Your search engine rankings and organic traffic depend heavily on a strong link profile. Backlinks are always changing; new ones appear, old ones disappear, and toxic backlinks can harm your SEO performance.
To effectively manage these shifts, backlink monitoring tools are crucial for your SEO success. They help you track, analyze, and protect your website’s most valuable link assets.
To help you choose, here is a direct list of some of the top backlink monitoring tools:
- Free Tools: Google Search Console, OpenLinkProfiler, Check My Links
- Freemium Tools: Ahrefs, Semrush, Moz Link Explorer, SE Ranking
- Premium Tools: Linkody, Monitor Backlinks, LinkResearchTools, Serpstat
This guide will provide a detailed explanation of each of these SEO tools. We will cover their features and best uses. This will help you pick the right tool to keep your website strong online.
Top 10 Backlink Monitoring Tools at a Glance (Free, Freemium & Premium)
To provide a quick overview, here’s a comparison of ten leading backlink monitoring tools across various price tiers. This table highlights their core strengths and suitable users.
| Tool Name | Best For | Status |
| Google Search Console | Foundational monitoring & penalty alerts | Free |
| OpenLinkProfiler | Free backlink analysis & industry insights | Free |
| SEO SpyGlass | Deep desktop audits for verified domains | Free |
| Ahrefs | Leading backlink index for quick snapshots | Freemium |
| Semrush | Link health checks & toxicity scores | Freemium |
| Moz Link Explorer | Link quality with DA/PA & Spam Score | Freemium |
| Linkody | User-friendly, alert-driven monitoring | $14.90/month |
| Monitor Backlinks | Real-time tracking & GSC integration | $39/month |
| LinkResearchTools | Enterprise-grade audits & penalty recovery | $599/month |
| SE Ranking | Affordable all-in-one with custom alerts | $65/month |
Essential Free Backlink Monitoring Tools for Foundational SEO
Building a strong backlink profile is crucial, but not every website owner has the budget for premium SEO tools.
Fortunately, some excellent free backlink monitoring tools exist. They offer core insights into your link profile, showing how search engines view your site.
These tools are vital for basic backlink analysis and SEO health. Here are the top free options.
1. Google Search Console
Google Search Console (GSC) is a powerful, free tool for monitoring and tracking backlinks. It shows backlink data that Google itself uses, found in the Links report. This is key to your SEO strategy.
Key Monitoring Focus:
- Top Linked Pages: Lists pages with the most external backlinks. Helps find “link magnets” and distribute link equity.
- Top Linking Sites: Shows external websites linking most often. Use for link quality checks and relationship building.
- Top Linking Text: Displays common anchor text. Check relevance and spot spam.
- Exportable Data: Download link data for link-building campaigns and link audits.
- Disavow Links Tool: A critical feature to tell Google to ignore toxic links and protect from manual actions.
Best For:
All website owners. Vital for basic backlinks monitoring, understanding Google’s view, and penalty management.
2. OpenLinkProfiler
OpenLinkProfiler is a free backlink analysis tool. It helps users monitor and track backlink profiles to improve SEO and find link-building opportunities. It offers valuable insights into link quality and quantity.
Key Monitoring Focus:
- Link Disinfection: Identifies harmful links with a “risk percentage.” Helps generate disavow files for Google Search Console.
- Link Influence Score (LIS): Evaluates link strength (0-100). Focus on high LIS for better SEO.
- Top Linked Pages: Lists pages with the most inbound links (“link magnets”). Useful for competitive analysis.
- Anchor Text Analysis: Breaks down anchor text usage. Helps ensure natural, diversified text and detect over-optimization.
- Link Context & Age: Shows linking website industry, country, and backlink age. Helps detect unnatural practices.
- Fresh & Active Links: Focuses on recent, active links with frequent backlink index updates. Good for tracking link-building campaign success.
- Competitor Analysis: Check competitor backlinks for free. Identify high-quality domains for your own link-building outreach.
- Link Alerts: (For registered users) Sends email notifications for new backlinks. Helps track link growth.
Best For:
Individuals, SEO specialists, and small businesses need a no-cost tool for backlink analysis, risk assessment, and competitor monitoring.
3. Check My Links (Chrome Extension)
Check My Links is a free Chrome extension. Its main purpose is to crawl a single webpage for broken internal and external links. It does not track inbound links to your site, but helps manage your own site’s links and find link-building opportunities.
