Semrush has always been my go-to for all things SEO and keyword research. And it recently updated its platform with a brand-new interface that claims to be an all-in-one marketing toolkit, with tools for social media, advertising, and content marketing, along with its signature SEO tools.
In this Semrush review, I look at all those new tools and see if Semrush still holds the overall number one spot in my heart (and on the Fit Small Business testing methodology).
Skip the read: Semrush is a good tool to add to your marketing stack if you plan to do a lot of content marketing, especially if you blog on your own website. Its recent interface update, which organizes its tools into Toolkits (i.e., SEO Toolkit, Traffic & Market Toolkit, etc.), makes it a lot easier to navigate. However, you’ll get the most out of it with a paid plan, as its free plan puts strict limits on its tools.
Quick recap: What can Semrush do? (+ An interactive Semrush demo)
When I think of Semrush, I automatically think of SEO and keyword research, and those are still the biggest things Semrush can do for your marketing strategy. Semrush is primarily a tool for SEO content marketing, specifically for researching the traffic and competitiveness of keywords to use in your blogs.
Full disclosure: My team uses Semrush to research keywords for this website. But Semrush can also analyze website traffic, conduct SEO audits, build local SEO citations, plan content for your blog, and even generate blog drafts using AI.
Semrush now categorizes its tools into “Toolkits” following its rebrand. You have the SEO toolkit, Traffic & Market toolkit, Social Toolit, and so on. The interactive Semrush demo below explores each of these new toolkits, as well as the tools under each one.
The SEO toolkit, as you’ll find, still sits at the very top, just below the “Home” page. It houses all the SEO and keyword tools, including the Keyword Overview and Keyword Magic tools for researching keywords, as well as Semrush’s website audit tool. Directly below it is the Traffic & Market toolkit, formerly known as “Trends,” showing all your website traffic and competitor insights.
Below those two toolkits are all the other Semrush tools:
- The Local Toolkit for monitoring your local listings, like your Google Business Profile.
- The Content Toolkit for planning blog content.
- The AI toolkit that analyzes your brand ranking on AI search engines.
- The Social and Ad Toolkits for managing your social media posts and online ads, respectively.
What’s interesting about Semrush’s rebrand is that you’ll only need to pay the platform on a toolkit-by-toolkit basis. If you only need the SEO Toolkit, for instance, that’s all you’ll pay for, or both the SEO and Traffic & Market Toolkits, and so on.
Semrush pros and cons from a content marketer
Pricing: 2.75/5
General features: 4.5/5
Advanced features: 4.5/5
Customer support: 2.25/5
Expert score: 4.06/5
I’ve really only had two major drawbacks with Semrush so far in the three years I’ve known it: its convoluted interface and its very limited allowances on the free plan. The recent rebrand somewhat resolved the interface issue, but its pricing and plan structures are still pretty much the same.
You can only do up to 10 search queries a day, which is almost nothing in the realm of keyword research. In fact, many other Semrush reviews also cite its free plan limitations as one of its biggest drawbacks, especially with prices starting at $117.33 to expand your limits.
What I like about Semrush:
- It’s the most comprehensive SEO research and analysis platform by far. Let’s start with Semrush’s biggest advantage and why it’s been my SEO platform of choice for years. It has pretty much every SEO function you need, be it researching the volume of a keyword or doing a health checkup of your website. Semrush even has local SEO insights for your specific area and competitor analysis tools.
- It has social media (and content marketing) tools. Any social media-slash-content marketer will understand why I love that Semrush has tools for both in one platform. Content marketing and social media marketing have many overlaps (shoutout to anyone who also repurposes content), so Semrush having the tools and analytics for both makes the process so much easier, especially for busy folks handling multiple strategies at once.
- It has a free-forever plan. For all its limitations, Semrush’s free-forever plan is still a huge help for many bootstrapped business owners or bloggers who are just getting started with SEO. I started doing keyword research using Semrush’s free plan myself, and it’s still reliable for one-time keyword checks or if you don’t have a full content strategy yet.
