SE Ranking and Semrush are two popular SEO tools that help businesses with all the essential tools to stay ahead of the competition. This puts one in a tricky situation when trying to understand which one to choose from SE ranking vs Semrush.
Both tools have been catering to bloggers, business owners, and small agencies for a very long time. If you are already searching about Semrush and SE Ranking, you must have noticed that both platforms offer almost similar features.
That’s why I have done a side-by-side comparison of SE Ranking and Semrush, exploring their core features such as keyword research, on-page and off-page capabilities, and traffic analysis.
I have tried including as many parameters as I can so you can get a detailed comparison and understand which one is right for you.
So, without wasting time, let’s get into the comparison!
SE Ranking vs Semrush: In A Nutshell (2024)
SE Ranking and Semrush are both amazing SEO suites with a well-rounded set of features that can help with all SEO-related tasks. However, both are better than each other in certain ways. Here’s a quick overview of that:
Now, let’s dive deeper into our comparison to understand the performance of both tools on this criteria.
| AI-assisted writing assistant | SE Ranking | Semrush |
| User Interface | Clean and easy-to-navigate UI | Sophisticated interface, learning curve |
| Keyword Database | A keyword database of 7.3 billion keywords | A huge database of 25.4 billion keywords |
| Local SEO | Don’t have many features to improve local SEO | Exceptional features to improve local and organic SEO |
| Rank Tracking | Geographical analysis for specific regions | In-depth keyword and rank tracking |
| Competitor Research | Get data on competitors’ backlinks, keyword positions, and traffic | Side-by-side competitor research and tracking |
| Social Media Management | Provides the ability to manage Instagram and Facebook | Get detailed reports on social analytics, social posters, and influencer analytics |
| Writing Assistant | AI-assited writing assistant | SEO-optimized writing assistant |
| Pricing | Starts at $129.95/month | Starts at $55/month |
| Best For | Individuals, small businesses, and agencies | SEO professionals, large businesses, and agencies |
What is SE Ranking?
SE Ranking is a cloud-based and feature-rich platform for digital marketing professionals that helps you take care of all SEO-related tasks such as rank tracking, competition analysis, website audit, and much more.
The best part about it is that you get everything in a single suite along with an easy-to-use interface. SE Ranking aims to make SEO accessible to everyone, be it a beginner or an expert.
If you want to know more about SE Ranking, check our detailed SE Ranking Review here.
What is Semrush?
Semrush is also a Cloud-based SEO suite that provides many tools and features to help you improve your SEO. Like SE Ranking, it is an all-in-one marketing software you can use to strategize and even automate your SEO and other content marketing campaigns.
Apart from this, Semrush can also help you identify trends for your niche and your social media marketing.
If you are a beginner, Semrush makes the whole concept of SEO easier for you to understand and put to better use.
Check our Semrush Review to learn more about this SEO tool.
SE Ranking vs Semrush: Pros and Cons
Before comparing both platforms, I should look at their advantages and disadvantages. Let’s look at the Pros and Cons of SE Ranking to get started!
SE Ranking Pros and Cons
Pros
- Broad feature set: Compared to Semrush, SE Ranking offers a decent set of SEO tools at an affordable rate. From backlink analysis to website audit and in-depth tracking, you will get access to every aspect of SEO.
- Exceptional keyword and competitor research: With this tool, you can track 20 competitors and thousands of keywords at once with detailed SEO metrics and stats.
- In-built content marketing tools: If we ignore Semrush’s writing assistant tool, SE Ranking is equally capable of optimizing content for SEO and Google.
- Report functionality: You can seamlessly share reports for team members and clients. Its report builder helps you create custom reports and schedule automated reports for specific dates.
- Value for Money: Compared to Semrush, SE Ranking offers an all-in-one SEO solution at a lower price point.
Cons
- Agency pack: This add-on is only available with the annual plans of higher subscriptions.
- No advanced SEO tools: SE Ranking doesn’t include cutting-edge SEO tools like Semrush.
- Limited social media management: SE Ranking’s SMM tool is very basic and limited compared to Semrush.
After getting to know about the pros and cons of SE Ranking, now let’s focus on the pros and cons of Semrush.
Semrush Pros and Cons
Pros
- Huge keyword database: Semrush’s keyword magic tool retrieves data from 25.4 billion keywords, whereas SE Ranking has a keyword database of 7.3 billion keywords.
- Extensive keyword and backlink metrics: The tool evaluates backlink and keyword opportunities with every possible data metric.
