Search engine optimization (SEO) is essential to the success of any website or online business. It can help you rank higher in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs), boost organic traffic, and increase sales. In the past, SEO has been time-consuming due to everything involved, including keyword research, writing good SEO content, and other advanced SEO techniques. Thankfully, with artificial intelligence (AI) taking the world by storm, you can streamline the SEO process like never before. In this post, we’ll showcase the best AI SEO tools to help you work smarter (not harder) to outrank the competition.
What AI SEO Tools Can Do For You
An AI SEO tool is an online platform or software that can automate various SEO tasks that help your website rank higher. They do everything from monitoring and analyzing your entire site’s performance to providing valuable keyword insights and suggestions for on-page SEO content creation. This cutting-edge technology employs machine learning algorithms to suggest relevant keywords, highlight areas for optimization, and perform a comprehensive site analysis—all at lightning-fast speeds that surpass human capabilities. Whether managing a single website or juggling multiple sites, an AI SEO tool can help you streamline your processes and achieve better results in less time.
The Best AI Tools for SEO
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We considered several things when choosing the best AI SEO tools to include on our list. First, we wanted to ensure these tools provide features that justify the cost. After all, many companies on our list are costly. Secondly, we considered ease of use. Learning how to use a complex SEO tool can add to your frustration if you’re a beginner. Lastly, we thoroughly tested each platform to calculate its strengths and weaknesses. So, without further ado, let’s dive in.
The Best AI SEO Tools Listed In Order
1. Semrush
🥇 Best AI SEO Tool Overall
Semrush happens to be one of the biggest names in SEO. It securely holds the title as one of the best SEO Saas platforms, period — and its new AI tools have made it even better. The main Semrush tools allow you to conduct keyword research, optimize on-page SEO, conduct a keyword gap analysis (competitor analysis), help you configure local SEO, build links, and track keywords, amongst other features. Although there are AI tools for content marketing native to the platform, Semrush offers specific AI tools for content creation that extend beyond their core platform.
One of Semrush’s main AI tools is ContentShake, an AI-powered writing assistant that streamlines the process of creating SEO content with reliable data-driven results. It can be used as an affordable standalone app for marketers and content creators to harness Semrush’s robust SEO features specifically for the purpose of writing high-quality SEO content that outranks your competitors.
ContentShake helps you do high-level keyword research that flows into topic clustering. With individual clusters, users can plan specific articles to cover and implement technical on-page SEO during content creation. For each article, ContentShake will help you use the right keywords and the right amount of keywords, and then it scores your content against what is currently ranking in the SERPs. It also offers AI writing tools to help you write everything from headings and titles to individual paragraphs and meta descriptions. Once everything is polished, ContentShake connects with a few CMSs to make publishing easy.
ContentShake AI access can be purchased with a regular Semrush account or even by itself as a standalone service.
What We Like About Semrush
- Powerful AI SEO Tools for Content Creation: The platform has robust AI SEO tools that extend beyond the core platform. They offer free online SEO tools as well as ContentShake AI for writing SEO content for articles and social media.
- Backlink Analysis: Analyzes backlinks with advanced metrics to improve link-building strategies.
- Competitor Insights: Offers in-depth competitor analysis to understand and outperform their SEO tactics.
- Keyword Research: Integrates first-party data from Semrush for comprehensive keyword research and tracking.
- AI Writing: Generates content suggestions using an AI writer based on live SERP result data.
- Topic Clusters: Find related topics for creating clusters of topical authority.
- Content Scoring: Scores content against currently ranking articles to guide optimization efforts.
- Publication Tools: Includes a WordPress plugin for easy data synchronization to the CMS, streamlining the publishing process.
What Could Be Improved
- Language Limitations: Currently supports only English for AI writing, limiting its usability for global markets.
- Separate Add-ons for AI: ContetnShake as well as the other AI Apps in the Semrush App Store, are separate purchases.
🥇 Why We Picked It
Semrush is known across the world as a premier SEO giant. Many other SEO tools simply are trying to catch up with it. On top of that, Semrush has integrated AI tools into its core platform and offers free AI SEO tools as well. The real power of Semrush’s AI capabilities is found in its flagship app, ContentShake AI, which provides a set of AI features that brings AI SEO research to the writing workflow better than most tools.
Who is Semrush Best For?
