Ahrefs Pricing (2026): Plans, Credits, Add-ons, Free Plan
Ahrefs has a free plan for your own websites and five paid plans. Starter costs $29 a month for light research. The full suite starts with Lite at $129 a month, then Standard at $249 and Advanced at $449; paying yearly cuts these by about 17% ($1,290, $2,490 and $4,490 a year). Enterprise costs $1,499 a month on an annual contract.
Most freelancers outgrow Lite's 1,000 monthly credits and choose Standard. Pick Advanced for 50 projects, 5,000 tracked keywords and 5 years of history. Budget for extras: additional users cost $40 to $100 a month each, AI Content Helper starts at $99 a month, Report Builder is $99, and Brand Radar's AI index starts at $199.
Prices checked 25 September 2026 on Ahrefs's official pricing page. Prices are in US dollars unless stated and can change at any time.
Ahrefs plans and prices
Ahrefs Free
- Site Explorer for verified sites, with up to 1,000 backlinks and keywords visible
- Site Audit with 5,000 crawl credits per project a month
- Web Analytics for up to 1 million events per project a month
- 1 AI Content Helper document a month
- Unlimited verified websites
- No research on competitors or sites you do not own
Starter
- Dashboard, Site Explorer, Keywords Explorer, Site Audit, Rank Tracker and Web Analytics
- 200 credits a month for most tools, plus 500 extra for verified projects
- Site Audit and Rank Tracker use their own limits, not credits
- No extra users, credits or add-ons
- You cannot downgrade to Starter from a higher plan
Lite
- 5 projects, 750 tracked keywords (weekly updates)
- 5 AI prompts tracked daily in Brand Radar (150 checks a month)
- 100,000 crawl credits a month and 6 months of history
- API and MCP access (100 rows per request)
- 1,000 credits per user a month; 2,500 rows per report
- Report Builder with 5 reports
- 1 user included; up to 2 more at $40/month each
- No Content Explorer, Portfolios or Batch Analysis
Standard
- 20 projects, 2,000 tracked keywords
- 10 AI prompts tracked daily (300 checks a month)
- 500,000 crawl credits a month and 2 years of history
- Unlimited credits per user; 30,000 rows per report
- Content Explorer, Portfolios, Batch Analysis and SERP comparison
- AI keyword suggestions, clusters, search intents and broken-link reports
- 1 user included; up to 5 more at $60/month each
Advanced
- 50 projects, 5,000 tracked keywords
- 20 AI prompts tracked daily (600 checks a month)
- 1.5 million crawl credits a month and 5 years of history
- Looker Studio integration
- Report Builder with 15 reports; 500 API rows per request
- 1 user included; up to 10 more at $80/month each
Enterprise
- From 3 users; unlimited extra users at $100/month each
- 100 projects and from 10,000 tracked keywords
- From 83 daily AI prompts (2,500 checks a month)
- Uncapped API access and custom API endpoints
- SSO, access management, audit log and unlimited history
Brand Radar AI
- AI Visibility Index built from Ahrefs' keyword data (475M+ prompts, per the pricing page)
- $199/month per AI platform index, or $699/month for all platforms (Ahrefs pricing data)
- Mentions, citations and share of voice for any brand
- Index re-tested monthly, not daily
- Your own daily prompts need a plan allowance or a prompt package
Custom prompt packages
- Basic: 2,500 checks a month (about 80 prompts daily on 1 platform)
- Growth: 7,000 checks a month (about 100 prompts daily on 2 platforms)
- Scale: 25,000 checks a month
- Overage $0.020, $0.015 or $0.010 per check
- Claude uses 8 checks per update
Is there a free plan?
Ahrefs Free (the renamed Ahrefs Webmaster Tools) costs nothing and needs no card. You verify that you own a website, then get Site Explorer data for it with up to 1,000 backlinks and keywords visible, Site Audit with 5,000 crawl credits per project a month, Web Analytics for up to 1 million events per project, and one AI Content Helper document a month. It does not let you research competitors. Ahrefs does not advertise a free trial of its paid plans: its pricing FAQ says it never runs discounts and points site owners to Ahrefs Free instead.
