Editor's score 4.4 out of 5
Semrush pricing explained (2026): what is free, what you pay for
OSI Affiliate Reviews DeskEditorial team
Semrush pricing is the question we get asked about most, and the vendor's own page answers a different one: what each tier is called. This guide is about the shape of the bill, which is what you feel a year in.
We do not print dollar figures here on purpose. Semrush changes them, and a stale number is worse than none. Check the pricing page for today's figure; use this page to know what the figure buys.
Semrush pricing at a glance
Limited free account, then paid
- How you pay
- Tiered subscriptions sold as Pro, Guru and Business that raise project, keyword and report limits as you move up, with additional users and specialist toolkits such as local or content sold as add-ons.
- What is free
- A lasting free account that lets you run a limited number of lookups and one small project, enough to look something up but not to work in.
How Semrush pricing is structured
Tiered subscriptions sold as Pro, Guru and Business that raise project, keyword and report limits as you move up, with additional users and specialist toolkits such as local or content sold as add-ons.
What you get without paying
A lasting free account that lets you run a limited number of lookups and one small project, enough to look something up but not to work in.
Where the bill grows
Best for in-house marketers and agencies who need to cover several jobs and report on them. The free account is real but narrow — enough to look something up, not enough to work in.
Is Semrush worth paying for?
For a small team with one person doing all of SEO, that breadth beats a better single-purpose tool. You can answer “what should we write”, “why did that page drop” and “what are they bidding on” without three logins and three invoices.
Skip it if you only need one of these jobs done. Buying the whole toolkit for backlink data or rank tracking alone is the most expensive way to get either.
For the full picture, including the score and who it suits, read our Semrush review. If the pricing shape is the problem, the Semrush alternatives page lists the tools we would look at instead.
Questions people ask
Is Semrush free?
There is a free account, and it is real but narrow: a handful of lookups a day and one small project. It is enough to check a keyword or a competitor, not to run an SEO programme. The paid tiers are where the toolkit actually opens up.
Is Semrush worth it for a small business?
Worth it when one person has to cover several jobs — keyword research, site audits, rank tracking, competitor and paid-search analysis — and report on them. If you only need one of those, buying the whole toolkit is the most expensive way to get it.
Written by
OSI Affiliate Reviews DeskEditorial team
The staff desk behind every review, shortlist and comparison on this site. We sign up for the tools ourselves, read the pricing page rather than the press release, and say plainly which links pay us. Where a finding rests on documentation rather than our own daily use, the page says so.