If you’re searching for the best SEO tool to boost your online business, you’ve likely come across Semrush and Moz. These two tools stand out in a sea of SEO software, helping businesses climb up search engine rankings.
Semrush vs Moz – which one should you choose?
I’ll guide you through the key features of Semrush and Moz. Both are packed with tools to enhance your online presence.
They’re different, though, each fitting various needs and situations.
In this blog, we’re diving into Semrush and Moz.
We’ll explore their strengths in keyword research, site audit, and other key features and benefits to find out which one is the best.
Let’s find out which one might take the crown.
In this article:
Ready to begin? Let’s go!
Semrush vs Moz: Overview
Let’s begin with quick overview of each tool.
What Is Semrush?
Semrush is your go-to digital marketing platform, packed with over 55 SEO and digital marketing tools. It’s really a full package for online marketing, helping you in everything from SEO to social media.
Semrush has over 100 million domain profiles and a whopping 25+ billion keywords in its database. That’s huge, right? It helps you figure out the best keywords to use, tracks how well you’re doing, checks out your competition, and gives your site an SEO health check.
With Semrush, you can:
- Discover keywords your audience loves.
- Perform in-depth SEO checks on your site.
- Make your website content shine.
- See what your rivals are up to and their traffic secrets.
- Plan and monitor your social media like a pro.
- Uncover new ways to build links to your website.
- Get smart insights for your paid ads.
And that’s just the start!
Founded in 2008 by Oleg Shchegolev and Dmitry Melnikov, Semrush is a big hit. Over 10 million marketers use it, making it one of the best out there.
So, what’s in Semrush?
It’s loaded with features. I’ll highlight some key ones:
- Domain Overview
- Traffic Analytics
- Organic Research
- Keyword Research
- Backlink Analytics
- Link Building Tool
- Site Audit
- On-page SEO Checker
There are even more tools and extras.
So, should you use Semrush?
Absolutely! It helps you understand the confusing world of SEO. Whether you’re a beginner or a pro, Semrush has something for everyone.
With its free trial, there’s no risk in giving it a go. You might just find it’s exactly what you need to take your site to the next level!
What Is Moz?
Moz began in 2004, created by Rand Fishkin and Gillian Muessig. It was first an SEO consulting firm, but later, they made their own SEO tool.
Moz, like Semrush, is a versatile SEO tool.
You can do site audits, backlink analysis, and keyword research with it. But that’s where the similarities with other tools end.
What’s awesome is that a lot of Moz’s features are free.
So, if you’re tight on budget and can’t spend on SEO tools yet, Moz’s free services are a great choice.
Here are some free tools from Moz:
- Link Explorer – Keep track of your links and find new link-building opportunities.
- Keyword Explorer – It helps you discover the best keywords.
- MozBar – This is a Google Chrome extension. It lets you see a website’s Page Authority (PA) and Domain Authority (DA).
You can also do keyword research and link analysis directly from your browser, without going to the dashboard.
You can download MozBar for Chrome for free.
Moz is popular among both beginners and experienced SEO professionals due to its user-friendly interface and comprehensive data. It’s often used alongside other SEO tools for a more complete approach to SEO.
Semrush vs Moz: Key Differences
| Feature/Aspect | SEMrush | Moz |
|---|---|---|
| Launch Year | 2008 | 2004 |
| User Base | Over 10 million users worldwide | Widely used in the SEO community |
| Key Offerings | All-in-one SEO tool | SEO toolset with a focus on simplicity and ease of use |
| Keyword Database Size | Over 25 billion keywords | Over 500 million keywords |
| Unique Features | – Search intent identification – CRM project management tools – Phone support | – Provides ranking data for multiple search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo) – User-friendly interface |
| Site Audit | Extensive site audit with health percentage | Standard site audit features |
| Position Tracking | Tracks up to 500 keywords in the cheapest plan | Tracks up to 300 keywords in the cheapest plan |
| Backlink Analysis | Deep link analysis and identification of toxic backlinks | Standard backlink analysis and tracking |
| Reporting Features | Advanced reporting with customizable PDFs | Standard reporting features |
| Social Media Analysis | Comprehensive analysis including management and optimization | Not a primary feature |
| Starting Price | Pro Plan: $129.95/month | Standard Plan: $99/month |
| Free Trial | 7 days | 30 days |
| Additional Offerings | – Sensor for measuring search result volatility – Ad builder and content insights – Post tracking for page tracking errors | – Free tools like Link Explorer, Keyword Explorer, and MozBar – Comprehensive SEO and content marketing resources |
| Data Collection Methods | Uses machine learning algorithms and data from various sources | Crawls and indexes links, collects data from third-party sources |
| Market Focus | Suitable for businesses, agencies, and enterprises | Ideal for beginners, startups, and small to mid-size businesses |
| Try Semrush ⟶ | Try Moz Pro ⟶ |
Semrush vs Moz: Comparisons
Let’s compare Semrush vs Moz based on some of the key aspects:
- Keyword Research
- Link Building
- SEO Audits
- Ease of Use
- Pricing Plans
- Free Trial Duration
- Support & Community
By the end, you’ll have a better understanding of which tool to choose for your needs. Overall, both tools have strengths and weaknesses.