What you will actually pay
Worked examples using the published prices above.
| Scenario | Cost | How we got there |
|---|---|---|
| Freelancer on Lite, billed yearly | $1,290/year ($107.50/month) | 12 x $129 = $1,548 on monthly billing, so paying yearly saves $258. |
| Small agency on Standard with 2 extra users | $369/month ($4,428/year on monthly billing) | $249 + 2 x $60 = $369; 12 x $369 = $4,428. |
| In-house team of 5 on Advanced with AI Content Helper | $868/month | $449 (Advanced) + 4 extra users x $80 + $99 (AI Content Helper, 50 documents) = $868. |
| Lite plus Brand Radar's AI index for one platform | $328/month | $129 (Lite) + $199 (one AI platform index) = $328. All platforms instead: $129 + $699 = $828. |
Ahrefs pricing compared with rivals
| Tool | Paid plans from | Free plan | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ahrefs | $29/month (Starter); full suite from $129/month (Lite), or $107.50/month billed yearly | Yes: Ahrefs Free (formerly Ahrefs Webmaster Tools), for websites you verify | The tool on this page |
| Semrush | $139.95/month, or $117.33/month billed yearly (SEO plan) | Yes: 10 reports a day, 1 project | Broader toolset; Semrush One adds 50 to 200 daily AI prompts from $199 a month. |
| SE Ranking | $129/month, or $103.20/month billed yearly (Core) | No free plan; 14-day free trial, no card | Core tracks 2,000 keywords and 100 AI prompts daily, against 750 and 5 on Ahrefs Lite. |
| Moz Pro | $49/month (Starter); Standard $99, or $79 billed yearly | No free plan; free trial on Medium | Cheaper, simpler suite; Standard tracks 300 keywords and 50 AI prompts weekly. |
| Surfer | $59/month, or $49/month billed yearly (Discovery) | No free plan; 7-day free trial of Pro | A content optimiser, cheaper than adding Ahrefs' $299 Content Kit, but no backlink data. |
| Otterly.AI | $29/month (Lite, 15 prompts) | No free plan; free trial | AI tracking only, with unlimited team members; 15 daily prompts against 5 on Ahrefs Lite. |
Yes, if you use it every week for links and competitor research. Standard at $249 a month ($207.50 on yearly billing) is the plan most working SEOs need, with unlimited credits and 2 years of history. Lite at $129 sits close to Semrush's $139.95 SEO plan, but its 1,000 monthly credits run out quickly for daily users.
The weak spot is AI. Five to 20 tracked prompts is a small allowance, and the full AI index costs $199 to $699 a month more. If AI-answer tracking is your main goal, SE Ranking Core tracks 100 prompts daily for $129 a month, and Otterly.AI starts at $29. Compare every option on our Ahrefs alternatives page or in our best AI visibility tools ranking.
Monthly vs yearly billing
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed yearly | Yearly saving |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | $29/month | Not offered | None |
| Lite | $129/month | $107.50/month ($1,290/year) | $258 |
| Standard | $249/month | $207.50/month ($2,490/year) | $498 |
| Advanced | $449/month | $374.17/month ($4,490/year) | $898 |
| Enterprise | Not offered | $1,499/month (annual commitment) | None |
Savings compare 12 monthly payments with one yearly payment. Ahrefs' FAQ says you switch an existing plan to annual billing by contacting support. Prices are in USD as listed on Ahrefs' pricing page on 25 September 2026.
Add-ons and Brand Radar pricing
| Add-on | Monthly price | What it adds |
|---|---|---|
| AI Content Helper | $99 | 50 documents a month |
| Content Kit | $299 | 250 documents, AI Content Grader, Content Inventory (coming) |
| Report Builder | $99 | 50 reports, 500 widgets, scheduling |
| Project Boost Pro | $20 per project | IndexNow auto-submit, Ask AI in Site Audit, faster always-on audit, AI detection for 1,000 URLs per crawl |
| Project Boost Max | $200 per project | Patches, batch AI in Site Audit, unlimited AI detection, fastest always-on audit |
| Brand Radar AI Visibility Index | From $199 per AI platform; $699 for all | Research any brand across Ahrefs' prompt index |
| Custom prompts Basic / Growth / Scale | $50 / $100 / $250 | 2,500 / 7,000 / 25,000 checks a month |
One check is one prompt on one AI platform in one location. Tracking 5 prompts daily on one platform uses about 150 checks a month, which is exactly Lite's allowance.
