Screaming Frog SEO Spider vs Semrush
We give Screaming Frog SEO Spider a 2.4 GPA and Semrush a 2.2, out of 4.0. Screaming Frog SEO Spider grades higher on value for money and the free plan. Semrush grades higher on features and platforms. They get the same grade on ease of use.
Price, platforms and features side by side. The table says where each price was read and when.
Screaming Frog SEO Spider
Desktop website crawler for technical SEO audits
Semrush
SEO suite for keyword research, rank tracking and AI search visibility
How we grade them
| 2.4GPAScreaming Frog SEO SpiderFair | 2.2GPASemrushFair | |
|---|---|---|
| Value for money | BGraded against its alternatives. A licence is $279 a year per user, about $23.25 a month, with no crawl limit and JavaScript rendering. Only Sitebulb Lite is cheaper, and it stops at 10,000 URLs; Semrush and Ahrefs cost about five times as much. | DThe SEO plan, the one Semrush aims at freelancers and small businesses, is $117.33 a month billed yearly ($139 monthly). That's in this category's dearest tenth, for one user. AI search tracking needs Starter at $165.17, and each extra person is from $45 a month. |
| Free plan and trial | BA free version with no sign-up crawls up to 500 URLs with the core audits, for as long as you like, so small sites can live on it. It can't save crawls, change settings, render JavaScript or pull in Google data. | CA free account with no card: 1 project, 10 reports a day and 10 tracked keywords. Fine for a look around, but you'll hit the wall in an afternoon. The 7-day trial of the paid plans checks your card with a small charge that's refunded at once. |
| Features | CIt does the crawling job fully: 300+ issues, JavaScript rendering, custom extraction, scheduling, crawl comparison and sitemaps. But that's one part of SEO, with no keyword research, rank tracking or backlink index. | BKeyword research from a database it puts at 29 billion keywords across 142 countries, competitor and backlink analysis, daily rank tracking and Site Audit. It covers the whole job, though the SEO plan only gets the basic research tools and no AI visibility. |
| Ease of use | CNo rating on record. Enter a URL and it crawls, but reading the results takes technical SEO knowledge, and custom extraction runs on XPath, CSS Path or regex. | CNo rating on record. It's a big suite with a lot of reports, and there are projects to set up and plenty to learn before it all makes sense. |
| Platforms and integrations | CA program for Windows, Mac and Linux, linked to Google Analytics, Search Console, PageSpeed Insights, OpenAI, Gemini, Looker Studio and Sheets. Computers only, with no web or phone version. | BWeb only, with no desktop or phone app. It connects to Google Analytics, Search Console, Wix, Yoast, AIOSEO, Supermetrics and Monday.com, has MCP from Starter, and the API comes with the custom-priced Advanced plan. |
| Best for | technical site audits on your own computer | the broadest all-in-one SEO suite |
The GPA is the average of the five grades: an A is 4 points, an F is none. The full reasons are on each tool's page: Screaming Frog SEO Spider and Semrush. How we grade
Price against what you get
Screaming Frog SEO Spider starts at $23.25 a month when paid by the year for each person and scores 2.0 out of 4 on features, ease of use and platforms. Semrush starts at $117.33 a month and scores 2.7.
Semrush scores higher, and starts $94.08 a month higher: the question is whether the extra is worth that to you. Of the other SEO tools on the chart, 6 score higher than Screaming Frog SEO Spider for less, and none scores higher than Semrush for less.
Features, ease of use and platforms, averaged
What paid plans start at, a month (each step along is roughly double) →
- The best score at each price
- Has a free plan
- No free plan
Where they differ
- Screaming Frog SEO Spider starts at $279 per user / year. Semrush starts at $117.33 per month, billed annually ($139 billed monthly).
- Only Screaming Frog SEO Spider lists Windows, macOS and Linux apps.
- Only Semrush lists a web app.
- Semrush also covers keyword research, rank tracking and backlink analysis.
