The recommended site audit setup for most websites is Google Search Console and PageSpeed Insights for free, Google-specific data, plus either Semrush Site Audit or Screaming Frog SEO Spider for broader technical analysis.

  • Best all-in-one tool: Semrush Site Audit
  • Best technical SEO crawler: Screaming Frog SEO Spider
  • Best free starting point: Google Search Console and PageSpeed Insights
  • Best for visual reports and prioritisation: Sitebulb
  • Best if you already use Ahrefs: Ahrefs Site Audit

The right combination depends on whether you need a complete SEO platform, detailed crawl data, client reporting or a free diagnostic baseline. Screaming Frog's free version crawls up to 500 URLs, while Google Search Console and PageSpeed Insights are free for every website.

Prices and feature limits noted here require a verification date:.

Tool Best for Free option Main strength Main limitation
Semrush Site Audit Businesses, agencies and marketing teams Limited free access Technical checks, scheduled audits and integrated SEO data Costs more than specialist crawlers
Screaming Frog SEO Spider Technical SEOs, developers and agencies Up to 500 URLs per crawl Detailed crawling, custom extraction, JavaScript rendering and crawl comparison Desktop software requires more technical knowledge
Google Search Console Every website owner Yes Google indexing, search performance and Core Web Vitals data Not a replacement for a full site crawler
PageSpeed Insights Page speed and user experience Yes Lighthouse lab data combined with Chrome real-user data Primarily a page-level tool
Sitebulb Visual audits and client reporting Free trial Prioritised recommendations, visualisations and reporting Paid plans are aimed at professional users
Ahrefs Site Audit SEO teams already using Ahrefs 5,000 crawl credits per verified project each month Technical audits alongside backlink and competitor research Its value is highest when used with the wider Ahrefs platform

Is Semrush Site Audit the Best All-in-One Option?

Semrush Site Audit is the best general choice for businesses that want technical auditing alongside keyword research, rank tracking, competitor analysis and reporting.

Semrush Site Audit checks more than 140 on-page and technical SEO issues. These include broken links, duplicate content, HTTPS, hreflang, crawlability and indexability. It supports scheduled recrawls and can crawl domains, subdomains or subfolders. JavaScript rendering is available on Guru and Business plans.

The official SEO Toolkit pricing lists:

  • Pro: $139.95 per month, with 100,000 crawl pages per month
  • Guru: $249.95 per month, with 300,000 crawl pages per month
  • Business: $499.95 per month, with 1 million crawl pages per month

The Pro plan allows up to 20,000 pages in one audit. The Business plan allows up to 100,000 pages in one audit.

Choose Semrush when:

  • You want one platform for technical SEO, keywords, rankings and competitor research.
  • Marketing staff need reports that require little technical interpretation.
  • You manage several websites or client campaigns.
  • Scheduled audits and automated PDF reports are useful.
  • You want technical SEO and AI-search visibility features in the same platform.

Semrush is less attractive if you only need detailed crawl data. Screaming Frog or Sitebulb can be a better fit for a specialist technical SEO workflow.

Is Screaming Frog Better for Technical SEO Audits?

Screaming Frog SEO Spider is the strongest choice for detailed technical crawling, investigations and migrations.

The free version crawls up to 500 URLs. The paid licence is listed at £199 per year. It removes the crawl limit and adds JavaScript rendering, crawl comparison, custom extraction, structured data validation, integrations and scheduling.

Screaming Frog is useful for:

  • Finding broken links, redirect chains and server errors
  • Auditing title tags, meta descriptions, headings and canonicals
  • Comparing staging and production websites
  • Investigating JavaScript-rendered content
  • Checking hreflang and structured data
  • Extracting custom elements from source code
  • Auditing large URL lists instead of relying only on links discovered from the homepage

The paid version can render pages with a Chromium-based browser and compare raw HTML with rendered HTML. This matters on React, Vue, Angular and other JavaScript-heavy websites where important content or links may not appear in the initial HTML response.

Choose Screaming Frog when crawl accuracy and flexibility matter more than an all-in-one dashboard. It is usually the better first purchase for an experienced SEO, developer or agency that already has separate tools for rankings and backlinks.

Google Search Console and PageSpeed Insights are the recommended free foundation for every website.

Google Search Console shows how Google crawls, indexes and serves a website. Its main reports cover:

  • Indexing and page exclusion issues
  • URL Inspection
  • Sitemaps
  • Manual actions
  • Security issues
  • Search impressions and clicks
  • Core Web Vitals based on real-world usage data

Search Console uses data from Google's own systems. That makes it useful for checking whether a problem reported by another crawler affects Google indexing.