What’s not great about Semrush:
- It takes time to navigate and learn. Even with its interface upgrade, Semrush can still be a lot to handle for people who aren’t familiar with SEO or content marketing. It’s a very comprehensive tool, but it’s not exactly beginner-to-SEO or busy-business-owner friendly. This is the kind of tool that requires sitting down at a desktop to navigate before getting the hang of it.
- It has very limited plan allowances (and many add-ons). As mentioned, getting the most use out of Semrush’s tools won’t come cheap. Its free plan only allows up to 10 search queries a day in total, and increasing your limits will start at $117.33 per month (annually, $139.95 monthly).And that doesn’t even cover the additional prices for each toolkit, which range form $20 to $289 a month. For comparison, Ahrefs has SEO plans from $29 a month and Ubersuggest from $12 a month.
- It’s not always updated to Google’s algorithm updates (and its data is primarily for Google). Although this argument could be made for other top SEO audit tools, it’s worth mentioning that Semrush isn’t 100% accurate with its keyword search volumes and traffic because its data isn’t always up to date with Google’s algorithm changes, especially those around Google’s recent AI overview updates.Another limitation is that its data focuses primarily on Google, which isn’t ideal if your digital presence is on a platform like Amazon or YouTube.
Semrush’s features: A toolkit-by-toolkit review
General features: 4.5/5
Advanced features: 4.5/5
This Semrush review wouldn’t be complete without going through all of Semrush’s newly organized toolkits and seeing what they can do. There are seven toolkits in total: the SEO Toolkit, Traffic & Market Toolkit, Local Toolkit, Content Toolkit, AI Toolkit, Social Toolkit, and AI Toolkit.
The SEO Toolkit houses all of the signature Semrush keyword research tools that the platform is most famous for. The interface inside the toolkit is pretty much the same as before, with the SEO tools all listed on the left-hand menu. The three tools I use most from this toolkit are Domain Overview, Keyword Overview, and Keyword Magic Tool.
- Keyword Overview gives you the search volume of a keyword (the number of people searching for it per month) and its keyword difficulty, aka how difficult it’ll be to rank on Google for that keyword. It also suggests related keywords and the top-ranking websites for that keyword.It basically gives you everything you need to know about a certain keyword if you plan to publish content around it. Additionally, I particularly like that Semrush tells you the primary intent of that keyword, whether it’s informational, navigational, or commercial (i).
- Keyword Magic Tool gives you a longer list of related keywords along with their search volume, difficulty, and search intent. It’s most helpful for knowing what other keywords to add to your blog, or what other related content you can publish based on what people are also searching for.
- Domain Overview, meanwhile, gives you the traffic, ranking keywords, and authority score of your website (or any other website). You’ll also see your site traffic over time and the best-performing keywords on your site.
These tools are still Semrush’s bread and butter and what I use the platform for the most. They give all the essential information you need to start content marketing and publish blogs that have the best chances of ranking on Google.
Aside from these tools, Semrush has the SEO Dashboard that gives a high-level overview of how your website is performing, including its authority score, organic traffic, and local presence. This is probably the section you’ll visit most on Semrush, as it gives all the essential information about your site and which parts need the most attention. It’s an SEO data nerd’s paradise.
But even if you’re not great with data, Semrush lays it all out pretty clearly. In a way, the SEO Dashboard is the summary of all of Semrush’s SEO and website traffic data, which it tracks over time.
One of the data reports I also use most from Semrush is the Traffic Analytics section, which shows where your website’s visitors are mainly coming from. It even shows data from Semrush vs Google Analytics, Google’s native data platform, so you can compare both for better accuracy. However, it can only show data up to the month prior.
The SEO dashboard gives an at-a-glance view of your site’s SEO and website traffic.
One thing I really like about Semrush’s update is that it separates its website traffic tools from its keyword research tools. All the site traffic and competitor analysis tools live under the Traffic & Market Toolkit, which is helpfully just beneath the SEO Toolkit.
The tools here are also still the same: Under Traffic Analytics, you’ll see your website’s visitors over time and where they’re coming from, whether organic search, paid search, social media, email, referrals, ads, or other sources. It’s especially helpful for seeing your website traffic vs that of your competitors.