At a glance
| Screaming Frog SEO Spider | Semrush | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free plan | Free plan |
| Starts at | $279 per user / year | $117.33 per month, billed annually ($139 billed monthly) |
| Free plan | Free version, no sign-up: crawls up to 500 URLs at a time with the core audits, but cannot save crawls, change the crawl configuration, render JavaScript or use integrations. | Free account: 1 project, 10 analytics reports a day across the main tools and 10 keywords in Position Tracking. No credit card needed. |
| Free trial | None listed | 7-day free trial of paid plans; a card is checked with a small charge that is refunded at once |
| Web | ||
| macOS | ||
| Windows | ||
| Linux | ||
| Made by | Screaming Frog Ltd | Semrush Holdings |
| Price read from | screamingfrog.co.uk | semrush.com |
| Checked | Oct 17, 2026 | Oct 17, 2026 |
Who each one suits
Screaming Frog SEO Spider
- Technical SEOs auditing large sites from their own computer
- Site migrations, where redirects and staging need checking against production
- Small sites under 500 URLs, which can use the free version indefinitely
Semrush
- Freelancers and in-house marketers who want research, tracking and audits in one account
- Agencies comparing many client sites against their competitors
- Brands that want to watch their visibility in AI chat answers alongside Google rankings
Worth knowing
Screaming Frog SEO Spider
- Licences are per user and last one year; two people need two licences.
- It is a desktop app, so crawl size depends on the computer's memory and storage.
- The free version cannot save crawls, render JavaScript, schedule audits or connect to Google data.
Semrush
- Each plan includes one user; extra users start at $45 a month each, priced by plan level.
- Scheduled PDF reports are an add-on at $10 a month, or $20 with white-labeling; Advanced includes reporting.
- API access and share of voice come only with the custom-priced Advanced plan.
- Local, content, social, advertising, AI PR and traffic tools are separate toolkits with their own prices.
Key features
Screaming Frog SEO Spider
- Technical SEO audit
- Find broken links, server errors, redirect chains, missing or duplicate titles and descriptions, and directives such as noindex and canonicals.
- JavaScript rendering
- With a licence, render pages in a built-in Chromium to crawl sites built with frameworks such as React, Angular and Vue.
- Custom extraction and search
- Pull any data from page HTML with XPath, CSS Path or regex, and search source code across a whole crawl (licence only).
- Google and AI integrations
- Pull Google Analytics, Search Console and PageSpeed Insights data into a crawl, or run pages through OpenAI and Gemini (licence only).
- Scheduling and crawl comparison
- Schedule crawls with exports to Google Sheets or run them from the command line, and compare crawls or staging against production.
- Site visualisations and sitemaps
- See site structure as force-directed and tree diagrams, and generate XML and image sitemaps from a crawl.
Semrush
- Keyword research
- Look up search volume, difficulty and intent from a database Semrush puts at 29 billion keywords across 142 country databases.
- Competitor and backlink analysis
- See which keywords and pages bring a rival site its traffic, and inspect any domain's backlink profile.
- Position Tracking
- Track daily rankings for 500 to 5,000+ keywords depending on the plan; Pro+ adds tracking by location and device.
- Site Audit
- Crawl your sites for technical SEO problems. From the Starter plan the audit also checks how ready a site is for AI search.
- AI visibility tracking
- Starter and above track daily whether set prompts in AI chat tools mention your brand, with sentiment monitoring. The SEO plan has none of this.
- MCP and API access
- Starter and above can query Semrush data from AI assistants through MCP; the API itself comes with the Advanced plan.
Plans
Screaming Frog SEO Spider
Free$0
Up to 500 URLs per crawl, broken links, redirects, metadata, duplicates, XML sitemaps and site visualisations.
Paid licence$279
per user / year, for 1 to 4 licences
No crawl limit beyond memory and storage, saved crawls, scheduling, JavaScript rendering, crawl comparison, integrations and support. £199 in pounds.
Semrush
Free$0
1 project, 10 analytics reports a day and 10 tracked keywords, for trying the tools.
SEO$117.33
per month, billed annually ($139 billed monthly)
1 user, 5 websites, 500 keywords tracked daily, basic keyword and competitor research, and Site Audit. No AI search tracking.
Starter$165.17
per month, billed annually ($199 billed monthly)
5 websites and 500 keywords, full keyword research tools, MCP access, 50 AI prompts tracked daily and 300 AI visibility reports a day.
Pro+$248.17
per month, billed annually ($299 billed monthly)
15 websites, 1,500 keywords, historical data, content optimization, cannibalization checks, multi-location tracking and 100 AI prompts.
AdvancedCustom
40+ websites, 5,000+ keywords, share of voice, API access, team users, reporting and unlimited AI prompts. Sold after a demo.
Ways to pay less
Screaming Frog SEO Spider
- Other savings
Volume pricing from 5 licences
Buying 5 to 9 licences at once costs $265 each a year, 10 to 19 cost $249 each, and 20 or more cost $235 each, against $279 for 1 to 4.
Semrush
- Annual discount
Save up to 17% with annual billing
Semrush's pricing page lists annual billing at up to 17% less: Starter is $165.17 a month billed annually instead of $199 billed monthly.
