Your website and online presence can connect you with potential customers, but only if search engines can find you. No wonder SEO tools are vital to the growth and success of any business. Too many businesses fade into obscurity because broken links and SEO issues let their web pages suffer.
To succeed with SEO, you need the right SEO tools to keep up with the ever-changing and complex world of search engine optimisation. You can learn how the Perth SEO consultants at Perth Digital Edge can increase your website rankings and improve your organic traffic and brand awareness, but there are also free SEO tools to help you tweak your web pages and boost your visibility online.
Here are our picks for the best free SEO tools online that also provide a wealth of accessible information about search engines, search volumes, SEO best practices, health checks, and troubleshooting. Enjoy exploring, and if you decide that you need more help or want a dedicated team to stay on top of your SEO, we’re here for you.
Best Free SEO Tools Online
While there’s no one-size-fits-all best SEO tool online, we’ve gathered a variety of tools to suit your SEO needs. From auditing your web pages for SEO issues to learning about what’s becoming popular in online searches so you can stay ahead of consumer trends, here’s an alphabetised collection of free SEO tools to have in your personalised toolkit.
Ahrefs’ Backlink Checker
Ahrefs is a well-known toolset for SEO analysis and backlinks that has several free SEO tools for consumers. Similar to Moz Link Explorer, Ahrefs’ Backlink Checker pulls up the top backlinks and referring domains for any URL or website, along with any applicable URL Rating (UR) or Domain Rating (DR).
Paste your competitor’s website into Ahrefs’ Backlink Checker, and scope out where they’re finding traffic, along with potential opportunities for your business. The free version lists only the top 100 backlinks.
Ahrefs SEO Toolbar
Add the Ahrefs SEO toolbar as a free extension to Firefox or Chrome and check any web page for no-follow links, broken links, redirect chains, and other SEO metrics. The Ahrefs SEO toolbar also generates an SEO report for any site you check that includes its word count, meta description, headers, hreflang tags, and more.
The on-page and technical SEO features are free. With a paid Ahrefs account, you can use the Ahrefs SEO toolbar to find metrics such as keyword difficulty, CPC, and search volume.
Ahrefs Webmaster Tools
With Ahrefs Webmaster Tools, you can run a technical audit of your website to check for more than 100 technical SEO issues. Ahrefs Webmaster Tools also suggests how to fix these issues, plus areas to improve your internal linking, which boosts your search engine rankings.
Curious about your site’s organic keyword rankings, or who’s linking to your site? Ahrefs Webmaster Tools does this for free, too. The free version limits you to 5,000 crawl credits per month per project.
AlsoAsked
Use data from Google’s “People Also Ask” feature to your advantage with AlsoAsked. Type any search term into this free SEO tool, and it will comb through “People Also Ask” searches to find links to that term. It also groups questions and topics visually, so you can see how these searches connect.
Using AlsoAsked can help you identify content gaps and develop a content plan so that you can inspire writers, satisfy users, and reach your SEO potential.
Answer The Public
If you’re wondering just what’s on people’s minds about a particular topic, Answer the Public has the answers. Enter any keyword into this free SEO tool and scan the questions people post on search engines, social media, blog posts, and forums.
Answer the Public provides a huge range of long-tail keywords, plus common questions asked across several categories. The free version caps searches at two per day.
BeamUsUp
If you have Java installed, the free desktop crawler BeamUsUp helps you quickly and easily find duplicate content and SEO errors such as missing meta descriptions, short titles, long titles, and faulty page frames.
Similar to Screaming Frog (more on that below), this free SEO tool doesn’t have as many bells and whistles, but it includes helpful features such as filters for individual page information. Plus, BeamUsUp doesn’t limit how much you can search per month.
Bing Webmaster Tools
Google isn’t the only web giant with free SEO tools that anyone can access. Enter your web page into Bing Webmaster Tools to gain performance data and analysis of key insights to improve your results on this search engine.
Bing Webmaster Tools also includes features such as a site scan, keyword research, and backlink analysis, allowing you to dive as deeply as you like.
BrightLocal Search Results Checker
If your business goes beyond a specific area, or you want to expand into other cities, you might wonder what’s on potential customers’ minds and how you can reach them. The BrightLocal Search Results Checker enables you to view real-time Google results from any location around the world.
Enter the town, city, or postal code that you’d like to check, plus your search term and language for even more specific results, and learn how to rank beyond your current location.
Checkbot
Give your website a check-up with the free SEO tool Checkbot. Checkbot audits your site for more than 50 SEO best practices, turning up invalid HTML, broken links, duplicate content such as similar page titles, missing image ALT text, thin content pages, and other SEO issues.
Checkbox also runs security and speed tests on your pages to locate other weak areas that might affect your SEO search results and overall site health. This includes flagging whether your pages use HTTPS, have secure password forms, or have render-blocking scripts.