- Robust link-building features: Semrush’s link-building tool is second to none. The tool provides access to all the necessary tools you need to track and manage your outreach campaigns.
- Complete SEO feature set: Semrush is a complete SEO suite that includes solutions for your on-page and off-page SEO requirements.
- Ample usage allowance: Despite being an advanced SEO platform, Semrush offers a generous usage allowance on all its tools.
Cons
- Complex user interface: The user interface of Semrush is not beginner-friendly. Plus, there are too many tools jammed in one place, which can be a bit overwhelming.
- Expensive pricing plans: Compared to SE Ranking plans, Semrush’s plans, user seats, and add-ons are very costly.
- Google-centric data: If you want to retrieve data from other search engines like YouTube or Bing, Semrush won’t be very helpful as it only focuses on Google.
Now, we’re ready to dive deep into comparing both these SEO suites. Let’s do that!
#1. User Experience
The UI of SE Ranking is clean, with all the features easily accessible and well-organized. The dashboard has a top bar incorporating all the essential features, such as keyword research, competitive research, etc. Then, you get a whole set of features on your left, which shows all the details about your project.
Semrush, on the other hand, divides all its features into various toolkits. And when you click on the toolkits, the tools and their associated features are displayed.
This organization helps it keep things less cluttered despite the large number of features and tools it has to offer. However, it can still be a bit more complex to navigate for a first-time user of SEO tools.
Which has better user experience?
After analyzing both platforms, I can say that SE Ranking provides a better user experience for beginners with easier access to all the features. While Semrush is also built with a well-designed interface, it might be a bit overwhelming for new users due to its sheer number of tools and features. But eventually, everyone can learn their way around it, and then it can be quite easy to navigate.
#2. Keyword Research
Keyword research is the part where both Semrush and SE Ranking excel. Both tools offer three main sections for keyword research:
- Keyword Overview
- Related Keywords
- SERP Analysis
Keyword Overview
Keyword overview provides a spot-on overview of a specific keyword on the basis of search volume, keyword difficulty, search intent, and CPC for a selected country/region.
I searched for the keyword ‘best running shoes,’ I got two fairly different keyword overviews from both tools.
Since the last update (which was too basic), SE Ranking’s keyword overview is now similar to Semrush’s. Now, it has added more keyword metrics and infographics to show an in-depth overview.
The same goes for Semrush. It instantly came up with the keyword’s search volume, difficulty, and global data for top countries (high to low search volume).
As you can see in the images, both tools came up with keyword search volume, keyword difficulty, trend, CPC, and global data. The data didn’t exactly match, but they were pretty close.
Since it is a commercial keyword, the keyword difficulty should be higher. Semrush is showing a KD of 63, while SE Ranking came up 35. So, how do we overcome this difficulty?
Semrush has a “Keyword Clusters” section where the tool simply breaks the keyword into hundreds of possible ranking and related keywords with a low KD. SE Ranking doesn’t have this instant feature, and you will need to use the Keyword Grouping tool to cluster keywords.
Related Keywords
SE Ranking’s Keyword Suggestions and Semrush’s Keyword Magic Tool are the tools to find related and semantic keywords. Since both tools offer tons of related keywords, filter them by:
- Keyword Difficulty (KD)
- SERP Features
- Volume
- CPC
Here is the result of using respective tools to get related keywords.
SE Ranking’s result was simple and well-categorized. Semrush’s result was a little bit complex, but it was detailed. You can also break down the chart by the number and volume.
The number of keywords was also different. Semrush listed over 25k keywords, while SE ranking listed only 6.5k keywords. It shows how big Semrush’s database is compared to SE Ranking.
However, you can filter all the keywords by relevancy, intent, exact matches, and KD with both tools.
SERP Analysis
The third section is SERP Analysis, where you can get an overview of top-ranking pages for the related keyword. With both tools, you can check organic traffic, page authority, and keywords they are ranking for.
Both tools show search total traffic and backlinks, while other metrics are different. SE Ranking only showed the top 10 results for the first page, but the metrics were pretty relevant and helpful. You can see the search results of 100+ pages with Semrush, but the data metrics were basic.
SE Ranking focuses more on organic traffic and keywords, so you can also see the changes in rankings. The sheet exactly shows how the page has moved up or down in its position rank.
Which tool is better for keyword research?
