Ahrefs vs Screaming Frog SEO Spider

Two SEO & local search tools side by side. Prices are the starting plan a small business would pick, in USD.

Compare	AhrefsAhrefs	Screaming Frog SEO SpiderScreaming Frog
In one line	Backlink and keyword data preferred by SEO specialists	Desktop site crawler, free up to 500 URLs
Starting price	Free	Free
Six-person team	$0/mo	$0/mo
Plans	Free plan; Starter $29/mo; Lite $129/mo; Standard $249/mo; Advanced $449/mo; up to 17% off annual	Free up to 500 URLs; licence $279/yr per user (about $23/mo); $265, $249, or $235 each when buying 5 or more
Pricing model	Free tier	Free tier
Free trial	—	—
Users	1 on Lite	Per licence
Integrations	Google Search Console, Analytics, WordPress	Google Analytics, Google Search Console, PageSpeed Insights
Team size	2–10 people · 11–50 people · 51–200 people	Just me · 2–10 people · 11–50 people
Available in	US · UK · CA · AU	US · UK · CA · AU
Phone support	None listed	None listed
Live chat	Plans not stated	None listed
Support hours	Not published	Not published
Incidents posted	We found no public status page for Ahrefs.	We found no public status page for Screaming Frog.
Capterra score	4.7 / 5 from 585 reviews	4.9 / 5 from 134 reviews
Trustpilot score	2.2 / 5 from 322 reviews	Not listed
Fit: Retail shop	40	30
Fit: Restaurant or café	30	25
Fit: Service business	55	45
Fit: Agency or studio	92	92
Fit: Trades or contractor	40	25
Fit: Online store	80	70
Why people pick it	Free tier for your own site Best backlink data	Free for small sites Finds technical problems fast
Where it falls short	Paid plans priced for pros Credit limits on Lite	Technical output Runs on your computer
	Visit Ahrefs ↗	Visit Screaming Frog SEO Spider ↗

Six-person prices are what a team of six would pay on the published plans; "Not listed" means those plans don't cover six. How we calculate prices