Semrush Pricing vs Competitors: Pick Your Alternative

Semrush now starts at $139 a month for its SEO plan, or $117.33 a month if you pay for a year up front. That makes it one of the dearer ways to get keyword research, rank tracking and a site audit in one login, because most rivals charge less for a similar entry tier. Ahrefs Lite costs $129, SE Ranking Core costs $129 with four times as many tracked keywords, and budget tools such as Mangools and SpyFu cost under $40 a month. The right Semrush alternative depends on what you track, how many people log in and whether you need AI search visibility data.

We compared Semrush with six competitors using each vendor’s own pricing page, with every price checked in November 2026. Prices are US prices in US dollars, except Ubersuggest’s subscription prices, which are the rupee prices its page shows to visitors in India; Mangools and Ubersuggest both set prices by region. All figures exclude sales tax and can change, so confirm the figure on the vendor’s page before you buy.

What Semrush Costs in November 2026

Semrush has reshaped its plans around AI search, and its main pricing page is now called “SEO and AI Search,” with a free plan plus four paid tiers. The cheapest paid tier, simply called SEO, covers classic search work, while the Starter and Pro+ tiers add AI visibility tracking that shows how often your brand appears in answers from AI chatbots. Semrush’s help center frames this as a choice between Semrush One and the SEO Toolkit.

These figures are data as of November 2026, taken from the Semrush pricing page. The free plan allows 10 reports a day and needs no credit card, and paid plans come with a seven-day free trial.

What Happened to Semrush Pro, Guru and Business

Many guides still quote the old names, partly because Semrush’s knowledge base still lists the SEO Toolkit plans as Pro at $139.95, Guru at $249.95 and Business at $499.95 a month. Those tiers map neatly onto the new ones: Pro had 5 websites and 500 tracked keywords, the same limits as today’s SEO plan, and Guru had 15 websites and 1,500 keywords, which Pro+ now matches. Business had 40 websites, 5,000 keywords, API access and share of voice tracking, which now sit in Advanced.

So the real change is the price of getting AI visibility data and the Guru-level features, since the core SEO limits have barely moved. On the knowledge base page, Guru added the SEO Writing Assistant, Topic Research, historical data and Google Data Studio reporting integrations. On the new pricing page, historical data and content optimization appear at the Pro+ level, which costs $299 a month.

Semrush Annual Discount and Add-On Users

Semrush advertises savings of “up to 17%” for annual billing, and the math backs that up for two tiers only, because Starter and Pro+ save 17.0% while the SEO plan saves 15.6%. Over a year, the SEO plan costs $1,407.96 on annual billing versus $1,668 paid month by month, while Pro+ costs $2,978.04 a year on annual billing versus $3,588 when paid monthly.

Extra people cost more, since the Additional Users add-on starts at $45 a month per user, and Semrush also sells report add-ons from $10 a month and a Lead Generation add-on at $90 a month. A three-person team can end up paying well above the sticker price, so it makes sense to price the seats before you compare plans. If you want to see how much a tool’s cost eats into a client retainer, our freelance hourly rate calculator shows what you need to charge to cover software.

Semrush Pricing vs Competitors: The Full Comparison Table

This table lines up each tool’s entry and mid-tier plans with the limits that matter most for budgeting. “Projects” means the websites or campaigns you can set up, and where a vendor does not publish a limit for a plan, the cell names what it does publish instead.

Every figure comes from the vendor’s own pricing page, linked in the sections below, and was checked in November 2026. Mangools and Ubersuggest set prices by region: Mangools figures are the US prices billed yearly, Ubersuggest’s lifetime prices are US prices, and its monthly and yearly prices are the rupee prices shown to visitors in India.

Cheapest and Mid-Level Plan Prices Across the SEO Suites

The first chart compares the cheapest paid plan from each vendor, and it shows that Semrush is the most expensive way in, and SE Ranking is close behind at $129, although its Core plan is a full platform rather than a cut-down starter. Ahrefs Starter at $29 is much more limited than its Lite plan, so treat it as a research pass rather than a Semrush replacement.

The mid-tier chart tells a different story, with Semrush Pro+, SE Ranking Growth and Ahrefs Standard all landing between $249 and $299. The gap between the big three is small at this level, and what separates them is how many people can log in and how much AI search data comes bundled in.