Semrush’s Saas platform is great for entrepreneurs and small businesses who are serious about improving their SEO strategy. If you want to incorporate AI into your SEO strategy, Semrush has the chops to give you all the tools you need to rank higher. Plus, it has leading data and additional tools to make the lives of SEO specialists easier. If you only want a content planning, writing, and optimization platform, ContentShake AI is just the ticket.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Although there aren’t many online reviews for ContentShake AI, there are plenty that vouch for Semrush’s core tools. It’s at the leading edge of SEO and the preferred SEO stack for many practitioners.
Pricing
Semrush has free SEO tools with basic AI tools built into its platform with the “Guru” plan that starts at $249.95 per month. ContentShake AI offers a free trial, with monthly plans starting at $60 per month (Semrush SEO tools not included).
2. Alli AI
🥈 Best for Ease of Use
The first AI SEO tool that tops our list is Alli AI, which offers a wealth of features to simplify managing your site’s SEO. With Alli AI, optimizing your on-page SEO can be accomplished en masse by creating site-wide optimization rules down to the single-page level with just a single click. Alli can generate page titles, meta descriptions, and content changes for your pages and posts site-wide, allowing you to accomplish more in less time.
Alli AI’s live editor transforms your SEO approach by enabling you to edit content directly on the front end. While some WordPress page builders, such as Divi and Elementor, already do this, this could be a game changer for those using other CMS platforms or static HTML websites. With the live editor, you can see on-page SEO recommendations and make changes on the fly. Additionally, Alli’s SEO automation process is the breadwinner. Upon your initial scan, Alli generates fresh suggestions to improve your SEO and then allows you to implement them with the click of a button. Alternatively, you can individually select the recommendations you want to execute while simply disregarding the ones you don’t.
What We Like About Alli AI
- Intuitive Editing with AI: Offers a familiar editing experience for those who have used A/B testing software like Microsoft Clarity or Semrush’s old Page Improve widget.
- Global SEO Edits: Allows site-wide on-page SEO edits, regardless of the CMS used.
- Bulk AI Generation: Can bulk-generate page titles, meta descriptions, and other content changes efficiently.
- Visual Editor: Features a live visual editor to preview changes as visitors see them.
- Agency Friendly: Ideal for agencies seeking a unified SEO workflow for on-page edits across various CMS and page editors.
What Could Be Improved
- Lock-in Effect: Since Alli AI dynamically alters your page and site content through JavaScript, those changes will be gone once/if you remove it from your site. So, years of work could be gone if you decide to switch vendors.
- Too Much JS Reliance: With Google revising Core Web Vitals metrics and including Interaction to Next Paint (INP), sites that overly rely on JavaScript might be slower than than they have to. Using Alli AI doesn’t immediately make a site fail these tests but can be a contributing factor.
- Slow Loading: Certain aspects of the UI can be rather slow to load, which isn’t great but isn’t a dealbreaker either.
🥈 Why We Picked It
If you’ve ever operated an agency, logging into customer websites for every single edit can actually be a hard task. Try creating SOPs for your entry-level staff for editing web pages with the top CMSs (and more). It is a tall order. Alli AI, with a simple script embed, makes it super easy to make changes to any website. Though this method has some drawbacks, it solves some ease-of-use issues that many SEO agencies face.
Who is Alli AI Best For?
Alli AI’s impressive features come at a cost, which may be a deal-breaker for some. Their lowest plans are even expensive and only a reasonable cost for agencies working on multiple client websites. The silver lining is a 10-day free trial to test it out.
Community Reviews and Ratings
People love all the features baked into Alli AI. From SEO task management to the visual page editor (even for static sites and back-end editors CMSs), Alli is helping SEOs get more work done. Pricing can be a little high, but that is mostly when using it for multiple websites. Users don’t mind the price when they have websites that can fully utilize Alli’s feature set.
Pricing
Starts at $299 per month for use on a total of 5 websites. Single-site owners might be priced out or have to find a group of other users to go in on it together.
3. Surfer SEO
🥉 Best for SEO Content Optimization
Our next AI SEO tool is Surfer. It uses a natural language processing (NLP) model to help you optimize your on-page SEO. Also, it integrates seamlessly with WordPress and other CMS platforms, making optimizing your SEO content easy – as you write it. It works by analyzing your competitor’s keywords and content, running it through an open-source NLP, and then suggesting how often you should use those keywords in your content. It also provides insight into how many words, headings, paragraphs, and images a post should have. By following their suggestion, Surfer SEO promises to boost your ranking in the SERPs.
What We Like About Surfer
- Blog Brief Creation with AI: Creates blog briefs to plan article outlines and provide topical insights before writing begins.
- AI Content Planner: Offers a content planner based on seed keywords/topics for creating authoritative topical clusters.