However, this is unfortunately not part of Semrush’s SEO Toolkit — it’ll take an additional cost of $289 a month, which, even for Semrush, is pretty steep. It offers comprehensive competitor data, but unless you’re in a space with plenty of competition, I’d say this is something you can skip, especially if you don’t have an SEO team to analyze all the data.
From a content marketing perspective, the data on where your site traffic is coming from is far more helpful in guiding your content strategy, which is already available with any paid SEO plan.
Semrush’s Traffic & Market Toolkit shows your website traffic vs your competitors, but it costs an additional $289 monthly. (Source: Semrush)
There are many other tools under the Traffic & Market Tool, like your digital ads’ traffic, audience demographics, and market overview. However, I still find Traffic Analytics to be the most useful.
I should also note that if these analytics are particularly important to your business (for example, if your website is your main traffic and revenue source), you’d fare better with a paid plan, as the free plan only allows up to 10 daily report requests.
One thing most people don’t know about Semrush is it has local SEO services. It can help you set up and manage your local listings like your Google Business Profile, Bing Places listing, and any other directories where you might be missing information and opportunities for people to find you.
This will be particularly helpful to any business with a physical storefront. Local SEO is one of the most important strategies to focus your marketing efforts on as it helps your business get found by your local community (say, when people do “near me” searches like “cafes near me”).
Semrush’s Local Toolkit can scan your local online presence and let you know about areas to fix. However, once again, this unfortunately comes at an extra cost of $60 per location on top of your base Semrush plan.
Semrush Local Toolkit ($60) can help you grow your local presence if you have a physical storefront. (Source: Semrush)
I may be biased as a content marketer at heart, but this is one of my favorite tools from Semrush and a major argument for why it’s worth the investment. All the prior tools I’ve mentioned so far are for data analysis and planning, but this one is for actually drafting content using the data from the tools above.
Using all the SEO and keyword data Semrush gathers, the Content Toolkit can ideate topics and generate blog outlines for your website, complete with primary and secondary keywords and titles.
The SEO Brief Generator under the Content Toolkit generates SEO-optimized outlines for your blog. (Source: Semrush)
There’s also an AI Article generator, although it’s not something I use often because it still has a tendency to sound robotic and be pockmarked with errors. Also, with the current state of Google’s AI Overviews, publishing AI content isn’t something I particularly recommend either as Google tends to rank human-written content higher on search results.
What I do like is the Content Optimizer tool that scans your content from an SEO perspective using Semrush’s SEO insights and recommends areas to improve.
Semrush’s Content Optimizer scans your content for SEO improvements, which is helpful for anyone with a blog. (Source: Semrush)
This is one of Semrush’s newest tools created in response to the new AI-powered Google Search landscape, which you may be familiar with if you have a website or blog. Many websites have reported seeing lower traffic ever since AI Overviews rolled out, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve been seeing the same.
That’s what Semrush’s AI toolkit aims to help navigate, particularly with the Brand & Marketing tab. It shows your brand’s “Competitive Perception per AI Platform,” or how different AI platforms like ChatGPT and Gemini perceive your brand. However, it shows this in percentages, which I hope will improve one day, as it’s not the most helpful metric for measuring brand sentiment. I can only assume that a higher percentage means a better perception, but Semrush doesn’t really clarify this.
The Key Sentiment Drivers box directly below is more helpful. It lists your strongest brand elements as they’re perceived online. For example, an eyewear brand might be best known for its trendy frame designs and its at-home try-on program.
These are all good indicators of your brand reputation and take away a lot of the guesswork and lengthy data-gathering part of marketing, especially if, like me, you’re not a big numbers person.
Semrush’s AI Toolkit helps analyze general sentiment about your brand. (Source: Semrush)
The AI Toolkit also has other data, like your brand’s market share and sentiment distribution, that could be helpful if you’re a decision-maker at your company. However, since all of it is AI-created, I’d say to take them all with a grain of salt. Or at least, do independent research as well to corroborate its data. Finally, this tool, unfortunately, comes at an extra $99 per website, and there is no free plan.
