As an experienced online marketer, you understand the value of leveraging data to gain those critical search engine ranking wins. But constantly monitoring positions across keywords, optimizing pages, researching competitors – it’s a grind. What if you could automate and scale much of that heavy lifting through intelligent use of SEO APIs?
What Are SEO APIs and Why Do You Need Them?
At their core, SEO APIs are interfaces that allow software tools to communicate with each other. Leading SEO platforms like Ahrefs, Moz and Semrush have opened up troves of data via APIs that can feed directly into your marketing stack.
"Think of SEO APIs as high-powered keyboards allowing you to interface directly with rich databases to extract just what you need, when you need it."
As Frederik from DataForSEO puts it:
"Modern SEO is increasingly driven by data. The top content, social and technology teams access millions of data points across the web to spot opportunities and react in real-time. SEO APIs are the gateway drugs that enable this always-on intelligence about your market."
Here are some of the headline benefits well-chosen SEO APIs can drive:
- Save time: Automate tedious but critical SEO tasks like rankings monitoring, gathering backlinks intel and keyword research
- Surface hidden insights: Slice and dice data to uncover patterns that would be impossible to manually analyze
- Make better decisions: API-powered dashboards give you an ‘at a glance’ view of performance to guide next steps
- Gain competitive edge: Keep tabs on competitors‘ strategies and rankings shifts to counter effectively
- Feed other systems: Pipe actionable SEO data direct into your marketing automation and analytics platforms
Clearly, integrating SEO APIs can transform how you optimize and scale campaigns. But with dozens of options to evaluate, where do you start?
15 Powerful SEO APIs for Marketers and Businesses
We‘ve thoroughly assessed over 25 of the top SEO APIs against key criteria like data depth, coverage, reliability and ease of use. Based on intense testing, here are 15 that deliver immense value:
1. Semrush
Semrush‘s SEO API makes it trivial to extract competitive intelligence and online visibility metrics for in-depth analysis.
With just a few lines of code, automatically pull incredibly detailed reports covering:
- Competitor keyword rankings – 30 million+ keywords tracked!
- Backlinks pointing to any domain – over 970 million indexed
- Comprehensive traffic analytics estimates
- Rich on-page optimization insights
- SEM Ad history – ads run, cost and performance
We also love that Semrush provides superb documentation and supports integration in every major coding language. For large enterprises, it‘s an incredibly powerful way to feed data into BI tools like Tableau for creating dynamic SEO dashboards.
2. Ahrefs
What Ahrefs API lacks in fancy charts, it more than makes up for in the sheer depth of backlink data. Each day, the Ahrefsbot crawls 45 billion web pages building up its gargantuan index.
We‘re talking:
- Information on over 295 billion backlinks
- Detailed metrics on 94 million root domains
- Granular anchor text insights unrivaled by any tool
By letting you tap into this goldmine, the Ahrefs API empowers tracking referral equity shifts, discovering influencer backlink opportunities and estimating traffic driven by specific sites linking in.
3. Mozscape
Industry pioneer Moz offers both its classic Mozscape API and the more modern Mozscape Graph API for mining backlink intelligence.
With instant access to:
➡ 40 trillion links
➡ 4.5 billion anchor text phrases
➡ Page authority scores for 297 million domainsit‘s perfect for uncovering competitor vulnerabilities and monitoring your own domains‘ backlink profile health.
Developers praise how easy it is to directly ingest domain authority, page authority and other Moz trust metrics into custom dashboards and SEO tools.
4. Searchmetrics
Less well-known outside Europe, Searchmetrics boasts an enterprise-grade SEO API covering essential keyword, ranking and content data.
Two stand-out features include:
IDEAS: Research module suggesting highly performant, low competition keywords in 70 locales
CONTENT: Analyzes search intent to recommend topic clusters and content structures optimized for rankings wins
Pricing starts at €249/month making this a smart choice for well-resourced teams aiming to fully automate SEO.
5. Rank Ranger
For tracking website visibility across search engines at scale, Rank Ranger have crafted a speedy, accurate API.
Covering 100+ million keywords across Google, YouTube, Bing, Yandex and more – key capabilities include:
- Rank Tracker API: Monitor ranking movements for targeted keywords including local pack 3 pack tracking
- SERP API: Check organic results for any query, location and device
- Google Suggest API: Discover recommendations as you type keywords
- Domain Rank API: Quick view of top pages and keywords driving visibility for a site
Pricing is based on usage starting at $99/month for 100K API requests.
6. SEO PowerSuite
The established LinkAssistant tool now offers an API focused specifically on backlink data aggregation and analysis.
Leveraging a huge crawl database encompassing Ahrefs, Majestic, Moz and more – metrics provided include:
• Total backlinks number
• Referring domains count
• Dofollow vs nofollow links
• Anchor texts driving traffic
• Linking page authority scores With the ability to check backlink profiles for 5 million sites and affordable pricing from $99/month – it’s a comprehensive option.
7. Serpstack
Serpstack has carved a niche for its speedy, elegant Google SERP API.
Stand out benefits:
✔️ Blazing fast – results under 100ms
✔️ Broad location coverage – 230 regions
✔️ Detail rich – organic results + map packs + knowledge panels
✔️ Affordable smaller plans from $7/month
Rather than requiring coding skills, Serpstack offers a friendly UI dashboard making results analysis straightforward even for non-developers.
8. CognitiveSEO
This relative newcomer to the SEO API game – CognitiveSEO – has quickly built up an impressive set of capabilities:
➡ Daily updated link index tracking over 60 billion backlinks
➡ Keyword rankings for top 20 Google results
➡ Webpage content analysis identifying SEO issues
➡ Social visibility metrics from Facebook, Pinterest and moreWith flexible filters and the option to schedule automated PDF reports – it presents incredible value. Pricing starts at an affordable $24/month for 5K API calls.
