SE Ranking vs SpyFu (2026): which should you pick?
As of Oct 23, 2026, SE Ranking and SpyFu share a 2.2 GPA, and only SpyFu has a free plan.
Checked Oct 17, 2026 and Oct 23, 2026 · graded Oct 17, 2026 and Oct 23, 2026 by ToolGPA
SE Ranking grades higher on features. SpyFu grades higher on value for money. They get the same grade on the free plan, ease of use and platforms.
Price, platforms and features side by side. The table says where each price was read and when.
SE Ranking
SEO platform for rank tracking, audits, research and AI visibility
SpyFu
Competitor research for SEO and Google Ads keywords and ad history
Which one is for you
Pick SE Ranking if
- Fits if you track lots of keywords daily across several client sites
- Works for small marketing teams who want research, audits and tracking under one login
Look elsewhere if
- Pricey if you're one person with one site, as Core is $103.20 a month even on yearly billing and there's no lower plan
- Tight if you need old data, since Core keeps 6 months of history and has 1 manager seat; extra seats start at $16 a month
- Pricey if you want white-label reports, as the Agency Pack is $69 a month extra and sold on yearly billing only
- Watch out: deeper AI search tracking is an add-on at $71.20 a month on yearly billing ($89 monthly)
- Watch out: payments are non-refundable unless the service wasn't delivered as promised, and there's no desktop or phone app
Pick SpyFu if
- Fits if you buy Google Ads and want to see what competitors bid on
- Works for agencies building branded competitor reports for clients
Look elsewhere if
- Not for you if you want to try before you pay, as there's no trial, only a 30-day money-back guarantee
- Skip it if you need daily rankings, since projects track weekly
- Tight if you're on Basic, with 1 user, 1 project, 10,000 rows per search and export, and site audits that stop at 500 pages a crawl
- Watch out: Pro + AI's $59 first month becomes $119 a month unless you pay $89 a month yearly, and extra users are $30
- Watch out: API use past the monthly credit, $40 on Pro + AI and $100 on Team/Agency, is charged to your card
How we grade them
| 2.2GPASE RankingFair | 2.2GPASpyFuFair | |
|---|---|---|
| Value for money | DCore is $103.20 a month billed yearly ($129 monthly), and it's the lowest self-serve plan. That's well above this category's middle, for one manager seat with 10 projects and 2,000 keywords tracked daily; extra seats start at $16. | CBasic is $29 a month billed yearly ($39 monthly), between the cheaper quarter of SEO tools at $21.75 and the middle at $39. It has 1 user and no API credit, and Pro + AI is $89 a month yearly or $119 monthly after a $59 first month. |
| Free plan and trial | CNo free plan, but the 14-day trial needs no card and allows 10 projects, 750 keywords and 20 AI prompts a day. Payments are non-refundable after that, so use the trial properly. | CA free version with no time limit: search any domain or keyword and you see a limited set of results. Full results, exports and tracking are paid. There's no trial, just a 30-day money-back guarantee, which isn't the same thing. |
| Features | BDaily rank tracking with share of voice, keyword, competitor and backlink research with no caps on either plan, audits of 250,000 pages a month, reports, listings in 100+ directories, AI answer tracking and API credits. The whole job. | CCompetitor PPC and SEO research, keyword ideas and grouping, rank tracking, backlinks, an AI site audit that writes fixes, and an API. Rankings update weekly, and Basic caps results and exports at 10,000 rows and its audit at 500 pages a crawl. |
| Ease of use | CNo rating on record. Projects, keyword lists and reports all need setting up before the tool pays off. | CNo rating on record. You start by typing in a competitor's domain, but there are a lot of reports, and projects to set up before the tracking side tells you much. |
| Platforms and integrations | BWeb only, connected to Looker Studio, Google Analytics, Search Console, Matomo, n8n, Make and Claude, with 25,000 API credits a month and MCP on Core. No desktop or phone app. | BWeb only, with SpyFu GPT for ChatGPT, Google Sheets, Google Tag Manager and RivalFlow AI, plus an API from the Pro plans, billed by rows returned. No desktop or phone app. |
| Best for | tracking rankings across many client sites | spying on rivals' Google Ads and SEO keywords |
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: SE Ranking and SpyFu. How we grade
Price against what you get
SE Ranking starts at $103.20 a month and scores 2.7 out of 4 on features, ease of use and platforms. SpyFu starts at $29 a month and scores 2.3.
SE Ranking scores higher, and starts $74.20 a month higher: the question is whether the extra is worth that to you. Of the other SEO tools on the chart, none scores higher than SE Ranking for less, and 6 score higher than SpyFu 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
At a glance
| SE Ranking | SpyFu | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free trial | Free plan |
| Starts at | $103.20 per month, billed annually ($129 billed monthly) | $29 per month, billed yearly ($39 billed monthly) |
| Free plan | None | Free version with no time limit: search any domain or keyword and see a limited set of results. Full results, exports and keyword tracking need a paid plan. |
| Free trial | 14-day free trial, no credit card required; 10 projects, 750 keywords and 20 AI prompts a day | None listed |
| Web | ||
| Made by | SER Acquisition Inc. | SpyFu, Inc. |
| Price read from | seranking.com | spyfu.com |
| Checked | Oct 17, 2026 | Oct 23, 2026 |
Worth knowing
SE Ranking
- Core keeps only 6 months of historical data and includes 1 manager seat; extra seats start at $16 a month.