Semrush is more reliable and data-centric compared to SE Ranking for keyword research. It provides more data points that help the user be more specific with their keyword research and, as a result, understand the search intent.
Our in-depth tests also show how accurate is Semrush.
#3. Off-page SEO Features
SE Ranking has many SEO tools and features that can help you with link building and other off-page SEO activities. Its backlink checker tool gives you access to your and your competitor’s backlink profile.
Through this profile, you can get data regarding your competitors’ domain and page authority scores and identify the websites lending to their authority. You can also analyze the dofollow-nofollow backlinks ratio, broken backlinks, etc.
A keyword rank tracker in SE Ranking can track your rankings for different keywords in popular search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo, and YouTube.
The rankings can be tracked based on location and device, providing data on positions and SERP features driving your traffic.
Semrush, on the other hand, helps you with your link-building and off-page SEO by offering 5 tools — backlink analysis, backlink audit tool, bulk backlink analysis, backlink gap analysis, and link-building tool. With the help of these tools, you can compare your backlink profile with up to 5 competing domains at a time.
It also provides a keyword rank tracker that works like the rank tracker of SE Ranking but provides a better understanding of movement in your rankings with charts and graphics. It also incorporates a filter to analyze the data and single out those keywords, generating traffic through SERP features other than the main rankings.
Which tool is better for off-page SEO?
Semrush provides more detailed backlink profiles than SE Ranking, and its rank tracker is also more visually appealing and well-designed. You can also use its link-building tool to automate your backlink outreach campaigns. Overall, I find Semrush to be a better choice than SE Ranking for off-page SEO.
Bonus tools lists:
#4. On-page SEO Features
The on-page SEO checker by SE Ranking provides an on-page performance score based on how well you have optimized your website. Then, it suggests the various steps you can implement to improve your on-page SEO.
The suggestions are based on the top 5 competitors of SERP on the page you are looking into. There’s also a website audit tool that can tell you the overall health of your website.
Semrush, on the other hand, has 3 tools for on-page SEO. The site audit tool by Semrush crawls your website in the blink of an eye and provides action solutions to fix the issues.
Next, the on-page SEO checker crawls the individual pages and gives you a detailed report on content lengths, readability, markups, and keyword usage.
Lastly, you can use its log file analyzer to analyze your error logs and discover the crawl errors that occur when a Google crawler interacts with your site.
The features concerning site auditing are more or less the same, which shows the site’s health and several signals, such as loading speed, usability, and localization. However, Semrush seems to provide a more detailed report about each.
Which tool is better for on-page SEO?
The on-page SEO features are on par with each other and do not differ significantly. However, Semrush digs deeper and provides more precise and detailed recommendations regarding on-page SEO. Also, its integration with Google Analytics, Search Console, and log file analyzer makes it better than SE Ranking.
#5. Local SEO Features
SE Ranking does not have any tools or features related to local SEO at the moment. However, they plan to launch those features soon as per their local SEO page. Their only tool for Local SEO is a local search rank tracker that finds out how your business ranks in local search results.
Semrush, on the other hand, has a complete toolkit for local SEO that will help you create the perfect strategy to get your website ranked in local search results. The listing management tool lets you track your local ranking progress on a ZIP code level.
Using its position-tracking tool, you can also follow your performance in local search results. Lastly, the social media toolkit has special tools to track and enhance your social media performance within a region.
Which tool is excels is local SEO?
Semrush is a perfect choice here as it has all the features related to local SEO, which can take your business to another level. SE Ranking, on the other hand, has just a local rank tracker. It is on the verge of acquiring other local SEO features, but it currently doesn’t have them.
#6. Traffic Analytics
SE Ranking has an SEO report generator that gives you access to unlimited data and information-rich reports. Also, it takes only 15 mins to come up with a report. This report generator also integrates with Google Analytics and Search Console to provide you with a detailed report of your website’s performance in one place. The reports can also be white-labeled with your brand name and logo.
Semrush is also packed with a wide range of reporting features and templates that can help users easily generate reports of their choice.
You can also create custom reports from various marketing channels and white-label the reports with your brand name and logo. However, reports generated by Semrush are heavier in numbers and less in graphics and visual representation of data.
Which tool gives better traffic analytics?
Both SE Ranking and Semrush integrate with Google Analytics and Search Console, and both can generate any kind of report. Both also allow you to white-label the reports.
However, Semrush reports are heavier in numbers and less in graphics, so they may be difficult to analyze. So, I’d recommend SE Ranking over Semrush for easy-to-understand traffic analytics.