Both charts use month-to-month prices wherever a vendor publishes them. Mangools shows its US prices as yearly plans, so its lighter bars are the monthly rate when billed yearly. Ubersuggest is left off the charts because it sells subscriptions at regional prices and, in the US, lifetime plans for a one-time payment.

How Each Semrush Competitor Prices Its Plans

Sticker prices only tell part of the story, so each tool below is explained by what you get at the entry and mid tiers, where the extra costs hide and who gets the best deal from it.

Ahrefs: The Closest Like-for-Like Rival

Ahrefs sells five tiers as of November 2026. Starter costs $29 a month and covers basic keyword and competitor lookups, while Lite costs $129 and is the real counterpart to Semrush’s SEO plan. Lite tracks 750 keywords, allows 5 non-verified projects and gives 1,000 credits per user each month. Standard costs $249 with 2,000 tracked keywords, 20 projects and unlimited credits, and Advanced costs $449 with 5,000 keywords and 50 projects.

Every paid plan above Starter includes one user, and extra users cost $40 a month on Lite, $60 on Standard and $80 on Advanced. Each full plan also includes Brand Radar AI checks, ranging from 150 a month on Lite to 600 on Advanced. A dedicated Brand Radar AI add-on starts at $199 a month for teams that want more prompts, and annual billing saves up to 17% on the plans themselves.

Pick Ahrefs if one person runs your SEO and link analysis matters most. It beats Semrush on tracked keywords at both entry and mid levels, but it loses that edge once you add two or three colleagues.

SE Ranking: Most Tracking per Dollar

SE Ranking has moved to three plans, with Enterprise priced by quote. Core costs $129 a month, or $103.20 billed yearly, and includes 10 projects, 2,000 keywords tracked daily, one manager seat and 25 content marketing articles. Growth costs $279 a month, or $223.20 billed yearly, and it doubles the article count to 50 while raising limits to 30 projects, 5,000 daily keywords and three manager seats.

Both paid plans include AI visibility tracking through SE Visible, with 25 daily prompts across five AI engines, and extra manager seats start at $16. The Agency Pack adds 30 client seats and white-label reports for $69 a month on annual billing. SE Ranking offers a 14-day free trial on both plans.

Pick SE Ranking if you track lots of keywords or manage several sites. At $129 a month, the Core plan tracks four times as many keywords as Semrush’s $139 SEO plan and allows twice the projects.

Moz Pro: Four Tiers With Gentle Steps

Moz Pro starts at $49 a month for its Starter plan, which covers a single website. Standard costs $99 a month, or $79 billed yearly, and gives one seat, 3 campaigns, 300 keyword rankings and 100,000 crawled pages a week. That is a smaller tracking allowance than Semrush’s SEO plan, but at well under half the price.

The bigger plans climb in gentle steps: Medium costs $179 a month, or $143 billed yearly, with 2 seats, 10 campaigns and 1,500 keywords, which matches Semrush Pro+ on tracking for $120 less each month. Large costs $299 a month, or $239 billed yearly, with 3 seats, 25 campaigns and 3,000 keywords. Moz also sells extra AI Visibility Dashboards at $20 each and extra tracked AI prompts at $50 per 100. Pick Moz Pro if you are a small in-house team that needs a few hundred keywords and a site crawl, and you want room to grow without jumping straight to $299.

SpyFu: Cheapest Path to Competitor and PPC Data

SpyFu focuses on what competitors rank and bid for in Google search and ads. The Basic plan costs $39 a month, or $399 a year, and it tracks 5,000 keyword rankings each week and allows 10,000-row searches and exports. The Professional plan costs $79 a month, or $699 a year, raising tracking to 15,000 weekly rankings and removing caps on search results and exports. Professional also adds 10,000 API calls and custom branded reports for agencies and freelancers.

All plans include unlimited searches and both US and international data, and a free plan exists with no credit card. The trade-off is that rankings update weekly rather than daily, which matters less for steady sites than for fast-moving campaigns. Pick SpyFu if you run Google Ads, want to see rivals’ keyword history, or need a cheap second tool next to a full suite.

