Best SEO tools for freelancers: plan prices, client capacity and trials

Best SEO tools for freelancers: clients, reports and entry price

The best SEO tool for a freelancer with up to five client sites is Serpstat Individual at $69 a month billed monthly. Six to ten clients fit SE Ranking Core at $129 a month billed monthly, and Screaming Frog covers technical crawls as a yearly license.

SE Ranking's prices are as read on 7 October 2026 from its FAQ page and its US pricing page as captured on 5 October 2026.

Serpstat Individual for up to five clients

Serpstat Individual is $69 a month billed monthly or $50 a month with the annual discount. It covers 5 projects, 100 searches a day and 10,000 position checks a month; a position check is one rank check drawn from a monthly pool.

Its documented limit is the trial: the 7-day trial takes a card, with a $1 check returned in 5 to 30 minutes, and the plan amount is charged after 7 days unless you cancel. SE Ranking vs Serpstat compares it with Core. Pick Serpstat Individual for up to five clients on the smaller bill.

SE Ranking Core for six to ten clients

SE Ranking Core covers 10 projects, 10 Report Builder reports and 2,000 daily keyword pairs, each pair being one keyword on one search engine. It also includes 3 business locations for local tracking. Core has 1 manager seat (a user who can create and edit projects), which fits one person working across clients.

Report Builder makes PDF, HTML or XLS reports and schedules them daily, weekly or monthly to up to 5 recipients. Pick SE Ranking Core for six to ten clients, local tracking and reports in one plan.

It costs $129 a month billed monthly or $103.20 a month billed annually, and annual plans are paid upfront. SE Ranking's 14-day trial has room for 10 client projects without a card, so several client sites can be tested at once. It has no permanent free plan, and payments are non-refundable except where the service was not delivered as promised.

Screaming Frog for technical audits

Screaming Frog's SEO Spider is a desktop crawler, and its pricing page describes no rank tracking. A license is $279 per license a year for 1 to 4 licenses and $265 for 5 to 9, and each license covers one user.

The free version crawls up to 500 URLs. When a paid license expires, the 500 URL limit returns and saved crawls cannot be opened. SE Ranking vs Screaming Frog compares its audit with SE Ranking's.

Moz Pro and Ubersuggest for a short client list

Moz Pro Standard covers 3 sites and 300 tracked keywords with 1 user, at $99 a month billed monthly or $79 a month for the first year billed yearly. Its trial is for Medium plans only and needs a card.

Ubersuggest Business covers 7 projects at 150 tracked keywords each, and its price is on Ubersuggest's page. The seven-tool comparison in best SEO software adds Semrush, Ahrefs and Mangools.