Are you struggling to choose between Ahrefs and Moz? If so, you have come to the right place.
Ahrefs and Moz are two SEO giants in the digital marketing and SEO industries. Both platforms offer almost similar features to help improve website ranking and SEO performance.
Ahrefs is more sophisticated and advanced, while Moz is intuitive and user-friendly. So which one do you choose?
I will compare Ahrefs and Moz to answer this question in this article. I will compare all the major features and pricing to help you pick between these toolkits.
Ultimate Ahrefs vs. Moz Pro Showdown (2024)
Here’s a quick comparison table to give you an overview of the main differences between Ahrefs and Moz:
| Features | Ahrefs | Moz Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Ease of Use | User-friendly, but some features have a learning curve | Known for an intuitive interface, easier for beginners |
| Keyword Research | A huge keyword database, powerful suggestion tools | Robust keyword research with solid metrics and analysis functions |
| Domain Analysis | Offers an in-depth domain overview | Provides DA metrics and comparison capabilities |
| Backlink Analysis | The largest backlink index with a powerful filtering system | Basic backlink analysis, harmful links |
| Site Audit | Extensive audits with actionable recommendations | Thorough site audit highlighting critical SEO issues |
| Rank Tracking | Accurate tracking across multiple search engines | Tracking with reporting features |
| Pricing | Starts at $99/month | Starts at $99/month |
| Free Trial | No free trial | 30-day free trial |
| Best For | Agencies, enterprise-level SEO | Small to medium-sized businesses |
Ahrefs vs Moz: A Quick Overview
Ahrefs is one of the finest SEO toolkits in the digital marketing field. It provides in-depth insight into backlinks, referring domains, keyword research, and site audits.
SEO experts use the platform to optimize their websites and pages to rank on the first page of SERPs.
Moz is well-known for its keyword research, link-building, and on-page optimization capabilities. It has a user-friendly interface and flexible pricing tier.
So whatever your expertise level in SEO, you will find a set of tools matching your criteria. However, the platform is preferred by small businesses and individual users.
Ahrefs vs Moz – An In-Depth Features Comparison
Now, let’s compare both tools and their features side by side.
1. Keyword Research
With Ahrefs’s Keyword Explorer tool, you can conduct keyword research in multiple search engines. Then the tool comes up with thousands of keywords and phrases with keyword difficulty score, search volume data, and SERP analysis.
Ahrefs:
It also allows you to identify low-competition keywords, analyze competitors’ strategies, and discover long-tail and question-based keyword opportunities.
Moz:
On the other hand, Moz provides basic keyword metrics, such as search volume and keyword difficulty.
However, it lacks the in-depth data and analysis that you will get in Ahrefs.
2. Domain Analysis
Moz and Ahrefs both offer domain analysis features. With this tool, you can get a quick overview of the performance, keywords, traffic, and backlinks of your or your competitors’ websites.
Ahrefs:
On Ahrefs, as soon as you add a project and website domain, it displays all the key metrics in the “Overview” section in the Site Explorer.
As you can see in the image, you will get a detailed and in-depth overview of your domain. From the General section, you can check performance (infographics) in terms of:
- Referring domain
- Domain rating
- Organic traffic
- URL rating
- Organic traffic value
- Organic pages
- Paid traffic
- Paid traffic cost
- Crawled pages
Apart from that, you can also check the organic search value and backlinks profile of your website. The best part about this tool is that it breaks down the overall traffic share country by country (140+).
Moz:
Moz also offers a high level of domain and page-level metrics, such as DA (Domain Authority) and PA (Page Authority). These insights provide a general overview of a site’s authority.
Compared to Ahrefs, the data provided by Moz Pro is not very in-depth, and some metrics are missing as well. For example, you won’t get an estimate of the domain’s traffic.
The best you can do that is connect your Google Analytics account to Moz. This will give you a complete overview of your domain with precise data and ranking information.
3. Rank Tracking
Both Ahrefs and Moz offer rank-tracking features. However, according to my tests, their data and tracking capabilities weren’t up to the mark as other top-rank tracking tools in the market.
Ahrefs:
Ahrefs’s Position Explorer checks domain and sub-domain to provide accurate rank positions on Google. You can track rankings in different locations, devices, and search engines to get a complete picture of how your website is performing in terms of ranking.
You can also use advanced filter options to check ranking based on various factors, such as mobile vs desktop or local vs national rankings. The only downside is that you can check the rankings of guest posts or keywords one at a time.
Moz’s rank tracking capabilities are very basic compared to Ahrefs. It lacks the customization and advanced filtering options that Ahrefs offers.
You won’t be able to get a ranking keyword list out of a URL. It is much more suitable for basic monitoring of a website’s ranking performance.
4. Backlinks And Link Building
Ahrefs is highly praised for its backlink analysis. It has the largest backlink index in the world among top Ahrefs alternatives. Besides a vast database, it provides detailed information on backlink data, referring domains, anchor text, and link types (new, lost, and broken).
Ahrefs:
Talking about its link-building abilities, it features powerful tools like Backlink Gap and Link Intersect tools that help users identify link-building opportunities and monitor competitors’ backlink profiles. Ahrefs also provides metrics such as DR and UR with the backlinks, which can be used to evaluate the quality and potential of backlinks.
Moz:
As for Moz, spotting inbound and outbound links is not as easy as Ahrefs. You will get basic backlink data, including the number of referring domains and anchor text distribution.
The link-building features are also limited on the platform (at least with the basic plans). That makes it less suitable for advanced link-building strategies and competitor analysis.
5. Site Auditing
Coming to one of the essential factors of SEO optimization – Site Auditing.