Key Monitoring Focus:
- Broken Link Building: Scan industry sites to find broken links. Create better content to replace defunct pages. Then, pitch your new content to the site owner as a replacement.
- Site Maintenance: Improve user experience and crawlability by fixing broken links on your own website pages. It highlights invalid links (e.g., 404 errors).
- Competitor Research (Outbound Links): Analyze competitor articles to see which external sites they link to. This can reveal their content sources and potential link-building campaign targets.
Best For:
SEO specialists, content creators, and website owners for quickly find broken links on any webpage, improve site maintenance, and identify broken link building opportunities.
4. Small SEO Tools Backlink Checker
The Small SEO Tools Backlink Checker is a free, web-based tool. It provides a snapshot of a website’s backlink profile at the time of query. It’s useful for beginners or quick, spot-check backlink analysis. Its data is limited compared to premium services.
Key Monitoring Focus:
- Backlink & Referring Domain Count: Gives a basic overview of a site’s link profile size. Useful for quick competitor comparison.
- Domain & Page Metrics: Displays Domain Rating (DR), Domain Authority, and Page Authority. Use these to gauge linking site authority and your own website’s credibility.
- Anchor Text Analysis: Shows frequently used anchor text. Helps assess natural distribution and spot red flags for search engines.
- Dofollow vs. Nofollow: Differentiates between dofollow links (pass SEO value) and nofollow links. Crucial for evaluating link impact.
- Competitor Backlink Audit: Check competitor backlinks to find link-building opportunities.
- Lost Link Recovery: Helps identify links pointing to 404 error pages. Use 301 redirects to recover link equity.
Best For:
Beginners and users needing quick, on-demand backlink analysis for basic comparisons, link quality checks, and initial competitor backlink audits.
Freemium Backlink Monitoring Tools: Limited Access, High Value
Need more than free tools but not a full paid subscription? Freemium backlink monitoring tools are a great choice. They offer limited free access to powerful backlink analysis. This lets you gain deeper insights into your link profile and competitor backlinks. They offer high value for targeted checks and strategic planning.
1. Ahrefs
Ahrefs is an industry-leading backlink monitoring and tracking tool. It began as a backlink checker in 2010. It boasts one of the largest and freshest link databases on the market. It provides comprehensive data for deep backlink analysis of your own site’s backlinks and your competitors.
Key Monitoring Features for Free:
- Top 100 Backlinks: The free tool provides a snapshot of the top 100 backlinks for any domain or URL.
- Referring Domains: Shows unique websites linking to the analyzed site.
- Domain Rating (DR) & URL Rating (UR): Proprietary metrics indicating domain strength and page authority.
- Anchor Text: Limited view of anchor text distribution.
- Link Types: Basic indication of dofollow versus nofollow links.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Automated Alerts: Receive automated notifications when your website gains or loses a backlink.
- Comprehensive Backlinks Report: Access all external links pointing to your site, sortable by DR.
- New & Lost Backlinks Reports: Track link growth and decay with historical records. Identify and reclaim lost link equity.
- Broken Backlinks Report: Find broken external links (e.g., 404 errors) pointing to your site for link juice recovery via 301 redirects.
- Competitor Backlink Analysis: Deep analysis of competitor backlinks using Site Explorer and the Link Intersect tool to find link opportunities.
- Backlink Auditing & Disavow: Identify low-quality or spammy links. Create a disavow file directly from the interface to nullify toxic backlinks.
- Content Explorer: Find linkable content and broken pages with many backlinks for link reclamation opportunities.
Pricing:
Best For:
- Free: Users needing quick, reliable snapshots of top backlinks and core link quality metrics.
- Pro: SEO agencies, large businesses, and experienced professionals needing the most comprehensive and up-to-date backlink data and link building strategy insights.
2. Semrush
Semrush is a robust, all-in-one SEO platform with integrated tools for comprehensive backlink monitoring and tracking. It helps track your backlink profile, analyze competitors, find new link opportunities, and manage link network health.
Key Monitoring Features for Free:
- Backlink Analytics (Limited): Shows total backlinks and referring domains. Provides Authority Score (AS). Offers some data on new/lost links, link attributes (dofollow/nofollow), and anchor text analysis. Also displays pages with the most backlinks.