PageSpeed Insights focuses on performance diagnostics. It combines:

  • Field data: real-user experience from the Chrome User Experience Report
  • Lab data: controlled Lighthouse testing
  • Diagnostics: performance, accessibility, best-practice and SEO checks

PageSpeed Insights reports metrics such as Largest Contentful Paint, Interaction to Next Paint, Cumulative Layout Shift and First Contentful Paint.

For many small websites, Search Console, PageSpeed Insights and Screaming Frog's 500-URL version are enough to establish a useful technical baseline.

Is Sitebulb Worth Considering?

Sitebulb is worth considering when audit interpretation, prioritisation and stakeholder reporting matter more than raw crawl data.

Sitebulb provides visualisations and prioritised recommendations across more than 300 SEO issues. Its desktop version can crawl up to 500,000 URLs per audit. Sitebulb Cloud supports larger crawls, team collaboration and up to 10 million URLs per audit, according to its current product information.

Sitebulb suits:

  • Agencies preparing client audits
  • In-house teams explaining technical problems to non-SEOs
  • Websites where it is difficult to decide which issues to fix first
  • Teams that need shared crawl data
  • JavaScript-heavy websites that require rendered crawling

It is less appealing if you want a low-cost crawler for occasional checks or prefer working directly with exported crawl data.

When Should You Choose Ahrefs Site Audit?

Choose Ahrefs Site Audit when backlink analysis, competitor research and technical auditing already belong in the same SEO workflow.

Ahrefs Site Audit checks more than 170 technical and on-page issues, including indexability, redirects, duplicate content, structured data, internal links, JavaScript, robots.txt, sitemaps and page performance. It also supports JavaScript execution and crawl comparisons.

Ahrefs Free provides site auditing for verified websites, with 5,000 crawl credits per project each month. The current Lite plan is listed at $129 per month and includes 100,000 crawl credits.

Ahrefs is a good fit for SEO teams that need to connect technical problems with:

  • Organic keywords
  • Backlinks
  • Competitor websites
  • Internal-link opportunities
  • Content and page performance

If technical crawling is the only requirement, Screaming Frog is usually the more focused and lower-cost option.

What Should a Site Audit Tool Check?

A useful site audit should check crawlability, indexability, technical responses, on-page elements, internal links, duplicate content, rendering, structured data, international SEO and performance.

The main checks are:

  1. Crawlability: robots.txt, blocked resources, crawl errors and crawl paths
  2. Indexability: noindex directives, canonical URLs, sitemap inclusion and index status
  3. HTTP responses: 3xx redirects, 4xx errors, 5xx server errors and redirect chains
  4. On-page elements: title tags, meta descriptions, headings and image attributes
  5. Internal linking: orphan pages, dead-end pages, excessive depth and broken internal links
  6. Duplicate content: duplicate titles, descriptions, headings, URLs and near-duplicate pages
  7. JavaScript rendering: content and links that appear only after JavaScript execution
  8. Structured data: invalid or incomplete Schema.org markup
  9. International SEO: hreflang implementation and language targeting
  10. Performance: Core Web Vitals, page weight, loading behaviour and mobile experience

An audit score does not guarantee higher rankings. Google states that strong Core Web Vitals or third-party audit results do not guarantee top rankings because Google also evaluates relevance, content quality and other ranking systems.

Small Business Website

Use:

  • Google Search Console
  • PageSpeed Insights
  • Screaming Frog free version
  • Ahrefs Free, if backlink and technical data are also needed

This combination covers Google indexing, performance and common technical problems without requiring a recurring SEO platform subscription.

Growing Marketing Team

Use:

  • Semrush Site Audit
  • Google Search Console
  • PageSpeed Insights

Semrush is convenient when the same team also needs keyword research, competitor analysis, rank tracking and scheduled reports.

Technical SEO Consultant or Agency

Use:

  • Screaming Frog SEO Spider
  • Google Search Console
  • PageSpeed Insights
  • Sitebulb when client-facing visual reporting is important

This setup provides detailed crawl control while retaining Google-specific validation and real-user performance data.

Large or JavaScript-Heavy Website

Use:

  • Semrush Guru or Business
  • Sitebulb Cloud
  • Screaming Frog for targeted investigations
  • Google Search Console for index validation

Large websites often need both scalable cloud crawling and targeted technical inspection. JavaScript rendering should be used selectively because rendered crawls require more resources and take longer than standard HTML crawls.

Final Recommendation

Choose Semrush Site Audit if you want an all-in-one SEO platform. Choose Screaming Frog SEO Spider if you want a specialist crawler. Use Google Search Console and PageSpeed Insights with either option because they provide Google indexing and real-user performance data that third-party crawlers cannot replace.

A practical starting stack is:

  • Free: Google Search Console, PageSpeed Insights and Screaming Frog free
  • All-in-one: Semrush Site Audit
  • Technical specialist: Screaming Frog paid
  • Visual agency reporting: Sitebulb
  • Backlink-led SEO workflow: Ahrefs Site Audit