- Start with Ahrefs Free on your own sites. Many small site owners never need more, and it tells you whether Ahrefs' data suits your market before you pay.
- Pay yearly only after a month of real use. It saves about 17%, but Ahrefs rarely refunds, and you switch to annual billing by contacting support.
- Leave pay-as-you-go credits switched off unless you set a budget. They bill automatically once you pass your limits.
- Before buying a Brand Radar prompt package, use the 5 to 20 prompts in your plan, and track Claude weekly rather than daily: each Claude update costs 8 checks.
- If you only need content optimisation, compare Surfer ($49 a month yearly) with the $99 to $299 Content Kit before you add it.
Jargon explained
- Backlink
- A link from another website to yours. Search engines treat links from trusted sites as a sign your page deserves to rank.
- Credits
- Ahrefs' monthly allowance for research reports. Starter includes 200 and Lite 1,000 per user; Standard and above are unlimited.
- Keyword difficulty
- A 0 to 100 estimate of how hard it will be to reach the first page of Google for a keyword.
- Check (Brand Radar)
- One AI prompt run on one AI platform in one location. Ahrefs prices custom AI tracking by the number of checks.
- MCP
- Model Context Protocol, a standard that lets AI assistants such as Claude or ChatGPT connect to outside tools and pull in live data. See what MCP is.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Ahrefs cost per month?
Starter costs $29 a month. The full suite costs $129 (Lite), $249 (Standard) or $449 (Advanced) a month, or $107.50, $207.50 and $374.17 a month on yearly billing. Enterprise is $1,499 a month on an annual contract.
Does Ahrefs have a free plan or free trial?
It has a free plan, Ahrefs Free, for websites you verify. It does not advertise a free trial of its paid plans; its FAQ points website owners to Ahrefs Free instead.
What is the Ahrefs Starter plan?
A $29-a-month plan launched in September 2024 for beginners. It includes Site Explorer, Keywords Explorer, Site Audit, Rank Tracker and Web Analytics with 200 credits a month for most tools. It is billed monthly only, and you cannot add users or credits.
What are Ahrefs credits?
Credits are Ahrefs' monthly allowance for research tools. Starter includes 200 and Lite 1,000 per user; Standard and above are unlimited. Site Audit and Rank Tracker have separate limits. Pay-as-you-go credits are optional and bill automatically.
Does Ahrefs offer refunds?
Rarely. Ahrefs says it does not issue refunds in general. On monthly plans you can ask for a refund if you have not used the service, but it may refuse if it sees activity on the account. Cancelled plans run to the end of the paid period.
How much is Ahrefs Brand Radar?
Paid plans include 5 to 20 daily prompts. The AI Visibility Index starts at $199 a month per AI platform ($699 for all), and custom prompt packages cost $50, $100 or $250 a month for 2,500 to 25,000 checks.
Sources
Every fact on this page comes from public information. Vendor figures are labelled as vendor claims.
- Ahrefs plans and pricing (Ahrefs)
- Introducing the Ahrefs Starter plan (Ahrefs)
- Ahrefs Free (Ahrefs Webmaster Tools) (Ahrefs)
- Brand Radar (Ahrefs)
- AI Content Helper (Ahrefs)
- Ahrefs big data (Ahrefs)
- About Ahrefs (Ahrefs)
- How frequently do my tracked keywords get updated? (Ahrefs Help Center)
- Letaido (Letaido)
- Yep (search engine) (Wikipedia)
- Ahrefs reviews (Capterra)
- Ahrefs reviews (Trustpilot)
- Semrush plans and pricing (Semrush)
- SE Ranking subscription plans (SE Ranking)
- Moz Pro pricing (Moz)
- Surfer pricing (Surfer)
- OtterlyAI pricing (OtterlyAI)
- About Search Console (Google)