Site Audit Tools

Site Audit & Crawler Tools

Crawl your site to find technical issues. Most of what these tools flag doesn't matter, but some issues are critical.

MY PICK

Screaming Frog

USE IT

The industry standard. Ugly interface, unmatched functionality. Been around forever, still the best desktop crawler. Free up to 500 URLs, which is enough for most sites.

Sitebulb has nicer reports, but Screaming Frog has more power under the hood. Learn the Frog first, consider Sitebulb if you need client-ready reports.

Free (500 URLs) / $259/year Visit Screaming Frog →

The Audit Trap

These tools will find hundreds of "issues" on any site. Missing alt text. Pages without meta descriptions. Non-canonical URLs. Most of it doesn't affect rankings. The tools don't distinguish between critical issues and noise.

Focus on indexation problems, crawl efficiency, JavaScript rendering, and site architecture. Ignore the red herrings. That's what separates useful technical SEO from busywork.

Read: Technical SEO Is a Distraction →

All Tools in This Category

12 tools

Screaming Frog SEO Spider

USE IT

Desktop crawler. Industry standard. Powerful, flexible, ugly. Free up to 500 URLs.

screamingfrog.co.uk | Free (500 URLs) / $259/yr

Sitebulb

USE IT

Desktop crawler with beautiful reports and actionable insights. Better UX than Screaming Frog.

sitebulb.com | $13.50+/mo

Lumar (DeepCrawl)

SITUATIONAL

Cloud-based enterprise crawler. Good for very large sites. Pricey for smaller operations.

lumar.io | Enterprise pricing

OnCrawl

SITUATIONAL

Cloud crawler with strong log file analysis integration. Good for combining crawl data with server logs.

oncrawl.com | $69+/mo

JetOctopus

SITUATIONAL

Fast cloud crawler. Good GSC integration. Rising competitor to Lumar/OnCrawl.

jetoctopus.com | $50+/mo

Ahrefs Site Audit

SITUATIONAL

Cloud crawler included with Ahrefs. Good enough for most, but less powerful than dedicated crawlers.

ahrefs.com/site-audit | Included with Ahrefs

Ryte

SITUATIONAL

German-based technical SEO platform. Good for European markets. Solid but not exceptional.

ryte.com | $99+/mo

SEOptimer

SITUATIONAL

Simple site audit tool. Good for quick checks. White-label reports for agencies.

seoptimer.com | Free basic / $19+/mo

Website Auditor

SITUATIONAL

Part of SEO PowerSuite. Desktop crawler with decent features. Budget alternative to Screaming Frog.

link-assistant.com | Free limited / $124/yr

Netpeak Spider

SITUATIONAL

Desktop crawler. Affordable Screaming Frog alternative with similar functionality.

netpeaksoftware.com | $14+/mo

Visual SEO Studio

SITUATIONAL

Windows SEO crawler with visual analysis. Interactive site structure views.

visual-seo.com | $14+/mo

Moz Site Crawl

SKIP IT

Included with Moz Pro. Basic crawler. Better options exist for the same price or less.

moz.com | Included with Moz Pro

Related Resources

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Technical SEO Is a Distraction →
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