Mangools: Simple Tools for Small Sites

Mangools bundles a keyword finder, rank tracker, backlink checker and SERP checker into one simple subscription. In the US, the Basic plan costs $37.70 a month billed yearly, which is $452.40 for twelve months, and it allows 100 keyword lookups every 24 hours and 200 tracked keywords, with no extra seats. Premium costs $52.70 a month billed yearly ($632.40 a year) and raises the limits to 500 lookups, 700 tracked keywords and up to three extra seats. The Agency plan costs $97.70 a month billed yearly, or $1,172.40 a year.

Pick Mangools if you run one or two small sites and want clean, simple tools without a learning curve. It is not built for large agencies, although Premium can cover a small team of up to four people.

Ubersuggest: Country-Based Prices and Lifetime Plans

Ubersuggest sets its prices by country, so what you pay depends on the country where you sign up. In the US, its lifetime plans cost a one-time $290 for Individual, $490 for Business and $990 for Enterprise. Visitors in India see subscription prices instead: the Individual plan costs Rs 1,135 a month or Rs 7,570 a year, which works out to Rs 630.83 a month. Business costs Rs 1,890 a month or Rs 11,825 a year, and Enterprise costs Rs 3,785 a month or Rs 25,640 a year.

Pick Ubersuggest if you would rather pay once than keep a subscription running, or if its regional price undercuts the dollar-priced tools where you live. A $290 lifetime Individual plan costs less than three months of Semrush’s SEO plan. Expect lighter data and fewer controls than Semrush in return for the much lower bill.

What a Year Costs: Two Worked Examples

Monthly prices hide how much you commit over a year, so the first example is a solo blogger who wants rank tracking and keyword research for one site, using the cheapest published way to pay for twelve months on each tool’s main working plan.

The Ahrefs row uses its monthly rate of $129; Ahrefs says annual billing saves up to 17%. To see what each saving means as a share of your budget, run the numbers through our percentage calculator.

The second example is a three-person agency that needs 1,500 to 2,000 tracked keywords. On Ahrefs Standard only one user is included, so two extra users at $60 each push the bill from $249 to $369 a month, or $4,428 a year. SE Ranking Growth already includes three manager seats and 5,000 daily keywords, and on annual billing it costs $2,678.40 a year, or $3,506.40 with the white-label Agency Pack added. Semrush Pro+ starts at $299 a month, and every extra user adds at least $45 a month on top.

Before you commit to any of these bills, work out how many clients or sales the tool must bring in to pay for itself. Our break-even calculator does that in under a minute once you enter the yearly cost.

Pick Your Semrush Alternative by Use Case

No single tool wins for everyone, so these picks match the plan limits above to five common buyers.

Solo Blogger: Mangools Basic

A blogger with one site rarely needs 500 tracked keywords on day one, and Mangools Basic gives 100 lookups a day and 200 tracked keywords for $452.40 a year, about a third of Semrush’s annual SEO plan. If you would rather avoid a subscription altogether, Ubersuggest’s US lifetime Individual plan costs a one-time $290. Move up to SE Ranking Core once you are tracking more than a few hundred terms. Pair the tool with a traffic tracker such as the one in our BlogVitals review to see whether rankings turn into readers.

Agency: SE Ranking Growth

Agencies pay for seats, projects and reports, which is where SE Ranking Growth stands out: it includes three manager seats, 30 projects and 5,000 daily keywords for $279 a month. The Agency Pack adds 30 client seats and white-label reports for $69 a month on annual billing. Semrush Advanced is the better fit only if you need its API access and share of voice tracking, and you should ask for a custom quote. When you set retainers, remember to cover the tool’s cost and your own client acquisition payback.

Local Business: Mangools or Moz Pro

A plumber, dentist or salon usually tracks a few dozen phrases in one city, and Mangools Basic covers that comfortably with 200 tracked keywords. Moz Pro Standard, at $79 a month on annual billing, adds a site crawl and 300 keywords across three sites, which suits a firm with more than one location or website. Paying $139 a month for Semrush is hard to justify at this size.

