Semrush Alternative: Get More User Seats, Data & AI Tools at Half the Price with SE Ranking
SE Ranking replaces Semrush for thousands of agencies by offering equivalent core features at roughly 50% of the cost.
The Essential plan starts at $65/month with GA4 and Search Console integration included, while comparable Semrush plans cost significantly more and exclude standard integrations.
SE Ranking bundles user seats directly into plans and includes AI Results Tracker and Yahoo! position tracking at no extra cost, whereas Semrush charges $45–$100 per additional user.
The platform features a cleaner interface, faster onboarding, and specialized agency tools like unlimited automated reports and white-label capabilities.
With over 1 million users including former Semrush customers, SE Ranking is positioned as a full upgrade rather than a budget compromise.
SEO agencies ask us this all the time: Can SE Ranking really replace Semrush? Well, in many cases, it already has. And in this video, you'll find out exactly why. If you're managing multiple clients, care about smooth team access, need solid data you can trust, and want to avoid those surprise paywalls, then stick with us. SE Ranking’s half the price, includes user seats by default, and—believe it or not—some say the data’s even sharper than Semrush. Now let’s break it down. I’ll walk you through what SEO teams are switching to, and what they’re actually getting in return. We’ll compare pricing, interface, and dive into SE Ranking’s core features. Let’s get started. I'll start by comparing the pricing. So, Semrush’s cheapest plan starts at around $140 a month. And with that, you get five projects and 500 keywords to track. Now, compare that to SE Ranking. Plans start at just $65 a month, and you’re getting similar features for 50% less! And here’s the kicker—SE Ranking includes Google Search Console and GA4 integration
even in their Essential plan. With Semrush, though, that’ll cost you an extra $10 a month. Now, let’s talk about higher-tier plans. For example, with SE Ranking’s Pro plan, you can: Track 2,000 keywords Audit 40,000 pages per project And manage 30 projects All for $119 a month. So, what does Semrush offer in its equivalent Guru plan? As we see it costs around $250 a month and only gets you: 1,500 keywords 20,000 pages per project And 15 projects (Yikes!) That’s nearly half the limits of SE Ranking, and you're paying more than double the price. If you’re running a team, SE Ranking is also way more affordable when it comes to team access. With SE Ranking, user seats are included in both the Pro and Business plans. Semrush meanwhile charges $45–$100 per extra user. And don’t forget, SE Ranking offers a 20% discount on annual plans, while Semrush gives you just 17%.
So, as you can see, SE Ranking keeps things simple and cost-effective. But what about its interface? Let’s talk about ease of use, because let’s be honest, if a tool feels clunky, you’re probably not going to stick with it. Makes sense, right? With SE Ranking, the experience is smooth from the start. The interface is clean, modern, and really intuitive. Even if you’re brand new to SEO tools, you can log in, set up your first project, and start gathering insights within minutes. Now, let’s be fair—Semrush is powerful. No doubt about it. But the interface? It can feel overwhelming, especially if you’re new. There’s just...a lot going on. When it comes to dashboards, SE Ranking keeps it simple. It puts your most important tools and data front and center—nothing extra to distract you. And yes, you can customize it to fit your workflow. With Semrush, the dashboard tends to feel cluttered. You’ve got tons of tabs, nested menus, and it’s easy to get lost if you’re not already familiar with the layout. So if you're looking for a tool that lets you get in, get what you need,
and get on with your day—SE Ranking is built for exactly that. By the way, SE Ranking is trusted by over 1 million users worldwide—and some of them are former Semrush customers. Want to take a look at SE Ranking yourself? Grab your free trial using the link below—we’ll keep going, but you can open that in a new tab right now. Okay, now let me walk you through some of SE Ranking’s main features. Let’s begin with one of SE Ranking’s most trusted and widely used tools—Rank Tracker. With this tool, you can, as the name suggests, track keyword rankings across Google, Bing, Yahoo! and more. You can also choose the location, device and language. Of course. By the way, Semrush doesn’t let you track positions on Yahoo!. It might seem like a small thing—until a client asks why their Yahoo traffic dropped and you have no answer. Once you set up your project, you get daily updates on how your website is doing in search. You’ll see your search visibility, average position, and estimated organic traffic—all over a set period.