Dashword
If your site has blog posts, you want to write relevant content that draws readers through SEO so that you can outperform your competitors. The free SEO tool Dashword has a helpful content editor that culls information from the top 30 Google results for any keywords, offering additional keywords on important topics that your content should include.
Dashwood uses real-time updates so you can see how your content compares to other rankings. It also provides tips to improve it so you’ll place it ahead of the pack.
Exploding Topics
If you ever feel like your business is a moment too late to hop aboard a current trend, Exploding Topics is one way to get a jump on the next big thing. Discover topics that are about to become popular based on keywords that are starting to trend in fields that are relevant for you, such as categories and time periods.
Sign up for the free Exploding Topics email newsletter, and you’ll receive weekly updates about a variety of trending topics, plus expert analysis and insights.
Google Analytics
You might have heard of Google Analytics, an SEO tool that’s been knocking around for a while. This tool allows you to build a complete picture of users of your site and apps so that you can see who’s visiting, where they’re from, if they’re using a mobile device, if they’re a returning user, and more.
Gain a deeper understanding of your customers while you check how well your website’s marketing, content, ad campaigns, and SEO are working.
Google’s Disavow Tool
Google’s Disavow Tool helps keep your page in Google’s good graces as far as using backlinks. As you know, backlinks can help your search engine rankings, but only if these links follow Google’s strict guidelines. A site that links to yours in a way that violates these guidelines can actually hurt your SEO.
Removing a poor backlink from another site can be difficult, so Google’s Disavow Tool allows you to tell Google to ignore it instead. Flag any links that you think create low-quality, artificial, or spammy traffic, and watch your SEO improve.
Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test
You might not have thought about how your website looks on a mobile device, but Google does. Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test checks how your site performs across all devices and points out critical errors that affect your search results for mobile users.
Google has been indexing websites’ mobile versions since 2018, so if you don’t optimise your content for mobile devices, your rankings will suffer. Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test also suggests how to manage your content so that it scores better on mobile devices.
Google My Business
Google My Business is a free SEO tool that improves your local visibility. Every business should create a listing in Google My Business, including key details such as your operating hours, phone number, physical address (if applicable), and customer reviews.
When potential customers head to Google to search for services in your area, your Google My Business listing can put your company top of mind.
Google Search Console
Google Search Console allows you to see your website as Google does with a wealth of features to improve your rankings. This powerful SEO tool compiles reports that measure your site’s performance and search traffic.
Using Google Search Console, you can learn which keywords rank your site the highest and discover which content draws the most traffic. You’ll also learn details such as backlinks that point to your site, SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages), and your site’s positioning.
Google Trends
Google Trends collects loads of helpful data about current popular search terms, trending topics, and subtopics on Google and YouTube. This free SEO tool also allows you to narrow your view of what’s popular by geography and industry so you can research relevant keywords, related keywords, and topics that align with your content strategy.
You can also use Google Trends to drill down a keyword’s or topic’s popularity over a period of time, from years to hours, and filter by content type.
JSON-LD Schema Markup Generator
The JSON-LD Schema Markup Generator builds microdata called structured data makeup, or Schema, that you can insert into the header or footer of your site. This helps search engines understand your content better and creates an enhanced description (or rich snippet) that draws more traffic to your site. Although it’s free, the developer welcomes donations for hosting costs through PayPal.
Keyword HERO
As powerful as Google Analytics is, sometimes it returns results that say keywords are “not provided.” Keyword HERO unlocks those mystery keywords with actual keywords that drive potential customers to your website.
Keyword HERO also helps you get a handle on your organic traffic by providing you with metrics such as conversion rate optimisation, bounce rate, and average session duration.
Keyword Surfer
Keyword Surfer is a free Chrome extension that instantly estimates how many times users search for a particular query each month. In addition to global search data, it also allows you to narrow your results by a specific location throughout 19 countries.
Keyword Surfer also reveals search volume estimates for autocomplete results, which are a great source of long-tail keywords.
Local Citation Finder
If you’re focused on improving your local search engine rankings, Local Citation Finder is one free SEO tool that can alert you to new opportunities. It tracks your citations across the web and identifies new citation sites where you can submit your business.
By using Local Citation Finder to research your competitors, you’ll also identify their citation sites, finding places to grow your own rankings.
LSI Graph
LSI keywords, or Latent Semantic Indexing keywords, help search engines understand your content by finding words and phrases that relate semantically to a specific topic. LSI Graph enables you to make the most of these keywords by generating a list of LSI keywords based on any main keyword.LSI Graph also points out which LSI keywords perform best so you can integrate these into your content and outrank competitors.
Mozbar
Mozbar is a free SEO toolbar that pulls up data on any website while you browse, so you can do SEO research on the fly. See how your site ranks or check out your competition with information such as a site’s domain authority, link status, relevant keywords, metadata, and more.Mozbar has a paid version, but you can access its features through a free 30-day trial, which might be long enough to suit your needs.
