Backlink analysis: free and paid backlink checker tools
Choosing a backlink checker and a backlink analysis method: Search Console's free data, how paid tools differ and the steps to separate risky links.
By Roozbeh Nazari · CEO
There are many backlink checker tools for seeing which sites link to a website; some are free, some work on a subscription. A common mistake is to take the number one tool shows as the site's "real" backlink profile. In fact, each tool sees only the part of the web it has crawled, and each offers a different sample. This article explains what free and paid backlink checker options do and do not show, and how to run a repeatable backlink analysis with that data. We do not compare figures: because the tools' index sizes and metric definitions change, we focus here on method and on how to read the data.
Free backlink lookup: the Search Console Links report
For your own site, the first free source is the Links report in Google Search Console. For external links, the report shows your most-linked pages, the sites linking to you most and the most common link text; for internal links, it shows the pages that receive the most links within the site. Google's help page states two limits clearly: the report shows a sample of links rather than all of them, and tables are limited to 1,000 rows, so the list may be truncated for heavily linked sites. The export option, however, allows downloading up to 100,000 rows from the main page.
The biggest advantage of this report is that the data comes directly from Google. Its disadvantages are that it works only for your own verified property, that it does not show when a link was first seen or whether it has been lost, and that it does not let you examine competitor sites. Bing Webmaster Tools also offers a similar backlink view for your own property; using both free sources together reduces the risk of depending on a single sample. We explain how we turn the other Search Console reports into decisions in our Search Console guide.
Paid backlink checker tools: what you are buying
Paid tools such as Ahrefs, Semrush, Majestic and Moz crawl the web with their own crawlers and build their own link indexes. A paid backlink checker gives you three things: the ability to examine competitor sites too, a history of links gained and lost over time, and filters that classify linking pages. Each tool has its own authority metric: Domain Rating in Ahrefs, Authority Score in Semrush, Trust Flow and Citation Flow in Majestic, Domain Authority in Moz. These metrics are each tool's own calculation; they are not a signal Google uses and they cannot be converted between tools. A site one tool calls "40" and a site another tool calls "40" are not saying the same thing.
It is normal to see different link counts for the same site across tools. A tool showing a bigger number does not mean it is more accurate; it may have indexed more low-value pages. So when choosing a tool, a more meaningful test than the number is how well it captures, on your own site, the important linking sites that Search Console shows.
There is also a middle option between free and paid. Some paid tool providers offer limited free versions for your own verified site, or free lookup pages that show only the top results. These versions can be enough for a quick look at your own profile; but features such as competitor analysis, historical data and bulk export usually stay in the paid plans. Because which feature sits in which plan changes often, check the provider's current plans page before deciding, and clarify your need with the question "my own site, competitors, or history?"
Backlink analysis method: five steps
The first step is collecting data: take the export from Search Console and download the list of linking domains for the same period from the paid tool you use. The second step is merging: combine the two lists at domain level and mark which source each domain appears in. Domains that appear in both sources are the most reliable core of your profile. The third step is classification: label each domain by type; press and publications, industry associations and directories, business partners, forums and user content, pages that look auto-generated. The fourth step is anchor text review: does most of the link text consist of the brand name and natural phrases, or are there repeating patterns with commercial keywords? The fifth step is comparison: do the same classification for two or three competitors and list the types of sites that link to them but not to you. This gap list is the input for your content and digital PR plan; we share a way to run a similar gap analysis without tools in our competitor clinic analysis article.
Backlink checks: separating risky links
Google's spam policies define link spam clearly: buying or selling links for ranking purposes, exchanging goods or services for links, using automated programs to create links, excessive link exchanges, advertorial content with optimised anchor text, low-quality directory and bookmark sites, and links embedded in widgets distributed across many sites all fall under it. The same policy also states that links for advertising and sponsorship are considered normal when marked with rel="nofollow" or rel="sponsored". Google's page on qualifying outbound links explains when to use the sponsored, ugc and nofollow values.
At the backlink check stage, the aim is not to treat every link with a low authority score as dangerous. A small but genuine local publication or industry blog is a valuable link. What deserves attention is patterns: links with the same anchor text from many unrelated sites, networks of pages that are not in the site's language and have nothing to do with its topic, or links known to have been bought in the past. If you see such a pattern, first try to understand its source; if the site has a history of buying links, removal requests and, if necessary, Google's disavow tool may come into play. The disavow tool must be used with care and is not needed for most sites.
Turning the analysis into decisions
A backlink analysis should end with three outputs: a list of the reliable core of the profile, a record of any risky patterns and their causes, and a gap list against competitors. These outputs are not a ranking guarantee; links are only one of the many signals Google uses. What we observe in practice is that link work has limited effect on a site with weak technical foundations and content. That is why we handle backlink analysis together with indexing and internal link structure within our technical SEO service. Whichever backlink checker you use, reading its data against Search Console is the simplest way to avoid wrong decisions.