How much does an SEO audit cost?
An SEO audit can cost nothing for an automated report, a monthly fee for a tool that runs many audits, or a quoted project price when a person reviews your site by hand.
At a glance
- Automated audits can be free
- Tool plans charge by how many you run
- Hand audits are quoted by size and depth
- No one can promise a top ranking
Three Kinds of Audit, Three Kinds of Price
The phrase SEO audit covers very different work, so the price range is wide. It helps to know which kind you are looking at.
- An automated audit. Software checks your links, rankings, pages and speed and gives you a report in minutes. Many of these are free or come with a free trial.
- A tool plan. You pay a monthly fee to run audits again and again, on your own site and others. This suits people who manage several sites or check often.
- A hand audit. A person reviews your site, your market and your competitors, then writes up what to fix and in what order. This is priced as a project and varies a lot.
What Our Audits Cost
Since you are here, these are our own prices as of October 2026, as listed on the pricing page.
- Free. Three full audits with no card. Each one covers links and the PageRanker Score, Google keywords and estimated traffic, a crawl of up to 60 pages, a mobile speed test and a home page check.
- Starter. $29 a month for 50 audits a month.
- Growth. $79 a month for 300 audits a month, side by side comparison and your logo on the PDF.
- Unlimited. $149 a month for unlimited audits under fair use.
Every plan gets the same five part report. Plans change how many audits you run, how many pages the crawl reads, and a few extras. For a single page, the page checker is free for ten pages a day.
What Drives the Price of a Hand Audit
If you hire a person, the quote usually depends on these things.
- How big the site is. A ten page local site and a store with thousands of products are very different jobs.
- How deep it goes. A quick review of titles and speed takes far less time than a full look at links, content, structure and competitors.
- Local or national. A local business audit adds maps, listings and reviews. A national site adds more competitors and more keywords.
- Whether fixes are included. Some audits are a report only. Others include doing the work or a call to walk you through it.
Prices for hand audits are not published in any standard way, so ask for a written scope before you agree to anything.
Is a Free Audit Enough?
For a lot of small businesses, yes, at least to start. A free automated audit finds the common problems quickly. The speed part of many audits, ours included, runs Google's Lighthouse test on a page. Missing titles, broken pages, slow mobile load, thin pages and weak links all show up without a person looking.
A hand audit earns its price when the problems are not obvious. A site that lost traffic for no clear reason, a site moving to a new address, or a large store with many similar pages are good cases for paying an expert. Even then, running a free automated audit first gives you a baseline and helps you judge what the expert finds. Give any fix time. Google's SEO starter guide says some changes take effect in a few hours and others take several months.
What to Ask Before You Pay
- What exactly will you check? Ask for the list.
- What will I get at the end? A report, a call, a fix list in order of impact, or the fixes done.
- Where does your data come from? Link and traffic numbers are estimates from link indexes and models. A good auditor says so.
- Will you show me sites like mine you have audited? Real examples beat promises.
Be careful with anyone who guarantees a number one ranking. Google's own guide, Do you need an SEO?, says no one can guarantee a number one ranking on Google. Rankings depend on many things outside any auditor's control.
A Simple Way to Start
Run a free audit on your own site. Then run one on the site that ranks just above you for your main search. Compare the two reports. The gaps in links, pages and speed tell you where to spend time, and whether you need to pay someone at all. Our list of common SEO mistakes explains what each finding means.
Sources
- Google Search Central, Do you need an SEO?, opened October 17, 2026
- Chrome for Developers, Lighthouse overview, opened October 17, 2026
- Google Search Central, SEO starter guide, opened October 17, 2026
Common Questions
Is a free SEO audit worth anything?
Yes. A free automated audit finds most common problems, like missing titles, broken pages, slow mobile speed and weak links. It also gives you a baseline to judge any paid work against.
How long does an SEO audit take?
An automated audit takes seconds to a few minutes. Our report opens in about ten seconds, and the crawl and speed test fill in within a couple of minutes. A hand audit by a person can take days or weeks depending on the site.
Should an SEO audit include fixes?
It depends on what you pay for. Many audits are a report only. If you want the work done, ask for that in writing before you agree to a price.
Can I audit a competitor's site?
Yes. An audit only uses public information, such as published links, public search rankings and pages anyone can open. Comparing your site with a competitor's is one of the most useful things an audit does.
See where your own site stands. Links, Google rankings, a site crawl, mobile speed and your home page, checked in one report.
Run free audit