Ahrefs:
Ahrefs conducts an in-depth site audit for any website to analyze both technical and on-page SEO factors. Once the audit is done, you will get detailed reports on issues such as broken links, duplicate content, and site speed. You will also get recommendations for improving on-page optimization.
The site audit feature of Ahrefs is capable of improving search engine performance, content quality, internal linking structure, and page speed.
Moz:
Moz also offers on-page and technical SEO audits that cover some of the essential elements of SEO, such as page titles, meta descriptions, and HTML structure.
But again, the data level and insights are not similar to Ahrefs. Also, you won’t get recommendations for improving a website’s overall search engine optimization.
6. Ease Of Use Ahrefs vs Moz
After using the core features of Ahrefs and Moz, here’s my overall verdict on both platforms’ user interface.
Ahrefs:
Ahrefs has an intuitive yet user-friendly interface. Features are cleanly lined up and easy to navigate and use. However, some features may be too advanced for beginners. So, it has a learning curve but not as Semrush.
Overall, the platform is designed with SEO professionals in mind. So, they can use flexible filters and customization options to fine-tune their website optimization.
Moz:
On the contrary, Moz’s interface is very straightforward. It doesn’t have a learning curve like Ahrefs or Semrush. All the tools are accessible through the left side of the dashboard. However, you need to check subsections in order to find a specific tool.
In terms of customization and depth of features, Moz seriously lags. That’s why it is more suitable for someone who needs basic SEO tools and easy-to-use features.
7. Support And Resources
I admire how Ahrefs quickly provides step-by-step guides whenever a user is stuck using a specific tool. All you need is to go to the “how to use” with the question mark and check the video tutorial and articles.
Ahrefs:
What’s more, you can find all the articles and guides for all the tools Ahrefs has in its inventory. You can go through them one by one or check whenever you are using the tool.
Moz:
Moz also has a good knowledge base and support system. All the guides and tutorials are focused on the basics of SEO and the usage of Moz tools.
You can access all the guides even if you are not on a subscription. You can sign up with your email and check how the tools work in real-time without subscribing.
Ahrefs vs Moz: Pricing Plans Comparison
Both platforms offer different pricing models, with Ahrefs generally being more expensive than Moz Pro.
Ahrefs:
Ahrefs pricing starts at $99 per month for the Lite plan and goes up to $999 per month for the Agency plan.
- Lite: $99/month or $990/year
- Standard: $199/month or $1,990/year
- Advanced: $399/month or $3,990/year
- Enterprise: $999/month or $9,990/year
Subscribing to the annual plan gives you two months free. Unfortunately, Ahrefs doesn’t offer any free trial or offers a refund policy.
Moz:
Moz also offers four plans ranging from $99 to $599 per month. All the plans cater to different types of users.
- Standard: $99/month or $950/year
- Medium: $179/month or $1,719/year
- Large: $299/month or $2,868/year
- Premium: $599/month or $5,750/year
Unlike Ahrefs, Moz offers a 30-day free trial without any upfront cost. You can choose the Standard or Medium plan and check out all the features for 30 days straight. You can cancel your plan before the trial expires if you don’t want to continue using the services.
Customer Testimonials
To gain a better understanding of how Ahrefs and Moz are observed by their users, let’s take a look at some real customer reviews (both positive and negative aspects):
Ahrefs Customer Reviews:
- Good: Ahrefs is very good to start with SEO projects as it gives all the details of any website by just putting its domain name under the backlink profile, Organic search details, and paid details in one go and comparing organic traffic with competitors on the fly. I can easily find the top pages of any website, which can help in devising the content strategies for our websites. Another feature I like is Keyword Explorer, which provides the keyword with its difficulty and click ratio. Click ratio is very important for us it’s the true metric that makes us understand to make it a primary or secondary keyword.
- Bad: Beyond its link index (and corresponding API), there aren’t a whole lot of features that really help Ahrefs stand out. Further, or perhaps because of that, they continuously increase the pricing while reducing the number of searches you can do for backlinks/sites (again, the primary tool and the one I would guess the vast majority of people use Ahrefs for, whether they admit it or not).
Source: G2
Moz Pro Customer Reviews:
- Good: I quite enjoy using Moz most of the time. It does a lot of different tasks quite well, including keyword research, SERPs ranking monitoring, backlink checking, etc. For budding SEOs on teams with a budget, it’s a useful tool to get started with. I currently use it daily at work, and I find it works great for my main use for it, being tracking rankings both daily and as part of ongoing campaigns to increase our company’s standing in Google searches.
- Bad: My main gripe with this software is that it seems features are often struggling to work correctly. Rank tracker, in particular, has been a source of frustration, with the feature just not working at all for weeks. While it’s not strictly necessary to monitor the day-by-day ranking fluctuation of pages against specific keywords, it’s something that Moz’s rank tracker is supposed to enable you to do, so the fact that it doesn’t work consistently is quite annoying.
Source: GetApp
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Final Verdict: Ahrefs Is The SEO Ninja Tool! Winner!
Ahrefs and Moz are two of the most preferred tools in the SEO industry. However, Ahrefs has a set of more powerful tools than Moz. The data and insights the platform provides are considerably reliable and accurate, too. That’s why it is ideal for SEO professionals and tech-compliant.
Moz, on the other hand, is suitable for small and medium-sized businesses. The tools are good, but they don’t provide deeper data like Semrush or Ahrefs. Still, it can be great starting point for beginners who want to learn more about SEO and optimization.
The selection between both tools depends on your specific needs. If you want to try Moz before investing directly into it, you can start with the free trial.