#7. Other Features
In this section, I’ll talk about other features both these SEO suites offer their customers.
Apart from the features mentioned above, SE Ranking has some additional features that can help you with other tasks related to your website’s SEO. They include:
- Keyword Grouper: This tool helps avoid keyword cannibalization issues and allows users to group keywords from SERPs.
- Index Status Checker: This tool lets the user check if search engines have indexed a particular page or not.
Now let’s talk about the extra features offered by Semrush:
- Link Building Tool: This tool can help you come up with high-quality backlinks for your site.
- Backlink Audit: This tool aims to assess the quality of the incoming links so that you can remove the low-quality links.
- Social media scheduling and automation: Semrush also allows you to manage and schedule posts from its dashboard to your social media accounts.
SE Ranking and Semrush both have some additional tools that are unique to each and can help the user improve the SEO of their website in many ways. These tools are all equally important, so there is no clear winner on this criterion.
#8. Reliability and Customer Support
SE Ranking provides multiple options to connect with their support team if you need help. It has a contact form on its website that can be used to submit your support requests.
You can also contact them over email and WhatsApp to get support for any problems. They are only available on weekdays from 9 am to 5 pm.
Semrush also offers three customer support channels: chat, email, and phone. There’s a help chat box at the corner of each page to help you whenever you get stuck. They generally get back to you within a business day’s time.
Which tool offers better support?
Semrush has been in the market for over a decade, so, unsurprisingly, it has robust customer support. They usually get back to you within a day whenever you try to contact them. On the other hand, you can contact SE Ranking’s customer support only on weekdays from 9 am to 5 pm. Therefore, Semrush provides better support than SE Ranking and is more reliable.
#9. Pricing
SE Ranking recently hiked its pricing on all three plans but also increased keyword limits. However, the company is still offering a 14-day free trial on every plan without needing to add card details. Here are the plans:
- Essential plan: This plan is suitable for individuals and businesses with less competition. With access to track 750 keywords daily, they will be able to automate major site optimizations and tasks. However, the plan does not include major SEO research tools and page change monitoring.
Price: $55/month
- Pro plan: This plan generally suits mid-sized businesses as it offers extended data limits and collaboration options with clients. You can track up to 2,000 keywords daily and will be able to use the page change monitoring feature.
Price: $109/month
- Business plan: This plan includes unlimited access to major features with 5 manager seats, so it is best suited to SMBs and large-sized businesses. Plus, you will get access to their API along with the ability to track up to 5,000 keywords daily.
Price: $239/month
If you want a long-term subscription, you can subscribe to SE Ranking’s annual plans and get a flat 20% discount on monthly plans along with free website migration options.
Semrush also has 3 different plans based on the size of your business. Among these, two of them have a free trial period of 14 days so that you can have a better understanding of their offering. Here they are:
- Pro: This plan is for small in-house teams. It allows tracking 500 keywords.
Price: $129.95/ month
- Guru: This plan is more useful for SMEs and marketing consultants. It allows tracking 1500 keywords.
Price: $249.95/ month
- Business: This plan is for large enterprises and agencies. It allows tracking up to 5,000 keywords.
Price: $499.95/ month
You can check our detailed Semrush pricing.
You can also save up to 17% on the annual plans of Semrush.
Which tool is affordable and value for money?
After comparing the pricing of both tools, I can see that Semrush is more expensive than SE Ranking. But it also doesn’t impose any restrictions on the number of keywords. So, SE Ranking is the best choice for people short on budget. But for people who can afford to pay, Semrush is the better choice.
Related Read:
My Verdict: Semrush is our clear winner!
After comparing all the major features, Semrush is undoubtedly a superior tool to SE Ranking.
However, both SEO tools target audiences with different budgets and needs. Here’s a quick verdict:
- SE Ranking: The tool is tailored for beginners, small businesses, and solo entrepreneurs. It is affordable, user-friendly, and great for people with basic SEO knowledge.
- Semrush: This tool is more suitable for SEO specialists, large companies, and SEO agencies. Semrush offers a broader set of advanced features and data analysis, which is why it comes with a higher price tag and a learning curve.
Regardless of the complexity and pricing differences, both platforms offer risk-free 14-day free trials to new users. That means you can use both tools and decide which one is perfect for your SEO needs.
So what are you waiting for? Sign up for your preferred SEO suite today, and thank us later!
You can also explore our list of top SEO tools!