- White-label reports need the Agency Pack, $69 a month and sold on annual billing only.
- Deeper AI search tracking is an add-on at $71.20 a month billed annually ($89 billed monthly).
- Payments are non-refundable except where the service was not delivered as promised.
SpyFu
- Pro + AI is $59 for the first month only, then $119 a month on monthly billing; yearly billing is $89 a month.
- There is no free trial; SpyFu offers a 30-day money-back guarantee, and refunds are requested through chat or email.
- Basic caps search results and exports at 10,000 rows, and its site audit stops at 500 pages a crawl.
- API use beyond the monthly credit ($40 on Pro + AI, $100 on Team/Agency) is charged to the card on file.
Key features
SE Ranking
- Rank Tracker
- Track rankings daily across major search engines, devices and locations, with Google top-100 tracking and share of voice.
- Keyword, competitor and backlink research
- Research keywords, competitors' traffic and backlinks with no usage caps on either plan, plus backlink monitoring.
- Website audit
- Crawl sites for technical issues, from 250,000 pages a month on Core to 2 million on Growth, with an on-page checker.
- AI visibility tracking
- Track 100 or 250 prompts a day across five AI models, with AI source tracking and AI competitor research by domain.
- Reports and local SEO
- Report Builder (10 or 30 reports), and local tools covering 3 locations, map rank tracking and listings in 100+ directories.
- API and MCP
- Plans include 25,000 or 100,000 research API credits a month and MCP access for querying the data from AI assistants.
SpyFu
- Competitor PPC research
- See the Google Ads keywords a domain buys, estimated clicks and cost per keyword, and the ad tests it has run over time.
- Competitor SEO research
- List the keywords a site ranks for, its top pages and its ranking history, and compare several domains to find keywords you are missing.
- Keyword research and grouping
- Generate keyword ideas filtered by volume, CPC and difficulty, and paste in a list to have it grouped with volume and CPC added.
- Rank tracking and projects
- Save keywords to a project per site to track rankings weekly, with labels, keyword groups and a daily summary dashboard.
- AI site audit
- Crawls a site for technical, metadata, content and linking issues and writes fixes for titles, descriptions and headings; plans include monthly AI credits.
- API and SpyFu GPT
- Pro plans and up include API access billed per rows returned, with a monthly credit; SpyFu GPT brings its data into ChatGPT.
Plans
SE Ranking
Core$103.20
per month, billed annually ($129 billed monthly)
1 manager seat, 10 projects, 2,000 keywords and 100 AI prompts tracked daily, 250,000 audit pages a month and 6 months of history.
Growth$223.20
per month, billed annually ($279 billed monthly)
3 manager seats, 30 projects, 5,000 keywords and 250 prompts daily, 2 million audit pages, all-time history and guest links.
EnterpriseCustom
Custom limits and terms, full API and advanced integrations, through sales.
SpyFu
Basic$29
per month, billed yearly ($39 billed monthly)
10,000 rows per search and export, 1 tracking project, 5,000 weekly tracked rankings, 50,000 audit pages a month, 1 user. No API credit included.
Pro + AI$89
per month, billed yearly ($119 monthly after a $59 first month)
Unlimited results and exports, 10 projects, 15,000 tracked rankings, 500,000 audit pages, RivalFlow for 1 site, $40 of API credit. Extra users $30.
Team/Agency$187
per month, billed yearly ($249 billed monthly)
5 users, unlimited projects, 50,000 tracked rankings, 2 million audit pages, daily audits, RivalFlow for 5 sites and $100 of API credit.
Ways to pay less
SE Ranking
- Annual discount
Save 20% with annual billing
SE Ranking's pricing page lists Core at $103.20 a month billed annually instead of $129 monthly, and Growth at $223.20 instead of $279.
SpyFu
No public discounts listed.
Common questions
Which is cheaper, SE Ranking or SpyFu?
As of Oct 23, 2026, SpyFu is cheaper to start with: $29 a month, against $103.20 a month for SE Ranking. SE Ranking starts at $103.20 per month, billed annually ($129 billed monthly), and SpyFu starts at $29 per month, billed yearly ($39 billed monthly).
Which has a free plan, SE Ranking or SpyFu?
As of Oct 23, 2026, only SpyFu has a free plan. SE Ranking does not, though it has a free trial.
More comparisons
How this page was made
- The verdict at the top follows a fixed rule. When both tools are in the same category and either is in our top three for it, the verdict follows that ranking: the higher-placed tool is our pick. The top three weigh who each tool suits as well as its grades, so a pick can go against the GPA. Otherwise the page does not pick one and says which grades higher: the higher GPA first; on a tie, the one with a free plan, then the one that starts cheaper in dollars a month, counted the same way for both; if they are still level, what the choice depends on.
- The grades are our own, from each tool’s review or report card. The GPA is their average.
- Prices, plans and platforms come from each tool’s listing. The table above says where each price was read and when.
- The differences and the answers to the questions are worked out from those listings.