Finally, this is the toolkit I had the least experience with going into this Semrush review. But it’s a convenient way to set up ads on Google and Meta (Instagram and Facebook) from inside the platform — and more importantly, to help find the best keywords to target for your ads.
Once your ads are live, Semrush shows how much traffic they’re getting, the actual keywords they’re ranking for, and their biggest competitors. It’s a good enough alternative to working in Google and Meta ads, as it shows all the important data about your ads from those platforms.
However, I didn’t really have an easy time navigating this toolkit. For example, to research the best keywords for an ad, you’ll need the PPC Keyword Tool, which you can only access by first creating a new ad campaign. It’s not readily accessible in the dashboard. Semrush basically hides its most helpful tool underneath the setup process instead of putting it front and center.
The other drawback is that the keyword data Semrush presents may not be entirely accurate, just because Google is so unpredictable nowadays.
Semrush’s PPC Keyword Tool under the Ad Toolkit recommends the best keywords for your ad
Special mention: Copilot AI, Semrush’s AI assistant
This is only available on Semrush’s paid plans, but I appreciate Semrush’s Copilot AI acting like my personal SEO assistant. It greets me first thing when I open Semrush and alerts me if any keywords have caused sudden drops in traffic or if we have suddenly lost some backlinks, or if there are any pressing site issues like broken pages and links.
However, it also shows new keywords to try and rank for and basically gives a personalized rundown of your overall SEO status.
Copilot AI gives you a rundown of your overall SEO status. (Source: Semrush)
Is Semrush suitable for beginners? Semrush’s ease of use review
Honestly, Semrush’s recent platform upgrade makes it significantly easier to navigate compared to its previous version. Semrush’s previous interface used to list all its tools, from keyword research to social media, on the left side of the screen, and you had to comb through each one to find the one you needed. The dashboard also tended to be a case of information overload with too many graphs and numbers for anyone to understand.
Semrush classic version: Lots of numbers and too many tools on the menu. (Source: Semrush)
Meanwhile, Semrush looks a lot cleaner and less anxiety-inducing now, with tools neatly organized into folders and not too many graphs on the home page. Semrush’s AI assistant also gives you an overview of your most pressing issues and recommended actions in sentence format instead of numbers and graphs that you have to analyze.
Semrush’s new version presents a much cleaner and more accessible look. (Source: Semrush)
It’s a lot cleaner, more organized, and easier to find the tools you need through the toolkit folders. It’s the most significant change in this upgrade by far and is something I’m really happy about — especially for the small business community — because it makes its tools a lot more accessible.
Better late than never, Semrush.
I can now easily navigate to the tools I need from the menu. If I’m working on my local SEO and Google Business Profile, I’ll just open my Local Marketing Toolkit. If I need keyword data, I’ll go into the SEO Toolkit.
The tools inside the toolkits are still the same as ever, which can be good or bad depending on how you liked Semrush before or how much you use SEO. I personally like that it’s still the same because Semrush’s detailed analyses are what I come to the platform for, although if you’re new to keyword research and SEO, it’ll likely have a learning curve. But it’s still the most comprehensive SEO tool on the market.
Semrush overall is the best option for people who already have some SEO know-how and a content marketing plan. It’s not exactly for beginners, but it’s not so inaccessible that you need to be an SEO expert to use it. I’d place it in the intermediate level of difficulty. Come to it when you already have an SEO and content strategy — that’s when you’ll get the most out of it.
Semrush customer support
Customer support score: 2.25/5
Unfortunately, customer support is one of Semrush’s biggest weaknesses. Getting any kind of human support is nearly impossible (other Semrush reviews from users corroborate this). For most inquiries, you’ll need to seek the answer out yourself on the online help center or rely on the AI chatbot, which isn’t always helpful.
For instance, when I asked a simple question about whether Semrush offered a free trial of their AI Toolkit, the chatbot asked me to specify the subject of my query, even when my question clearly indicated “AI Toolkit.” Not exactly promising. I would still have to click on one of its suggested replies or wait until it connected me with a human agent, which really shouldn’t be necessary for such a simple query.