However, there’s a lot you need to know.
Keyword Research
Both Semrush and Moz make the process of keyword research a breeze.
Pop a keyword into their ‘keyword overview’ tools, and bam! You get all the must-know info: how often it’s searched, how hard it is to rank for, who’s on top for that keyword, and similar keywords to consider.
Both of the software use a 100-point scale for analyzing keyword difficulty, where a higher score means it’s tougher to rank.
Moz and Semrush help you pick the right keywords, ones you’ve got a solid shot at ranking for. How? By checking the search volume (how many times it’s Googled monthly) and the keyword difficulty score.
SEMrush is amazing for its huge keyword database. They have over 25 billion keywords in their database! That’s a lot, right?
The tool estimates how many links you’d need to rank for a phrase. This info can be very useful while making fast SEO decisions.
Semrush also goes a step further in keyword research.
It adds context by showing search intent: whether a keyword is ‘informational’ (looking for answers), ‘commercial’ (exploring brands or services), ‘navigational’ (finding a specific site), or ‘transactional’ (ready to buy something). This feature is very useful when filtering through keyword suggestions.
Semrush’s ‘Keyword Magic’ tool might give you a long list of suggestions with thousands of keywords. But the ‘search intent’ menu lets you quickly weed out irrelevant ones, focusing on those with a business value.
Moz, on the other hand, has a ‘priority score’ feature.
The score tells you how much effort you should put into ranking for a phrase. It calculates this based on the traffic a keyword brings, its ranking difficulty, and the rate of organic clicks it gets.
Semrush also includes a ‘trend’ graph in its keyword overview, a helpful snapshot of a keyword’s popularity over time. Moz doesn’t offer this.
Additionally, Semrush has topic clustering feature. It helps you identify keywords around a phrase to build topical authority.
Winner: Semrush
Link Building
Both Moz and Semrush let you check backlinks of a website.
They both have their own huge web databases.
Semrush boasts 25 billion keywords, 43 trillion backlinks, and 808 million domain profiles. Moz, on the other hand, has 40.7 trillion links, 718 million domains, 7 trillion pages, and 1.25 billion keywords. So, Semrush might seem to have an edge in finding more backlinks to your website.
When comparing backlink analysis, both tools offer details like ‘dofollow’ vs ‘nofollow’ links, anchor text, and active versus lost links.
Semrush steps it up with extra data like outbound links and backlinks by country. It also has more filters for sifting through backlink data.
Overall, the presentation of this data in Semrush is more user-friendly for beginners, with graphs making it easier to grasp the information.
Now, for building backlinks, Moz and Semrush have ‘link intersect’ tools.
Moz’s ‘Link Intersect tool’ and Semrush’s ‘Backlink Gap tool’ show you websites linking to your competitors but not to you.
Moz lets you compare against five other sites, while Semrush limits it to four.
But Semrush shines here with its ‘Link building tool’. It suggests potential link opportunities based on your content and even gives email addresses for outreach. It works as a personal assistant for link building.
Additionally, Semrush offers an ‘overall toxicity score’.
It helps identify spammy links you can ask Google to ignore. Semrush even tries to find contact details for these link owners.
Moz also finds risky links but doesn’t make it as straightforward. You’ll need to manually sift through them in a spreadsheet.
So, in my experience with Semrush vs Moz, I find Semrush offers a more robust set of tools for backlink analysis and building new links.
If you want lots of backlink data and like to see what your competition is doing, Semrush might be your favorite SEO tool. But if you want something simpler and user-friendly, then Moz could be better for you.
Winner: Semrush
SEO Audits
Moz and Semrush both let you SEO audit your website.
They help you find technical and on-page SEO issues on your site.
Semrush calls their tool ‘Site Audit‘, while Moz names it ‘Site Crawl’. Both tools check for things that could be lowering your website’s ranking on search engines. They look for duplicate content, crawl errors, missing headings, too many keywords, and slow website performance.
Overall, the Site Audit tool in Semrush is easier to use than Moz’s. It puts everything in one dashboard and offers more details.
Semrush warns you if there are issues with structured data, JavaScript, or hreflang tags. On the other hand, Moz requires more navigating to find the info. You might also need to go through several sections like ‘on-demand crawl’, ‘redirects issues’, and ‘page grader’.