- AI Plagiarism Checker: Includes a plagiarism checker to ensure originality before publishing.
- External Integrations: Integrates with WordPress, Jasper, and more for seamless publishing and analytics.
- Free AI Outline Generator: Provides a free AI outline generator to enhance SEO workflows at no additional cost.
What Could Be Improved
- Business Pricing: While Surfer is a pricier option, its comprehensive features justify the investment.
- Over-Optimization: Surfer can make it easy to over-optimize content by stuffing primary and semantic keywords. Don’t try to reach a perfect score of 100.
🥉 Why We Picked It
Surfer is an excellent tool that creates a whole workflow for creating content where SERP analytics and AI are usable at every stage. It’s on the pricey side but long-time users love the platform. Surfer also gets active development with new features introduced every once in a while.
Who is Surfer Best For?
Surfer SEO is a fantastic tool for optimizing on-page SEO, offering valuable suggestions for keywords and headings, amongst other metrics. However, it’s worth noting that over-optimization may occur if you rely on Surfer alone. That being said, if you have experience with SEO and want to streamline the process, Surfer SEO is worth considering.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Another SEO AI writer scoring really well with customers is Surfer. Surfer was one of the first mega-popular SEO writers, and it shows in their mature feature set. There are some idiosyncracies, among them being the price tag, but users love using it.
Pricing
No free options with paid plans starting at $89 per month.
4. Frase
Our next product, Frase, is one of the best AI content writing tools that harness the power of AI to help you create high-quality content in a fraction of the time. It can help you identify keywords, optimize your current content, and give you a better chance at ranking higher in search engines. That said, it’s more than that. With Frase, you’ll get insights into how your website performs against your competitors in terms of SEO.
Apart from the exceptional AI content generation, the Google Search Console (GSC) content analysis tool is undeniably the most compelling feature. Once you connect your GSC account, this tool provides you with valuable insights to guide your SEO strategy. The KPI report and other essential metrics, such as ranked pages, impressions, and cost per click, are readily available in the Frase app’s content editor. Additionally, you can effortlessly discover your top-ranked keywords and their average ranking position, which helps identify your opportunities.
Another good feature of Frase is the topic planner. By entering a seed keyword, you’re provided access to long-tail keywords that further improve your content’s search rankings.
What We Like About Frase
- AI Writer: Employs an AI content writer for efficient content creation.
- SEO Content Outlines & Briefs: Generates AI outlines and briefs to streamline the writing process.
- AI Keyword Research Tools: Offers keyword research tools for targeted content optimization.
- Automated Link Suggestions: Provides internal and external link suggestions to enhance SEO.
- GSC Integration: Integrates with Google Search Console for in-depth content analytics.
What Could Be Improved
- Too Few Integrations: While Frase provides valuable integrations with platforms such as WordPress, Salesforce, and Google Search Console, enhancing its integration range with additional third-party platforms and tools would optimize user workflows for more users.
Who is Frase Best For?
Frase is one of the best AI SEO tools that offer valuable insights to improve your content while aiding in creating new content and measuring your site’s performance. With its affordable price point, Frase is accessible to anyone looking to enhance their overall SEO strategy.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Frase has a tremendous amount of good reviews, and for good reason—it makes SEO content writing a breeze. Its writing workflow is intuitive and helps users each step along the way between creating something and publishing it. Some users want more structure in how it handles article file organization inside the platform, but that is a relatively minor qualm.
Pricing
Starts at $14.99 per month with an unlimited AI content generation add-on for an extra $35 per month.
5. SE Ranking
SE Ranking, our next AI SEO tool, packs a punch with many features that can boost your website’s organic traffic. Among its standout features is the rank tracker, which enables you to monitor the performance of your keywords and compare them with your competitors. Additionally, the AI-powered site audit tool provides you with a comprehensive overview of your website. At the same time, the on-page SEO checker optimizes your content for maximum impact. To top it off, the white-label tool lets you create custom, in-depth reports for your clients, ensuring they are always up to speed with their site’s performance.
SE Ranking has impressive features, including the Content Idea Finder. This tool analyzes industry-related keywords and generates a comprehensive report with content clusters, search volume, and keyword difficulty. This is useful for creating a content strategy, starting a blog, or setting up a content calendar. You can click on one of the topics to launch the AI content creator to assist you in creating a post related to that keyword. The entire process is seamless, intuitive, and a great way to create new content ideas for your business.
What We Like About SE Ranking
- Keyword Tracking: Features a keyword tracker to monitor search rankings.