Semrush’s customer support chatbot wasn’t the most supportive, even with a simple query. (Source: Semrush)
Human support is available, but seemingly only during US office hours, and only through the Semrush web chat. Semrush unfortunately doesn’t offer other support avenues beyond the chatbox, whether through email, phone, or social media.
Semrush vs Ahrefs vs UberSuggest: The good and bad of each
For the validity of this search engine optimization software review, I put Semrush up against other leading SEO tools like Ahrefs and UberSuggest. Both offer similar features. Ahrefs, I’ve particularly used to research keywords for YouTube, and UberSuggest is the brainchild of Neil Patel, an influential figure in the SEO world.
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Pros:
Cons:
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Free, paid plans from $117.33 | Free, paid plans from $29 | Free, paid plans from $29 |
Data accuracy is also a pressing issue with these SEO tools. And while there’s no way to guarantee the accuracy of any SEO tool perfectly, I put these three to the test anyway by asking for suggestions around the keyword “vegan doughnuts.”
Semrush gave me a 1,300 search volume (SV) with a 31% keyword difficulty (KD). Ubersuggest gave it an SV of 27,100 and KD of 45, which is a notable difference. Meanwhile, Ahrefs simply gave it a search volume of “more than 100” and a keyword difficulty of “Medium,” the least detailed analysis of the three. They also had the suggested keywords “vegan doughnuts near me” and “vegan doughnuts recipe” in common.
Overall, the difference in these data is the sources they pull from and how recently they were pulled. However, Semrush claims to collect data from Google’s actual search results, which is great if you aim to rank on Google, but not if you’re mainly on YouTube or an ecommerce platform like Amazon or Etsy.
Semrush pricing: Is Semrush a good investment?
Pricing: 2.75/5
Semrush’s pricing system lets you use all its SEO tools on the free plan, but all your results and analytics will be very limited. For instance, you can only request data — whether keyword data, competitor analysis, or website traffic — up to 10 times a day.
Plus, its non-SEO toolkits like the Content, AI, and Social Toolkits are all additional costs on top of your paid plans. Upgrading to a paid plan starts at $117.33 a month (on annual billing), and there are three plans to choose from: Pro, Guru, and Business.
Free | Pro | Guru | Business | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Monthly cost (annual billing) | $0 | $117.33 | $208.33 | $416.66 |
Data requests per day | 10 | 3,000 | 5,000 | 10,000 |
Tracked keywords | 10 | 50 | 1,500 | 5,000 |
Results per report | 10 | 10,000 | 30,000 | 50,000 |
SEO Toolkit | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Website audit | 100 pages | 100,000 pages | 300,000 pages | 1 million pages |
ChatGPT search tracking | ✕ | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ |
Add-ons:
- Traffic & Market Toolkit: $289/month
- Local Toolkit: $30/month (Base), $60/month (Pro)
- Content Toolkit: $60/month
- AI Toolkit: $99/month per domain
- Social Toolkit: $20/month (Base), $40/month (Pro), $250/month (Business)
- Advertising: $99/month (Base), $220/month (Pro)
Whether or not Semrush will be a good investment will depend primarily on your business needs and objectives. For instance, if content and ranking on Google are a large focus for your business, investing in an all-in-one content tool like Semrush will be worth it in the long run. However, it’s also worth noting that its extra features give it a much higher starting cost than its alternatives.
So, is Semrush worth it?
My expert score: 4.06/5
If your strategy is focused on content marketing, say, if you plan to publish blogs and post on social media regularly, then yes, Semrush will be a good tool to have in your marketing stack. It’s an overall helpful tool if you want to grow your brand’s digital presence.
It’s especially good if you’re just starting out, as Semrush already has tools for publishing social media posts, setting up ads, and monitoring your brand reputation — along with its SEO research tools — in one platform.
It might take a while to get the hang of the platform, but Semrush has been an invaluable tool in the years I’ve been in content marketing. And if you’re publishing any kind of blog, it takes away a lot of the guesswork when you’re thinking of what topics would resonate best with your audience.