MozCast
Google often changes its algorithm to keep its results up to date. MozCast keeps tabs on all these changes, not just the major ones that get the most attention from SEO experts and technical blogs.
With MozCast, you’ll learn about even tiny changes that could impact your online visibility. This SEO tool also has a SERP tracking feature so you can see how your site ranks day-to-day with each implemented change.
Page Speed Insights
It’s tough to retain customers when your site takes too long to load. Page Speed Insights, another of Google’s performance tools, analyses how fast your content loads on all types of devices. This tool also generates suggestions about how to make your pages load faster.
Redirect Path
If your website moves to a new domain, deletes pages, or changes structure, visitors might experience redirects or searching errors. Redirect Path, a free Chrome extension, prevents you from losing potential customers by informing you about redirects on your website.
Redirect Path also provides detailed information so that you can handle redirects in a way that doesn’t penalise your website in search engine results.
Screaming Frog
Screaming Frog is an SEO spider, which crawls through your site to extract loads of SEO issues. Find HTTP header errors, duplicate content, bloated HTML, trouble rendering JavaScript, and other problems that contribute to low search engine results, plus suggestions of fixes to improve your rankings.
You can comb through up to 500 pages with Screaming Frog’s free version or upgrade to the paid version.
Seolyzer
Seolyzer is a free SEO tool that combines a crawler with real-time log analysis so you can discover SEO issues immediately and fix them as soon as possible. It tracks key performance indicators for successful optimisation, so you can feel confident that you’re keeping an eye on major categories for creating content.
Seolyzer also has a categorisation feature that lets you see which pages on your website search engines crawl the most.
SEO Minion
Keep track of your daily SEO tasks with SEO Minion, a free SEO tool that’s a browser extension for Chrome or Firefox. You’ll analyse on-page SEO issues such as problematic headings and metatags, learn of broken links and how serious these are through status codes, and find all redirects related to server or JavaScript.
SEO Minion also includes a SERP Preview Tool where you can see how specific keywords affect your search results, as well as a multi-location SERP tool to check your rankings across different locations around the world.
SEO Quake
Another browser extension, SEO Quake conducts SEO audits of any web page in real-time. Examine external and internal links, compare URLs and domains, analyse keyword density and SERP, and learn how your site ranks on metrics such as the Google Index, SEMrush Ranking data, Alexa Rank, Facebook likes, and more.
With SEO Quake, you also can export your findings so that you can refer to them as needed. This powerful free SEO tool is compatible with Chrome, Firefox, Microsoft Internet Explorer, and Opera.
SerpRobot
For a quick health check on how your site ranks for particular keywords, pop over to SerpRobot. The manual version gives you a free SEO tool where you can check your keyword positions in real-time from any location and on any device: a desktop, laptop, tablet, or mobile device.
After a free trial, a paid version is available that performs automatic SERP checking locally and globally, for your site as well as any competitors.
Smush
If one of your web page issues involves slow loading time or how well your site displays on a mobile device, Smush is one free tool to keep handy. Smush is a WordPress plugin that compresses, resizes, and optimises images on your site so your pages load quickly.
Smush also flags any images that are the wrong size or that load lazily, so you’ll be able to fix imaging problems in no time.
Ubersuggest
Ubersuggest is a free SEO tool that provides a huge range of info through a Chrome extension. Once you set your language and location, just enter a domain or keyword to pull up details such as SEO difficulty, monthly search volume, and the average cost per click.
Ubersuggest also dives deeper into these organic results by noting the average authority on the sites that rank for these keywords and the average number of backlinks. It also suggests keywords and content ideas that can improve your SEO.
Xenu Link Sleuth
Xeno Link Sleuth is a no-frills free SEO tool, but it handles the tasks of basic auditing and searching for broken links just fine. It only works in Microsoft Windows (up to version 10), but it supports SSL websites (those beginning with https).
Xeno Link Sleuth checks all links, plug-ins, backgrounds, frames, scripts, local image maps, style sheets, and Java applets. It also can deliver you a detailed report via email.
Yoast SEO
You might have heard of Yoast SEO and with good reason. This SEO tool is an easy way to optimise a WordPress website without having to dip into different websites or extensions.
If you install Yoast SEO on your WordPress site, you’ll get a range of tips for each page or post to improve your content and rank it higher based on selected keywords, metadata, and other metrics. The annual paid version, Yoast SEO Premium, includes access to the Yoast SEO Academy if you want to learn even more about how to enhance your SEO tactics.
SEO Tools in Perth at Your Fingertips
We hope that these free SEO tools give you a taste of how search engine optimisation can help your business grow. If you’d like hands-on help in boosting your online presence and creating a more robust SEO strategy, the team at Perth Digital Edge is ready to serve you.
We specialise in Perth search engine optimisation and forward-thinking techniques to keep your business at the front of Google searches and customers’ minds. Let us show you how we can help people find your services and meet their needs in an understandable, effective, and affordable way. Find your digital edge today.