- On-page AI Checker: Provides an on-page SEO checker for website optimization.
- White-label Reporting: Allows custom white-label reporting for professional presentations.
- AI Content Cluster Creation: Enables the creation of content clusters that can be edited with AI for coherence.
What Could Be Improved
- Needs More Data: SE Ranking is a little behind on the amount and quality of data it collects on KWs (compared to Ahrefs and Semrush).
- Improved Local SEO Toolset: Some users say that the Local SEO tools leave some to be desired. If that is a major focus, there may be other SEO tools to check out for localized data.
Who is SE Ranking Best For?
If you’re looking for an all-in-one solution for generating content and keeping track of your site’s SEO performance, consider trying SE Ranking. They offer a 14-day free trial without requiring a credit card, so you’ll have plenty of time to poke around in the platform to see if it’s right for you.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Users love a more affordable keyword research tool and enjoy its added AI benefits with its AI content writer. People tend to use it instead of Semrush because of affordability, but because of that, they also acknowledge that it’s first-party data isn’t always as good or expansive as some of the bigger SEO tools out there. However, it offers a competitive toolset that doesn’t disappoint.
Pricing
No free plans, with paid plans starting at $55 per month.
6. CanIRank
CanIRank takes a unique approach to SEO compared to the other products on our list. Instead of solely relying on its own data, CanIRank gathers information from other SEO services, such as Ahrefs, and uses it to provide valuable insights, opportunities, and recommendations. Additionally, CanIRank’s AI-powered tools simplify tasks like keyword research and link building, allowing you to efficiently manage all aspects of your SEO strategy using a single comprehensive solution.
CanIRank offers one of the most valuable features for website owners, which is the actionable solutions provided after an initial scan of the site. It uses AI to scour the internet to present suggestions on what steps to take to improve a site’s rankings, along with an estimated cost and completion time, should you need to outsource the work. When we tested the platform, it provided us with specific posts related to our keyword and steps to reach out to the post’s author to ask to promote our Cat Cafe website. This is particularly useful for small business owners looking to enhance their SEO rankings and network with popular blogs that frequently post about similar businesses. Using a series of practical, outlined steps, they can choose to implement them on their own or outsource the work to a freelancer or agency.
What We Like About CanIRank
- Keyword Research Capabilities: Supports comprehensive keyword research for SEO planning.
- Competitive Analysis: Performs detailed competitor analysis for a competitive edge.
- Link Building Tools: Offers link-building strategies to improve site authority.
- AI SEO Suggestions: Suggests SEO improvements through AI-driven insights for better rankings.
What Could Be Improved
- Dated UI: CanIRank isn’t the prettiest thing to look at. But the data is what matters, and if that works for you, that’s what matters most.
- Lack of Data: Doesn’t have the best or highest number of collected data on keywords. But, for a budget tool, it gets the job done.
Who is CanIRank Best For?
Can I Rank is an excellent solution for small business owners or freelancers. You’ll get a series of actionable steps that will have you ranking higher on search engines in no time. If you want to try their premium plans, they offer a 7-day free trial without using a credit card.
Community Reviews and Ratings
There are quite a few longtime users of CanIRank, which means that they offer something of value. We’ve mentioned some of its shortcomings, which tend to be echoed by other reviewers as well. But it gets the job done, and users love its free plan and the price point of its paid tools.
Pricing
Offers a basic free version with paid monthly plans starting at $49.
7. Diib
Diib is another SEO tool that offers a comprehensive suite of features to help you enhance your search engine rankings, explore growth opportunities, and gain insight into your competitors’ strategies. Unlike other tools on our list, Diib goes above and beyond by providing valuable services such as page speed insights, social analytics that evaluate your performance on Facebook, and alerts for items that require immediate attention.
When you log in to Diib, a suite of powerful tools is available to help you optimize your website. Diib provides you with insight into your website’s health by analyzing your mobile speed, core web vitals, domain authority, current keyword rankings, sitemap, SSL certificate, blacklists, and email deliverability. Plus, you’ll receive a weekly health score forecasting your website’s performance based on Diib’s metrics.
In addition, you can monitor your website and social media ranking, evaluate how mobile-friendly your site is, and gauge the overall browsing experience of your visitors. Lastly, you can navigate Diib’s suggestions, known as objectives, aiming to boost your search engine rankings.
What We Like About Diib
- SEO Alerts: Delivers automated alerts for prioritizing SEO-related tasks.
- Keyword Insights: Facilitates keyword research for strategic content planning.
