you access to all the major tools on its platform. Here's an overview of the free plan for the top SEMrush features.

Keyword Research

The SEMrush free plan includes access to SEMrush's Keyword Magic tool. To use the Keyword Magic tool, you enter a root keyword, and SEMrush returns information on the top related keywords. The free plan limits your searches to 10 results.

SEMrush Keyword Magic Tool

Using the free plan, you can also use SEMrush's Keyword Gap tool. This tool allows you to enter multiple domains and analyze the keywords where they all rank, or only some rank. It's an effective way to find the keywords that are driving traffic to your competitor's websites, but not yours. The free plan limits you to 10 keyword results.

SEMrush Keyword Gap Tool

Competitive Research

The SEMrush free plan includes access to the Domain Overview tool. You can use this tool to see organic search traffic, top keywords, backlink count, and competitors for any website. The related Traffic Analytics report includes even more domain-specific data such as visits, bounce rate, and traffic sources. The free plan does not include detailed reports such as data on the website's top pages or audience.

SEMrush Free Plan

Keyword Position Tracking

You can monitor your keyword ranking using the SEMrush free plan. However, you can only select 10 keywords to track, and you cannot monitor keywords on different locations or devices.

SEMrush Position Tracking

Site Audit

SEMrush also includes a tool for auditing websites for SEO errors. This tool is available in the free plan, but you can only crawl 100 pages. The Site Audit tool returns a lot of data including:

  • Overall site health
  • Most critical issues
  • Broken internal links and images
  • Missing title tags, canonical tags, and H1 tags
  • Duplicate title tags, meta descriptions and content
  • 4xx and 5xx status codes
  • Page speed issues
SEMrush Site Audit

SEMrush Free Alternatives

There are several free alternatives to SEMrush. The top tools you should explore are:

ToolTool Description
Google Keyword PlannerGoogle Keyword Planner is Google's keyword research tool. It allows you to enter multiple keywords to see their search volume, competition, and estimated cost-per-click.
Google Search ConsoleGoogle Search Console is the portal that Google uses to share search analytics with website owners. In the Search Console, you can find the keywords your pages rank for, as well as your impression count, ranking and click-through rate.
Answer the PublicWith Answer the Public, you enter a seed keyword and the tool returns numerous related keywords. These include questions, prepositions, comparisons, and related searches.
Keyword SheeterWhen you enter a seed keyword in Keyword Sheeter, it returns all of Google's autocomplete suggestions. It does not include search volume, competition, or CPC data.
QuestionDBQuestionDB returns the common questions associated with a root keyword. You can sort results by relevance or topic, and click directly to the questions source page.
MozMoz offers some of its tools for free. You can use the Link Explorer to check the backlink profile of any website, and its toolbar to quickly check the backlink count of pages in search results and the on-page SEO elements of any webpage.
UberSuggestUberSuggest provides basic traffic analytics data for any website for free. You can see estimated traffic volume, backlink count, top pages and the site's top keywords.
Screaming FrogScreaming Frog offers a free version of their spider that analyzes all the major on-site SEO elements for up to 500 URLs.

Which SEMrush Plan is Right For You?

There's substantial value in SEMrush's free plan. It provides access to all major SEMrush tools including its Keyword Magic tool, Keyword Gap tool, position tracking, and site audits. The plan limits the amount of available data in each tool, and limits you to 10 requests per day.

If you have a small website and only need basic functionality, then the free plan is a highly valuable option. It's also an effective way to test the SEMrush platform to see if you would like to purchase a subscription.

If you're interested in learning more about SEMrush, read our in-depth SEMrush review.

Bruce Hogan

Bruce Hogan is Co-founder & CEO of SoftwarePundit. He leads the team's research and publishes content about software products and trends. Bruce has experience investing at multi-billion dollar private equity firms, leading teams at venture-backed technology companies, and launching new businesses. You can connect with Bruce on LinkedIn.

Bruce is an expert in several software categories including:

  • Dental software
  • Mental health software
  • SEO software
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