- Backlink Audit Tool (Limited): Identifies toxic links using a Toxicity Score. Helps with initial link removal workflow and disavow file generation.
- Backlink Gap Tool (Limited): Allows basic comparison of backlink profiles with up to five competitors. Helps find link opportunities where rivals have links you lack.
- Monitoring & Alerts (Limited): Offers some notifications for new, lost, or broken backlinks.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Backlink Analytics: In-depth view of total backlinks, referring domains, and Authority Score (AS). Filters for active, new, lost, and dofollow/nofollow links. Includes detailed anchors report and top pages report. Visualizes link networks.
- Backlink Audit Tool: Identifies toxic backlinks using Toxicity Score (50+ markers). Features automated disavow workflow and outreach integration for manual link removal. Monitoring and Alerts for new, lost, or broken backlinks from negative SEO attacks or toxic links.
- Backlink Gap Tool: Compares up to five competitor backlink profiles to find link opportunities. Highlights referring domains linking to rivals but not to you, creating actionable prospects.
- Link Building Tool: Complete workflow for link building campaigns. Generates link prospects, manages email outreach (templates, tracking), and monitors results (e.g., new links obtained). Includes automated monitoring.
- Brand Monitoring Tool: Finds unlinked brand mentions for potential link-building opportunities.
- Continuous Monitoring & Alerts: Automatically monitors backlink profile changes. Configures automated notifications via email for new or lost backlinks. Integration with Google Search Console for accurate data.
Best For:
- Free: Users needing core backlink analytics, initial link profile health checks, and basic competitor backlink audits.
- Pro: SEO agencies, larger businesses, and SEO specialists requiring an all-in-one SEO platform with robust, integrated backlink monitoring, auditing, and link building management.
3. Moz Link Explorer
Moz offers backlink monitoring and tracking through its Link Explorer tool. It provides extensive backlink data for analyzing your site’s link profile and performing competitive analysis. While not a full marketing suite like Semrush, Moz excels with its widely trusted authority metrics.
Key Monitoring Features for Free:
- Domain Authority (DA) & Page Authority (PA): Moz’s proprietary metrics that predict website or webpage ranking likelihood based on link profile. Use to quickly assess authority and backlink value.
- Spam Score: Estimates the percentage of sites with similar characteristics that were penalized. A higher score suggests potentially toxic backlinks.
- Link Explorer (Limited Use): Access to core backlink data, including inbound links, linking root domains, and anchor text analysis.
- MozBar: A free browser extension for instant DA, PA, and Spam Score on any page.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Link Tracking Lists: Primary feature for continuous backlink tracking and monitoring of link growth and loss over time.
- Detailed Backlink Reporting: Full access to comprehensive backlink profile data. Includes newly discovered and lost links, DA, PA, Spam Score, anchor text, and link type (follow vs. nofollow).
- Link Intersect: Competitor analysis tool showing domains linking to rivals but not you, identifying link-building opportunities.
- Link Metrics History: View historical trends in DA, PA, and link counts for link profile health.
- Campaign Management: Integrates backlink data with rank tracking and site audits for holistic SEO performance.
- Broken Link Detection: Identifies broken external links (4xx errors) to recover link juice.
Best For:
- Free: Users needing quick link quality assessment using DA, PA, and Spam Score, and basic backlink data checks.
- Pro: SEO specialists and businesses prioritize trusted authority metrics, detailed link profile analysis, and competitor insights for strategic link building.
4. Majestic
Majestic is a specialized “Link Intelligence” tool, focusing exclusively on backlinks. It aids monitoring and tracking through its massive link database and proprietary metrics. Its strength lies in historical data and granular link quality metrics like Trust Flow and Citation Flow.
Key Monitoring Features for Free:
- Backlink Checker: Provides a high-level summary of any website’s backlink profile.
- Site Explorer: Gives a quick snapshot of key metrics like referring domains, backlinks, Trust Flow, and Citation Flow.
- Majestic Browser Plugin: A free extension for quick access to flow metrics for any webpage.
- Topical Trust Flow: Insights into relevant topics of linking domains.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Campaigns: Primary feature for ongoing backlink monitoring. Organizes work and tracks backlink profile evolution, including new and lost backlinks.