Moz isn’t far behind, though.
You can enter a webpage URL and a keyword, and it shows you a clear list of improvements to rank better for that keyword.
Semrush’s on-page SEO checker, however, checks your entire site, not just one page. It gives you a prioritized list of tips for every page. It includes advice on keywords, appearing as a Google ‘featured snippet’, improving copy and meta descriptions, getting backlinks, content length, and internal linking.
Also, when Semrush finds an issue, you can send it directly to Trello or another tool via Zapier. This helps your team fix the issue quickly.
Semrush even has a simple CRM tool for keeping track of SEO tasks.
So, when comparing Semrush vs Moz for website audits, both give valuable information for improving your site’s technical and on-page SEO. But, Semrush seems to put more info in one place, making it easier.
Winner: Semrush
Ease of Use
Semrush and Moz are both great tools, but when it comes to user-friendliness, Semrush stands out. Its menus make more sense and its dashboards bring together information in a clearer way. If you’re into graphs showing data, you’ll love how Semrush does it. It gives you a quick look at SEO details, while with Moz, you might have to click around more to find what you need.
Moz isn’t hard to use, but Semrush’s design feels more straightforward.
Also, you’ll like the extra help Semrush offers in its tools – Next to each data point, there’s an icon explaining what it means.
Plus, if there’s an error in a site audit, Semrush offers a helpful link telling you why and how to fix it. This makes solving problems easier.
Especially for site audits, Semrush is easier to use. The instructions it gives for boosting your search results are clear and to the point.
And if you’re into link building without the hassle of exporting tons of Excel files, Semrush is the better choice. Its CRM-style approach lets you keep everything in one place, even letting you email site owners directly from the app.
Winner: Semrush
Pricing Plans
Cost of Semrush
Semrush has four plans:
- Pro: $129.95 a month
- Guru: $249.95 a month
- Business: $499.95 a month
- Custom: price varies.
If you pay for a whole year upfront, you can save up to 17%.
Plus, there’s a free trial of 7 days to try Semrush.
Cost of Moz Pro
Moz Pro has five subscription plans:
- Standard: $99 a month
- Medium: $179 a month
- Large: $299 a month
- Premium: $599 a month
- Moz Enterprise: price varies.
Paying annually gets you a 20% discount, and Moz offers a 30-day free trial, which is pretty generous compared to others.
When comparing Semrush vs Moz for value, you should know that both of the tools limit how many projects (or ‘campaigns’) you can run, which is key for things like website audits and rank tracking.
Moz allows 3 to 50 campaigns, depending on your plan, with an option to add more for $10 each per month. Semrush offers 5 to 40, but you can’t add more unless you get a custom plan.
Additionally, Semrush plans start with just one user. Adding more costs extra – $45 to $100 per month, depending on the plan. Moz starts with one user for its cheapest plan but includes more users in higher plans (up to 5 for Premium). Extra users cost $49 each, no matter the plan.
Free Trial Duration
When comparing the free trial durations of Semrush vs Moz, there’s a noticeable difference you’ll find. Semrush typically offers a 7-day free trial, but sometimes you’ll find special promotions that extends this to 14 days.
On the other hand, Moz stands out with a generous 30-day free trial, giving you a full month to explore its tools and features.
So, if you are looking for a longer trial period and need ample time to evaluate the tool’s effectiveness for your SEO needs.
Support & Community
When you’re comparing Semrush vs Moz, especially for customer support, the winner is Semrush. It gives you more ways to get help. You can call them, chat live, or send an email. Moz has two options: email or live chat.
If you need to talk to someone quickly, both Semrush and Moz let you use live chat right after you log in.
To call Semrush, just click the ‘contact us’ button at the bottom.
Also, Moz helps only in English.
But Semrush? They’re really ahead here. They offer support in 13 languages. That’s a big deal if English isn’t your first language.
Winner: Semrush
Semrush vs Moz: Verdict
Okay, let’s sum this up — Semrush vs Moz showdown.
When it comes to choosing the right SEO and digital marketing tool, making the right choice is critical. After all, your success depends on it.
I’ve looked closely at both, and here’s my honest opinion: If you’re aiming for the stars with your site, Semrush is your rocket!
Why am I leaning towards Semrush?
Well, it’s packed with over 25 billion keywords and loads of features to explore. It shines in almost every aspect as we discussed already.
And if you’re thinking, “This sounds complicated,” don’t worry!
Semrush is surprisingly user-friendly.
It’s designed to make SEO understandable, even if you’re just starting out. Plus, with their 7-day free trial, you can take it for a spin.
So, if you’re asking me, I’d say give Semrush a try.