- Social Analytics: Includes social analytics to track and improve social engagement.
- Speed Insights: Offers speed-related data for website performance optimization.
- Competitor Insights: Conducts competitor analysis for strategic positioning.
- Affordable SEO Tool: Many small businesses love using Dibb as it is within a traditional SMB’s price range.
What Could Be Improved
- Lack of Updates: There could be a quicker pace of platform updates and feature releases that keep it relevant.
- Direct AI Use: More exposure to AI tools inside the platform could speed up user workflows when using Diib.
Who is Dibb Best For?
If you want an affordable, feature-packed AI SEO tool, you should give Diib a try. With tons of insights, guided steps to increase your search engine rankings, and a simple interface, Diib is an excellent option for budget-conscious people who want to up their SEO game.
Community Reviews and Ratings
Many of Diib’s uses of AI are under the hood, and users would love more direct access to those features. Feature updates are a little slow, which doesn’t always inspire confidence in the quickly evolving SEO industry.
Pricing
Diib offers a free plan with paid plans starting at $14.99 monthly.
Comparison of The Best AI SEO Tools
We’ve shown you quite a few tools in detail, but let’s take a step back and see things from a different view.
Feature Comparison for AI SEO Tools
What SEO specialist doesn’t want more features? Below, we compare our top three tools and their features to show a comprehensive comparison. Which one fits your needs most?
| Feature Comparison | 🥇Semrush + ContentShake | 🥈Alli AI | 🥉Surfer SEO |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starting Price | $249.95/mo | $299/mo | $89/mo |
| AI Writing Assistance | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| CMS Integrations | ✔️ | ✔️ | ✔️ |
| Live Visual Editor | ❌ | ✔️ | ❌ |
| AI Outline Generator | ✔️ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| Blog Briefs & Content Planning | ✔️ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| Plagiarism Checker | ❌ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| Topic Clustering | ✔️ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| Content Scoring Against SERPs | ✔️ | ❌ | ✔️ |
| First Party KW Data | ✔️ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Community Rating | 5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Read Reviews | 4.5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Read Reviews | 5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Read Reviews |
| Get Semrush | Get Alli AI | Get Surfer | |
Price Comparison of SEO Tools with AI
Price is another huge factor in the SEO industry. It seems like there are new tools all the time coming in at lower prices, yet as these tools age, they quickly increase in price. So, if you are looking for something that matches your budget, here’s a comparison of prices.
| Plugin | Starting Price | Free Option | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🥇 | Semrush | $119.95/month | ✔️ | Visit |
| 🥈 | Alli AI | $249/month | ❌ | Visit |
| 🥉 | Surfer SEO | $49/month | ❌ | Visit |
| 4 | Frase | $14.99/month | ❌ | Visit |
| 5 | Diib | $7.99/month | ❌ | Visit |
| 6 | SE Ranking | $49/month | ❌ | Visit |
| 7 | Can I Rank? | $49/month | ✔️ | Visit |
What is the Best AI SEO Tool?
AI SEO tools can provide a great way to improve your website’s search engine rankings. Out of all the products on our list, Semrush’s content tool, ContentShake, is an excellent choice. It mixes keyword research, SERP analysis, and AI writing to create an excellent workflow. Alli AI is a great choice for many high-volume agencies. Surfer, much like ContentShake, is also for creating data-informed content writing workflows.
Need more AI tools? Check out our complete list of the best AI tools. Here are a few you might enjoy as well:
- Best AI Website Builders
- Best AI Writing Software
- Best AI Marketing Tools to Boost Your Business
- Best AI Art Generators
- Best AI Chatbots
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Before we wrap up, let’s answer some of your most common questions regarding AI SEO tools. Did we miss one? Leave a question below, and we will respond!
Semrush
Alli AI
Surfer SEO
What about GREMI.app or Jasper.ai? Those seem like the heavy hitters in the space right now?
Hey Donald, thanks for your mentions.
Jasper is only a great SEO tool if it is paired with Surfer SEO’s integration, so that’s why it didn’t make the list. Also, there is a lot more to SEO than content creation, so we wanted to point out the other great use cases for SEO + AI.
Thanks for these tools. One of the reasons my last site was successful was because I worked hard to stay up to date and learn the newest technology. I’m trying to do the same now for my new site, probetheglobe.com so that I can be as successful with this site as I was the last one that I sold.
Hello Rachel, I’m curious to know which tools you tried and how if you were successful in using it. I’ll try one or two and see if they’ll live up to expectations. I will also share my findings with you.