- Backlink History: Access to “Fresh Index” (last 120 days) and “Historic Index” (since 2006) for long-term link growth analysis.
- Clique Hunter: Competitive analysis tool identifying sites linking to competitors but not to you, revealing shared link opportunities.
- Bulk Backlink Checker: Analyze backlink metrics for multiple URLs or domains at once.
- Link Context: Details on where a backlink is placed, including proximity to other links, for editorial value assessment.
- Link Graph: Visualizes backlink networks up to several tiers deep to understand relationships and spot suspicious patterns.
Best For:
- Free: Users needing quick link profile summaries and access to Trust Flow and Citation Flow metrics.
- Pro: SEO specialists and link builders focused on deep link quality analysis, historical backlink data, and advanced competitor research to uncover link opportunities.
5. SE Ranking
SE Ranking is an all-in-one SEO platform offering dedicated tools for backlink monitoring and tracking. It enables analysis of your own and competitor backlink profiles, identification of link-building opportunities, and automatic monitoring of important links.
Key Monitoring Features for Free:
- Backlink Checker (Basic): Can perform a basic backlink check for any domain, but data is limited. Shows some referring domains, total backlinks, and Domain/Page Trust scores.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Backlink Checker & Monitor: Full data access for unlimited backlink checks. Provides metrics like referring domains, total backlinks, new and lost links, dofollow vs. nofollow links, and Domain/Page Trust scores.
- Automatic Monitoring: Upload a list of backlinks (manual or CSV). Receive email notifications if a link is removed or changes attributes.
- Domain & Page Trust: Proprietary metrics (0-100 scale) for assessing link quality and credibility of linking sites or pages.
- Backlink Attributes: Information on link type (text, image), anchor text, and attributes (follow, nofollow, sponsored, UGC).
- Backlink Gap Analyzer: Compare your domain against up to five competitors to find link-building opportunities. Highlights referring domains linking to rivals but not to you.
- Toxicity Monitoring: Includes extensive toxicity analysis to help find and disavow harmful links.
- Google Search Console (GSC) Integration: Seamlessly import backlinks from your GSC account into the Backlink Monitor.
Best For:
- Free: Users needing a basic backlink check for a quick overview of a domain’s link profile.
- Pro: Small to medium-sized businesses, freelancers, and agencies seeking an affordable yet comprehensive all-in-one SEO platform with strong backlink monitoring, competitor analysis, and toxic link detection.
6. Ubersuggest
Ubersuggest is known for its user-friendly interface and affordability. It offers tools for backlink monitoring and tracking, suitable for beginners and small businesses. It helps analyze your backlink profile and find link-building opportunities.
Key Monitoring Features for Free (limited):
- Backlink Overview: Snapshot of referring domains, total backlinks, and new/lost link trends.
- Domain Score: A proprietary metric for website strength and authority.
- Top Linking Pages: Shows pages with the most backlinks.
- Competitor Analysis (Basic): Perform basic analysis of competitor backlinks (e.g., their top pages).
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- New & Lost Backlinks Report: Detailed information on recent referring domains gained or lost. Crucial for link-building campaign tracking and reclaiming lost links.
- Backlink Opportunity Tool: Competitive analysis tool. Compare your domain against up to three competitors to find link prospects (sites linking to rivals, not you).
- Automated Reports: Set up projects for ongoing monitoring and receive email updates on backlink activity.
- Historical Data: Access longer backlink data history for trend analysis.
- Spam Score: Calculates a spam score for referring domains to identify potentially harmful links for disavowal.
Best For:
- Free: Beginners and small business clients needing a straightforward way to track their site’s basic backlink profile and do quick competitor checks.
- Pro: Small businesses, bloggers, and individuals looking for an affordable, user-friendly tool for backlink analysis, competitive research, toxic link detection, and link-building opportunity discovery.
7. SEO SpyGlass
SEO SpyGlass is a downloadable desktop application within the SEO PowerSuite toolkit. It is designed for comprehensive backlink monitoring and tracking, analyzing link profiles, auditing for risks, and performing competitor analysis.
Key Monitoring Features for Free:
- Limited Backlink Analysis: Check a limited number of backlinks for any website.
- Top Backlinks & Referring Domains: View a summary of total backlinks and referring domains.
- Anchor Text Analysis: Get insights into anchor text distribution.