9. BrightLocal
Specialists in local SEO – BrightLocal furnish a suite of APIs targeted specifically at multi-location brands.
Pull in a goldmine of localized data covering:
💬 Location citations listings
🗺️ GMB, Apple and other map listings
🔎 Organic rankings for key phrases
🏆 Reputation via OTA reviews data
Pricing is based on monthly API calls making this ideal for franchises and companies managing 100s of locations.
10. DataForSEO
This aggregator API from DataForSeO is a jack of all trades – which is both its strength and weakness.
Covering everything from Google manual actions to job listing trends, key offerings include:
Keyword data APIs
Backlink analysis and tracking APIs
Google manual actions and messages data
Job trends and economic indicators APIsIt’s thus ideal for developers seeking a one-stop shop. But beware – some niche APIs have coverage gaps limiting utility. Pricing can also get expensive at high monthly request volumes.
11. SEMrush (Honorable Mention)
Yes – we‘re featuring SEMrush again because its capabilities warrant it! Beyond the core SEMrush API, they offer a full suite covering:
➡ Backlink data API
➡ Google Analytics API bridge
➡ Google Search Console API bridge
➡ Google My Business API bridgeThat flexibility to mashup data from SEMrush‘s database with other best-of-breed marketing platforms is incredibly powerful. Perfect for both in-house BI teams and digital agencies managing vast client accounts.
12. Seobility API
German vendor Seobility has been around for over 20 years constantly honing their SEO API offering.
Alongside the usual rank tracking and audit capabilities, we especially like:
PDF API – effortlessly generate white-labeled SEO analysis reports
White Label Reseller API – customize and manage access to results
For SMBs juggling multiple clients, its a smart pick thanks to flexible account management capabilities.
And that wraps up the top 12 most robust SEO APIs available today. Below we cover 3 more popular options for completeness – before diving into implementation recommendations.
13. SERanking API
SERanking focuses explicitly on large-scale rank tracking and position monitoring.
With clever data caching – the SERanking API can efficiently handle billions of daily requests. For managing rank tracking across thousands of domains and millions of keywords – it‘s thus a leading contender.
14. Site Auditor API
Part of the PowerMapper suite, this API allows automation of website audits at scale.
Just pass any URL to instantly analyses critical on-page factors including:
• Duplicate content checks
• Page speed / Core Web Vitals grades
• Broken links detection
• Security issue scanningPricing is based on monthly scan credits making Site Auditor cost-effective.
15. SheerSEO API
Rounding out our list – the SheerSEO API offers core organic rank tracking abilities coupled with local SEO monitoring smarts.
Perfect for multi-location brands, two useful features are:
RankByCity – track keyword ranks for any geo
GetCitiesWithLocalOffers – discover GMB locations driving most visibility
Pricing is transactional starting at 500 credits for $49/month.
Evaluating and Integrating SEO APIs
Now you have the breakdown of 15 leading SEO APIs spanning backlink data, rank tracking, website auditing and more.
Here are 7 tips when assessing options:
1. Clarify core need
Do you just need backlinks intelligence? Or full stack monitoring from ranks to reviews? That drives which API meets needs.
2. Assess ease of integration
Look for clean documentation and coding samples to estimate complexity.
3. Compare API coverage
Keywords tracked, sites indexed, locations supported. More = better.
4. Validate accuracy
Spot check ranking or backlinks data against other sources. Critical the API delivers.
5. Review API call limits
Entry plans often limit requests – understand all caps to avoid surprises.
6. Evaluate pricing models
Flexibility is key. Balance subscription costs against overage fees for bursts.
7. Talk to their support
How responsive are they via chat or email? Vital for resolving integration issues.
Getting these base factors right ensures you select the optimal SEO API aligned to budget and goals for your specific needs.
Now – let‘s examine how to actually implement these APIs for advanced workflows:
Workhorse: Keyword Rank Tracking
Monitoring keyword positions forms the foundation of most SEO programs. But constantly pulling reports across properties and geographies burns precious hours.
APIs like SERanking and Seobility exist to automate this grunt work.
"With the SERanking API, we built a custom dashboard updating daily with the top 10,000 keywords for our client sites. This lets us react fast if any sensitive terms drop ranks." Christopher L. Digital Analytics Director
Business Intelligence: Data Visualization
Pulling feeds from multiple APIs into data visualization dashboards gives cross-functional teams an always-on view of your SEO and wider marketing effectiveness.
"Instead of siloed reports – our C Suite now has a 50 inch dashboard powered by Ahrefs and SearchMetrics data piped via APIs into Tableau. So decisions happen 5x faster." Lisa T. Online Growth Lead
Competitive Intelligence: Backlink Tracking
Dynamically checking domain and page authority metrics allows countering the latest link building assaults from key competitors.
"We wrote a Node.js scraper polling Mozscape‘s API continuously for fresh PA scores for our target‘s best content. We rapidly match sites they get links from." David U. Founder, Growth Agency
Content Optimization: Automated Auditing
Coupling the Site Auditor API for surface level SEO checks with CognitiveSEO‘s deeper content crawl reveals opportunities to better optimize target landing pages – at scale.
The use cases are endless. In short, take advantage of these SEO data power ups or risk being left behind as the competition increasingly shifts into API-enhanced hyperdrive.
I‘m Tom, a digital analytics expert who helps brands unlock their online growth potential through technical integration. Follow more of our original research and practical guidance on using marketing technology judiciously via our newsletter.
