Moz

Moz’s strongest feature is its rank tracker. I set up a campaign for a local bakery chain with 45 keywords and within 24 hours I had daily position data that matched manual checks almost exactly (within 1–2 positions). For a 50-keyword campaign the interface is clean — you can see movement curves, average position, and search volume at a glance. I have used [rank tracker](/rank-tracker/) tools from several vendors, but Moz’s is the least noisy: it filters out personalised results by default and lets you set a specific location (even a city radius). That matters more than raw frequency for most clients.

I changed my mind about Moz Local after actually using it. I used to think any citation tool was roughly the same, but Moz Local’s duplicate detection found 12 duplicate listings for a client with 8 branches that we had missed entirely. It auto-syncs with Google, Facebook, Yelp and a dozen directories, and the dashboard surfaces new duplicates as they appear. For multi-location businesses it saves hours each month. I now recommend it alongside [BrightLocal](/brightlocal/) for agencies that need a second opinion on listing accuracy.

Moz’s Link Explorer gives you a spam score per domain that, while imperfect, is a useful first filter when building a disavow file. I once ran a backlink audit on a site with 4,000 referring domains; the spam score highlighted 200 domains that turned out to be comment spam, paid links, or expired domains — all confirmed manually. It is not as deep as Ahrefs’ index, but for a quick triage it works.

Moz’s Site Crawl is the feature I abandon most often. It found 17 broken links in a crawl of a 300-page site, but [Screaming Frog](/screaming-frog/) (free up to 500 URLs) found 34, including redirect chains and missing canonical tags. Moz’s crawler is slower and does not surface JavaScript-rendered issues. If technical SEO is your focus, you are better off with Screaming Frog or a dedicated audit tool.

The keyword research tool feels like it stopped evolving around 2018. When I typed “coffee beans” into Moz’s Keyword Explorer, it returned 120 suggestions — about a third of what [Ahrefs](/ahrefs/) or [Semrush](/semrush/) offered. The difficulty score is reliable enough, but the lack of question-based and long-tail suggestions makes it hard to build a full content brief. I have caught myself exporting from Moz then cross-checking with Google Trends to fill gaps.

Pricing is the elephant. The Starter plan at $99/month limits you to 5 campaigns and 50 keywords per campaign. That is fine for a single site, but if you have three client sites you hit the ceiling immediately. The Medium plan at $179 gives you 15 campaigns and 250 keywords — still tight. Compare that to [SE Ranking](/se-ranking/) which offers unlimited campaigns and 200 keywords at $55. Moz’s data is more polished, but the cost-per-campaign ratio hurts for agencies.

If backlink analysis is your primary workflow, Ahrefs wins outright. Its index is larger, the Link Intersect tool shows gaps Moz cannot see, and the raw data export is more complete. I maintained both subscriptions for a period but dropped Moz when I realised Ahrefs’ rank tracker was just as consistent and its keyword research far richer.

For a broader SEO suite, Semrush is the upgrade. Its Position Tracking is comparable to Moz’s, but the domain vs domain comparison, the content marketing toolkit, and the advertising tools make it a better hub if you run paid and organic together. Semrush’s Starter plan at $119 includes 50 keywords, but the $229 Guru plan gives you 1,500 keywords versus Moz’s 250 at $179. The value shifts fast.

If you are budget-conscious, SE Ranking is the hidden card. I switched a group of small-business clients to it last year. The rank tracker updates daily (or more often if you pay extra), the site audit is better than Moz’s, and the white-label reports saved me from reskinning spreadsheets. At $55 for the Essential plan it covers 10 projects and 200 keywords — and there is no campaign limit. The trade-off is a less polished interface and smaller link index, but for most SMB work it is more than enough.

I used to think Moz was the safe default because of its reputation. After six months of side-by-side testing, I see it as a specialist: excellent for rank tracking and local SEO, but not a one-stop shop. Know which job you are hiring it for.