- Basic Competitor Comparisons: Compare your backlink profile against a limited number of competitors.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Unlimited Backlink Analysis: Removes limits on backlinks per project.
- Historical Backlink Data: Access historical data to track link profile changes over time, including new and lost links.
- Penalty Risk Assessment: A Proprietary metric for analyzing backlinks for potential risks, helping disavow harmful links before Google penalties.
- Link Intersection (Domain Comparison): Compares multiple domains to find shared backlinks and link opportunities where competitors have links, but you don’t.
- Advanced Filtering & Data: Filter backlink data by dofollow/nofollow status, linking domain IPs, country, and more.
- Customizable Reporting: Generate and export branded backlink reports (HTML, PDF).
- Integrated Disavow Workflow: Create and manage your disavow file directly for toxic links.
- Scheduled Tasks & Alerts: Automate backlink checks and receive email alerts for new or lost backlinks, or when a competitor gets new links.
- Third-Party Integration: Connect Google Search Console and Google Analytics to import data.
Best For:
- Free: Users needing initial backlink research and basic competitor backlink analysis for smaller needs, especially those preferring desktop software.
- Pro: SEO specialists and agencies requiring extensive, in-depth backlink audits, penalty risk assessment, advanced competitor analysis, and customizable reporting via a desktop application.
8. Backlink Manager
Backlink Manager is a specialized backlink monitoring and management tool. It’s designed to replace manual tracking for link-building campaigns, link exchanges, and client reports. It focuses on managing active link-building efforts.
Key Monitoring Features for Free (limited):
- Basic Link Tracking: Monitor a limited number of links (e.g., up to 200).
- Link Status Updates: Provides notifications if link status changes (dofollow to nofollow, 404 error, or removal).
- Client & Partnership Management: Offers a basic CRM interface to track link-building partners and clients.
- Target Organization: Organize links into target groups for easier management.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Larger Link Capacity: Monitor thousands of backlinks (10,000+ with higher plans).
- Automated Monitoring & Alerts: More frequent, customizable monitoring with automated email alerts for new/lost links or status changes.
- CRM & Partnership Scorecard: Advanced CRM tracks link-building partner status, including reciprocal exchanges.
- Advanced Reporting & Analytics: Comprehensive dashboards with export options, including white-label reports for agencies.
- Link Quality Tracking: Monitors the average Domain Rating (DR) of linking domains to evaluate link portfolio quality.
- Team Collaboration: User management and collaboration features for agencies.
- Upcoming Link Matching Tool: Planned feature to find relevant link exchange partners based on domain relevance, DR, and anchor text.
Best For:
- Free: Users actively building links who need to track the status of a limited number of acquired backlinks and manage basic link-building partnerships.
- Pro: SEO agencies and professionals managing extensive link-building campaigns, link exchanges, and requiring detailed client reporting and link quality tracking.
Premium Backlink Monitoring Tools for Complete SEO Strategy
Serious SEO professionals and businesses need top search engine rankings. For them, premium backlink monitoring tools are vital. These powerful SEO tools offer advanced features, deeper backlink indexes, and more detailed data analysis. They provide insights to build a strong link profile, manage toxic backlinks, find link opportunities, and boost competitor analysis.
1. Linkody
Linkody is a specialized backlink monitoring tool. It automatically checks your links 24/7. It is a straightforward, affordable, and easy-to-use option. It’s ideal for small agencies, freelancers, and businesses needing a focused backlink solution.
Key Monitoring Features for Free (during 30-day trial):
- Backlink Profile Summary: Quick overview of total backlinks, referring domains, Domain Authority, and Spam Score.
- Competitor Analysis: Check competitor backlinks to find link-building opportunities.
- CSV Export: Option to export backlink data (limited).
- Basic Link Status: See if a link is active or lost.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Automated 24/7 Monitoring: Continuously tracks backlinks. Sends automated email reports and notifications for link status changes (e.g., deleted, nofollow).
- Disavow Tool: Identifies potentially harmful links. Creates an exportable disavow file for Google Search Console.
- Link Visualizer: Visually shows the exact location of a backlink on a source page.
- Advanced Metrics: Full suite of metrics, including Moz Domain Authority, Page Authority, and Spam Score for link quality assessment.
- Link Analysis Reports: Complete reports on anchor text, keywords, and link distribution by country/IP.