Ecommerce Store: Ahrefs Standard Plus SpyFu

Online stores have thousands of product and category pages, so crawl capacity matters, and Ahrefs Standard includes 500,000 crawl credits and 2,000 tracked keywords for $249. Semrush’s SEO Toolkit Pro, by comparison, is listed with 100,000 pages crawled per month. Add SpyFu Basic at $39 if you run Google Shopping or search ads and want to see what rivals bid on. Stores selling on Shopify can also read our list of email marketing agencies for Shopify stores for the channel that often converts SEO visitors into repeat buyers.

Tight Budget: Mangools or SpyFu Basic

If you have less than $50 a month, Mangools and SpyFu give the most data for the money. Mangools wins on price, at $37.70 a month on yearly billing. SpyFu wins on tracking, with 5,000 weekly rankings and unlimited searches for $39 a month, and it has a free plan you can test on your own site before paying.

Hidden Costs That Change the Semrush Comparison

The entry price is the smallest number you will pay, because four other costs push bills up and they hit each tool differently.

• Extra users: Semrush starts at $45 a month per added user and Ahrefs charges $40 to $80, while SE Ranking seats start at $16. For a team of three, seats can cost more than the plan itself.
• AI visibility tracking: On Semrush, the jump from SEO to Starter costs $60 a month and mainly buys 50 daily AI prompts. SE Ranking includes 25 daily prompts on both plans, and Ahrefs includes Brand Radar AI checks on Lite and above.
• Keyword and prompt top-ups: SE Ranking’s extra keywords start at $22.40, and Moz sells extra tracked AI prompts at $50 per 100. Small add-ons like these can be cheaper than moving up a whole tier.
• Annual lock-in: Yearly billing saves roughly 15% to 26% across these tools, but you pay for twelve months up front. Run a monthly plan for the trial period, then switch once you know the tool fits.

If you are weighing a tool against hiring help, compare the full yearly cost to what you spend to win each customer. Our guide to blended CAC vs paid CAC explains how to split organic and paid acquisition costs.

Is Ahrefs Cheaper and Does Semrush Still Sell Guru?

How Much Does Semrush Cost per Month in 2026?

Semrush’s paid plans cost $139 (SEO), $199 (Starter) and $299 (Pro+) a month, with Advanced priced by quote. Annual billing cuts those to $117.33, $165.17 and $248.17 a month, and a free plan allows 10 reports a day.

Is Ahrefs Cheaper Than Semrush?

Yes, at the plan level, because Ahrefs Lite costs $129 against $139 for Semrush SEO, and Ahrefs Standard costs $249 against $299 for Semrush Pro+. Ahrefs also tracks more keywords at each level, but the gap narrows once you add users, because Ahrefs charges $40 to $80 for each extra seat.

What Is the Cheapest Alternative to Semrush?

Ahrefs Starter has the lowest entry price at $29 a month, but it is a limited research plan. Among full keyword and rank tracking tools, Mangools Basic is the cheapest at $37.70 a month billed yearly, and Ubersuggest’s US lifetime plan costs a one-time $290. SpyFu Basic, at $39 a month, is the cheapest option with large rank tracking limits, and it has a free plan you can try first.

Does Semrush Still Sell the Guru Plan?

The main pricing page no longer uses the Guru name, although Semrush’s knowledge base still lists SEO Toolkit Guru at $249.95 a month with 15 websites and 1,500 tracked keywords. On the current pricing page, Pro+ at $299 has the same limits and adds AI visibility tracking.

Is SE Ranking as Good as Semrush for Agencies?

On price and limits, SE Ranking is ahead for most agencies, as its Growth plan includes three seats, 30 projects and 5,000 daily keywords for $279 a month, and white-label reports cost $69 a month more. Semrush has a larger toolset and API access on Advanced, which matters more for large agencies.

Semrush Knowledge Base Limits and Rival SEO Suite Prices

• Semrush: SEO and AI Search plans and pricing
• Semrush Knowledge Base: SEO Toolkit pricing and limits
• Semrush Knowledge Base: Semrush One vs SEO Toolkit
• Ahrefs: Pricing
• SE Ranking: Subscription plans
• Moz: Moz Pro pricing
• SpyFu: Plans and pricing
• Mangools: Plans and pricing
• Ubersuggest: Pricing