Its SEO tools are also still the most complete compared to those of its competitors. It has tools for gauging the search volume and difficulty of certain keywords, suggesting related keywords, monitoring website traffic, and conducting SEO website audits, among many others.
Semrush will be especially helpful if you have a primarily online business and want your website to get noticed by more people, or if you publish a lot of content and want to be known as an authority in your subject area.
For instance, say you own a vegan cafe and want your business to be known as a local industry leader in vegan dining, you might publish a blog around the subject of ”vegan dining.” Semrush can help you plan the best content around that subject and suggest related subjects to blog about, then monitor how effective your blogs are by how much traffic they’re getting.
Case studies: When to use Semrush
- You have a fully online, website-based business: Use Semrush to target the right keywords to get your site ranking on Google search results for the people that matter most to your business. Use Semrush’s website audit tool to do regular checkups of your site to make sure it’s running well, which is important if it’s your main source of traffic and revenue.
- You run a blog and earn through affiliate links and brand partnerships: Use Semrush to plan content strategically around the right keywords so that it ranks on Google and earns visitor traffic. The Traffic & Market Toolkit can also help you monitor your site’s biggest competitors and see what your site can do better. Then, use the Social Toolkit to share your blogs across your social media channels.
- You have a physical location: Use Semrush’s Local Toolkit to manage your local listings, keep them consistent across multiple platforms, and build a strong local presence. Also, use the Keyword Research tool to find the best keywords to add to your profiles.
Frequently asked questions (FAQs)
Yes, Semrush is a legitimate keyword research and all-around SEO tool. It can also suggest the best keywords to add to your content, help plan the best topics to write about, and draft blog outlines using AI.
It has tools for monitoring your website traffic and that of your competitors, conducting website audits (aka website health checkups), scheduling social media posts, and setting up Google and Meta ads. Semrush’s AI Toolkit can analyze your online brand sentiment and how your business is perceived on AI platforms like ChatGPT and Gemini.
Semrush is better than Ahrefs in the comprehensiveness of its SEO analysis, and it has more tools, but only if you use its paid version. Semrush’s keyword research analysis is more detailed than that of Ahrefs. For instance, it gives specific numbers for your keyword’s search volume and difficulty, whereas Ahrefs only gives estimates and “easy,” “medium,” or “difficult” ranking levels.
Semrush also has extra tools beyond SEO like social media and digital ads setup tools. However, Ahrefs covers other platforms beyond Google, including YouTube and Amazon, and has a lower starting cost ($29/month).
Yes, Semrush has a 100% free plan. However, it can only accommodate up to 10 data requests a day, whether for keyword analysis, domain overview, or website audits, so it’s very limited — not ideal if you strategize and publish content regularly.
It also doesn’t do competitor research and can only audit up to 100 website pages, so it’s only ideal for one-time or casual SEO research. If you publish content regularly, the paid plan will be far more useful, which starts at $117.33 on annual billing.
Bottom line
Semrush has always been my go-to platform for researching keywords and planning content. And so far, my current Semrush review still finds it a worthy tool for your content marketing toolkit, especially with an interface upgrade that makes it a lot more accessible to beginners.
If you do a lot of content strategy and have a mostly online business, consider upgrading to the paid version to get the most out of the platform. Use it to plan your blog content, monitor your website traffic, and maintain your website’s health.
Semrush’s Social Toolkit’s biggest benefit is the convenience of having an all-in-one marketing platform, rather than any particularly noteworthy social media tool. It lets you schedule content on your social media profiles and shows impressions and engagement rates, the most important parts of social media marketing. But it’s not the most intuitive platform, especially compared to the best free social media schedulers.
What I do like about this tool, however, is its detailed insights, which really isn’t surprising considering data is Semrush’s biggest advantage. The Social Tracker shows your competitors’ social media analytics and even lists all their published posts — this is probably Semrush’s most unique tool by far for social media marketing.
However, Semrush doesn’t give recommendations on next steps, just the data, so you’ll still need to make analyses and inferences yourself. It’ll be most useful if you’re in a super-competitive social media space and are competing with many other brands for the same audience.
Semrush’s Social Toolkit shows your competitors’ social media data so you can analyze their strategy.