- Competitor Tracking: Monitor competitors’ backlinks over time.
- Team & Client Management: Features for agencies, including white-label PDF reports and user roles.
- Landing Page Monitoring: Tracks landing pages for 404 errors to help recover lost “link juice”.
Best For:
Small agencies, freelancers, and businesses prioritize a user-friendly, affordable, and dedicated backlink monitoring tool with robust automated alerts and toxic link detection.
2. Monitor Backlinks
Monitor Backlinks, now part of SEOptimer, is a specialized backlink monitoring and tracking tool. It provides notifications for backlink profile changes. It’s designed to be a straightforward, user-friendly option for small businesses and those new to SEO.
Key Monitoring Features for Free (during 30-day trial):
- Backlink Profile Overview: High-level summary of total backlinks, referring domains, and new/lost link trends.
- Competitor Analysis: Ability to check competitor backlink profiles.
- Basic Link Details: Information on link type (text/image) and dofollow/nofollow attributes.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Automated Email Alerts: Immediate notifications for new/lost backlinks or link attribute changes.
- Negative SEO Attack Detection: Quickly spot suspicious activity (e.g., influx of spammy links) by sorting new links by domain strength.
- Lost Link Recovery: Track and receive alerts for lost links, allowing contact with site owners for reinstatement.
- Competitor Tracking: Monitor competitors’ backlink profiles to find link-building opportunities.
- Google Analytics Integration: Connect to see backlink performance related to website traffic and conversions.
- Disavow Tool: Create a disavow file for spammy links to upload to Google’s Disavow Tool, protecting from Google penalties.
- Domain & Page Strength Scores: Proprietary metrics reflecting the authority of linking domains and pages to assess link quality.
Best For:
Small businesses and new SEO specialists prioritize real-time automated alerts, user-friendly backlink monitoring, negative SEO attack detection, and Google Analytics integration.
3. LinkResearchTools (LRT)
LinkResearchTools (LRT) is a high-end, specialized suite of SEO tools focused exclusively on backlink analysis, monitoring, and auditing. It aggregates data from over 25 sources, providing deep, granular insights for comprehensive risk management.
Key Monitoring Features for Free (limited trial/tools):
- Quick Backlink Checker: Provides a sample of top backlinks for any domain.
- Link Research SEO Toolbar (Chrome extension): Instant access to Power*Trust, social signals, and link velocity trends.
- Link Check Tool: Manually checks if backlinks are still live.
- Limited Trial: Offers a taste of toxic link detection with limited data.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Link Alerts: Real-time email notifications for new and lost backlinks (for your site and competitors).
- Link Detox: Core tool for identifying and removing harmful backlinks. Uses DTOXRISK® (proprietary metric) for a risk score per link, based on Google penalty data.
- Link Detox Boost: Expedites Google’s recrawl and recognition of your disavow file, speeding penalty recovery.
- Link Juice Recovery: Identifies broken links (404s) on your site to recover lost link equity via 301 redirects.
- Backlink Profiler: Aggregates and recrawls link data from 25+ sources for the most complete backlink profile.
- Backlink History: Access historical data (since 2006) for long-term link growth and decay analysis.
- Link Velocity Trends: Tracks backlink growth speed to detect unnatural link growth patterns (potential Google penalties).
- Competitive Landscape Analyzer: Compares multiple competitor backlink profiles to uncover new link opportunities.
- Backlink Simulator: “What-if” tool to simulate a link’s effect on your backlink profile before building it.
- Google Search Console Integration: Automatically imports links from GSC for analysis.
Best For:
Large agencies and enterprises, SEO specialists, and those requiring exhaustive link audits, toxic link detection, Google penalty recovery, and deep competitive analysis from aggregated data sources.
4. Serpstat
Serpstat is an all-in-one SEO platform offering dedicated tools for backlink analysis, monitoring, and tracking. It is a budget-friendly alternative for SEO teams and small businesses needing a combined set of SEO tools.
Key Monitoring Features for Free (during 7-day trial):
- Basic Backlink Check: High-level summary of a website’s link profile.
- Backlink Overview: General metrics such as backlinks count and referring domains.
- Competitor Analysis: Analyze competitors’ link profiles to uncover new link opportunities.