There’s also a super handy graph that shows how your rankings are distributed—like how many keywords you have in the top 3, top 10, and so on. And there’s a bar chart that highlights which keywords have gone up, down, or stayed the same. Want to dig deeper? You totally can. Zoom in on each keyword, check for presence in SERP features or AI Overviews, analyze daily position changes, and even spot cannibalization issues. Everything is filterable and customizable. You can add tags, adjust your dashboard view, and organize the data however you like. And don’t miss the competitor analysis feature built right into the tool. That way, you’ll see exactly how your rankings stack up against the competition. Let’s take a look at how SE Ranking helps you track your presence in AI Overviews. Very hot topic right now! With the help of the relatively new tool called the AI Results Tracker, you can see how many keywords are triggering AIOs, how often your site is featured, and track your presence over time with day-by-day insights.
The tool even shows how your rankings compare to rivals in AI-driven search. Want to see what the AI answers actually looked like? You can check cached versions of those search results too. And here’s where it gets even more useful—you’ll see which domains and URLs are being used as sources, along with their Domain Trust scores, referring domains, and full keyword lists. Oh, and FYI—this kind of data costs extra in Semrush. With SE Ranking, it’s included. Let’s move on to the Website Audit tool. This tool runs a deep scan of your website, checking over 120 technical parameters across 16 key categories like site health, indexing, usability, and page speed. Once the scan is done, you land on a clear, visual dashboard that tells you exactly how your site is doing. You’ll see a clear health score, a list of the most critical issues, indexability status, Core Web Vitals, domain metrics, and more. But you don’t just get a list of problems. The tool gives you step-by-step recommendations on how to fix them. You can also compare past audit results,
so you can actually track your progress and show stakeholders or clients what’s improved. If you want to automate your workflow, you can schedule audits, set crawl rules, and even target specific pages or directories. Now, let’s jump into the On-Page SEO Checker. This tool alone can save you hours of manual audits! It lets you analyze any page on your site and gives you detailed, AI-powered suggestions to boost its SEO performance. So here’s what it does: you enter a URL and a target keyword, and the tool instantly analyzes your page—comparing it to the top 10 organic competitors in Google for that same keyword. Then it gives your page a Page Quality Score based on things like keyword usage, content length, internal linking, usability, and more. You’ll also get a clear list of SEO tasks to implement. The tool prioritizes issues
by severity, so you’ll know exactly what to tackle first. Plus, it offers SERP-based recommendations. And you can compare your page’s key on-page parameters with those of your competitors—including keyword terms, titles, meta descriptions, headings and more. Next up: the Competitor Research tool. This feature lets you analyze competitor websites from every angle. You’ll get detailed insights into their organic and paid traffic—including estimated traffic cost, top traffic-driving countries, and more. Here’s what you can explore: Your competitors’ keywords, complete with key metrics and ranking trends Their top-performing pages Ranking changes over time Even who their competitors are And if you’re running paid ads, you’ll love this: SE Ranking shows actual ad copy and historical ad data. You also get access to historical data dating back to 2020, so you can track how a site’s performance has evolved over time—not just where it stands today. And with the largest keyword and domain database in the U.S., you’re working with solid, reliable data. And here’s the cherry on top: you can run a side-by-side comparison between your
site and up to two competitors. Spot overlapping keywords, uncover content gaps, and identify new opportunities for both SEO and PPC. Alright, now let’s talk about SE Ranking’s Keyword Research tool. This one gets a lot of praise from users—especially for its accuracy and reliability. In fact, it’s one of the key reasons many SEO pros have made the switch from Semrush to SE Ranking. If you want to see real results, we’ve linked a case study in the description so you can check it out for yourself. With this Keyword Research tool, you can evaluate any keyword by difficulty, search volume, and search intent. The tool also generates a comprehensive list of related keywords—including similar terms, long-tail variations, and question-based suggestions. You can explore the real-time SERP for each keyword, complete with AI Overviews and SERP features, and track ranking changes month by month. You can upload your own list of keywords directly if anything’s missing from the database.
