I view SEMrush similarly to Ahrefs — both are excellent tools in their own right, but aren’t built for the specific use cases that I need for rank tracking.
Specific to rank tracking, if you have to choose one or the other, I think SEMrush is the better tool. You have significantly more grouping, tagging, and filtering capabilities. I also tend to use SEMrush for keyword research a lot more than I use Ahrefs. I think the interface is cleaner, and the keyword level data is more intuitive and useful.
My favorite part of the SEMrush rank tracker is the landscape reports, specifically the serp features. It’s always useful to see which buckets I’m tracking, or my site is associated with, that throw serp features. From that, I can intuit which to focus on and build out and have some level of clarity on the potential impact. For the campaign oriented approach, you could use this to track which of your pages have flipped over following some code changes to support any particular feature.
Some might find it useful that there’s a mobile app for both iOS and Android. I don’t often check my rankings on the go, but I could see being bored sitting on a flight or somewhere without my laptop and taking a peek.
This review is part of a buyers guide
For the full experience, view the rest of the rank tracker reviews.
Pros
- Solid competitive analysis
- Great serp feature reports
Cons
- Google Only
- Expensive if only used for tracking.
Which search engines are supported?
What’s the price?
SEMrush starts at $99 per month for 500 keywords.