Key Monitoring Features for Pro:
- Serpstat Domain Rank (SDR): Proprietary domain authority score to assess the credibility of linking websites.
- Malicious Sites Report: Identifies backlinks from malicious or deceptive websites.
- New and Lost Backlinks: Tracks the dynamics of new and lost links for link profile health.
- Anchors Report: Detailed report on the most frequently used anchor texts.
- Link Intersect: Identifies common and unique backlink donors between your site and competitors.
- Backlink Attributes: View dofollow, nofollow, and other link attributes.
- IP Subnets: Helps ensure backlinks come from diverse IP addresses.
- URL Recrawling Tool: Update backlink data for up to 500 URLs per day.
Best For:
- Free: Users needing a basic overview of a link profile and initial competitor backlink analysis during a trial period.
- Pro: Budget-conscious SEO teams and small businesses seeking an all-in-one SEO platform that includes reliable backlink analysis, toxic link identification (via Malicious Sites), and competitor insights.
Selecting Your Ideal Backlink Monitoring Tool: Step by Step
Choosing the right backlink monitoring tool can directly boost your SEO success. Let’s walk through a real-life scenario to help you pick and use the perfect tool.
Step 1: Define Your Mission – What Do You Need to Monitor?
Imagine you run “Healthy Pet Bites,” a small online store selling dog treats. Your goal isn’t just to see how many backlinks you have, but what kind of insights you need.
Scenario A: New Blogger / Small Site.
You just started. You need to know if anyone links to your blog posts. You can’t spend much. Here, a free tool like Google Search Console is your first stop. It shows Google’s view of your backlink profile.
Scenario B: Growing Business.
Your store is getting popular. You need to find toxic backlinks, understand why you lose links, and see what competitors are doing. A freemium tool like Semrush or Ahrefs becomes valuable. You’ll get some link quality metrics and competitor analysis.
Scenario C: Scaling Agency.
You manage several pet businesses. You need detailed link audits, real-time monitoring, and white-label reports for clients. A full paid tool like Linkody (for dedicated monitoring) or SE Ranking (for all-in-one) is essential.
Step 2: Test Drive – See How the Tool Works for You
Once you know your mission, try the tools. Most SEO tools offer free trials or limited free access.
Use the Free Tiers: Start with Google Search Console for your own site. Then, try the free versions of Ahrefs or Semrush by checking your domain. See how they show referring domains, anchor text, and link quality scores (DR/AS/DA).
Focus on Key Monitoring Features:
- Can you easily see new or lost links? This is core backlink monitoring.
- Does it offer automated alerts for changes?
- How clearly does it show potential toxic backlinks or Spam Score?
- Can you quickly compare your link profile to competitor backlink profiles? Tools with Link Intersect or Backlink Gap features shine here.
Check Data Scope: Ask yourself if the backlink index size feels complete enough. Does it update frequently (crawl frequency) to give you current backlink data?
Step 3: Implement & Act – Turn Data into SEO Success
No tool works alone. You need to use its insights.
- Set Up Alerts: Once you choose a tool, activate automated alerts. Get notified instantly about new, lost, or changed backlinks. This is crucial for real-time monitoring.
- Handle Bad Links: If your tool flags potentially harmful links (high Spam Score), investigate. Use the tool to generate a disavow file for Google Search Console if needed.
- Find Opportunities: Use competitor analysis to find link opportunities. If a site links to a competitor (e.g., “Best dog food brands”) but not to you, reach out!
- Fix Broken Links: If your tool identifies broken links (404s) pointing to your site, fix them with 301 redirects to recover link equity.
- Streamline Workflow: Connect your chosen tool with Google Analytics or Google Search Console for better SEO performance tracking. If you’re an agency, use white-label reporting for clients.
Ready to Master Your Backlink Profile for SEO Success?
We’ve covered 16 top backlink monitoring tools, from free tools like Google Search Console to powerful full paid platforms such as Ahrefs and Semrush. These SEO tools are vital for tracking new, lost, and toxic backlinks and are crucial for your SEO performance.
Your link profile constantly changes. Proactive backlink monitoring helps you find link opportunities, preserve link equity, and improve your link-building strategy. Pick the right tool and use it well to turn backlink data into SEO success.
Are you ready to take control of your backlink profile and boost your search engine rankings?
Share any further questions below. We are here to help you get more organic traffic.