If you need to move fast, you can use the bulk keyword analysis feature. And the Keyword Manager helps you easily track, update, and organize your lists in one place. Alright, let’s take a quick look at SE Ranking’s Local Marketing tool and what it can do. With the Grid Rank Tracker, you can monitor how your business ranks on Google Maps by keyword and location. The tool also helps you audit your Google Business Profile and schedule posts. You can also manage your listings across 100+ directories—all in one place. You’ll get alerts about any inconsistencies in your name, address, phone number, or URL. The tool sync updates automatically. On top of that, there’s a review management feature. It pulls in reviews from platforms like Google, Facebook, and Tripadvisor, and uses AI to highlight recurring themes in customer feedback—so you can spot issues and improvement areas more easily. What else does the SE Ranking platform offer? Let’s quickly review the backlink tools—there are three of them.
First, we have the Backlink Checker, which lets you analyze the backlink profile of any website. You can evaluate the Domain Trust score, backlink toxicity, view a graph of gained and lost backlinks or referring domains over time, and check for broken links. You’ll also get a full list of referring domains and backlinks with essential metrics to assess their quality and relevance. Plus, it provides detailed anchor text reports. Next, the Backlink Gap Analyzer helps you discover link opportunities by identifying sites that link to your competitors but not to you. You can add up to 5 competitors. Finally, the Backlink Monitoring tool allows you to easily track your backlinks status. Once you add a link, the tool regularly checks key parameters and sends email alerts if any changes occur. And of course, we can't forget about the Content Editor! This tool lets you generate detailed content briefs based on the top-performing pages in SERPs. These briefs give you recommendations on text length, keywords, structure, links,
metadata—basically everything you need to get your content ranking higher. You can use the built-in AI Writer to generate headings, paragraphs, sections, or even full articles. Just one click, and you’re good to go. Or, if you prefer, use the step-by-step wizard to define things like tone of voice, audience, content type, and key talking points. Once your content is ready, you can optimize it with the Content Editor’s recommendations. It gives your text a Content Score to help you see how search-friendly it is. Plus, it checks for grammar, punctuation, plagiarism, and readability issues. And for those of you who prefer working in Google Docs—SE Ranking has a Content Editor add-on for Google Docs. Well, let me share a few more words about the integrations. SE Ranking connects with tools like Google Analytics, Search Console, and Matomo. This allows you to pull real-time performance data directly into SE Ranking and track campaign
results without switching between platforms. It also offers connectors and templates for Google Looker Studio, complete with user-friendly dashboards. That make it easy to visualize rankings, backlinks, competitor data, and technical audit results. SE Ranking also integrates with other popular platforms like Zanata, Reportz, Zapier, Google Docs, and Wix, making it easier to manage tasks, create content, build reports, and more. The last thing I want to show you is the set of features designed specifically for agencies. SE Ranking offers scheduled reporting, plus unlimited manual reports—even on the basic plan. (That’s something you won’t find with Semrush.) By the way, one of SE Ranking’s clients actually reduced their reporting time by 2–3 hours per week after switching from Semrush. That adds up to over 100 hours a year saved! Just think what you could do with that time—take on more clients, run deeper audits, or, let’s be honest, finally take a break. There’s a case
study linked below if you’d like to check it out. You also get a white-label feature to match your branding, and the ability to share guest links—so clients can view website stats without logging into the platform. If you need to give more access, the platform supports multiple user seats with flexible permission settings. Plus, your agency can be featured in SE Ranking’s exclusive Agency Catalog. And that’s it for our quick look at SE Ranking’s main features. So, can SE Ranking really replace Semrush? If you’re looking for a powerful SEO platform that’s easier to use, more budget-friendly, and built with agencies in mind—the answer is yes. SE Ranking delivers everything most teams need to grow search presence, keep clients happy, and save serious time on reporting, audits, and analysis. And with over a million users already on board—including former Semrush customers—it’s clear this isn’t just a backup plan. It’s an upgrade. Want to explore it further? Try the
14-day free trial—check out the link below. Thanks for watching! If you found this video helpful, give it a like and subscribe for SEO insights.