The 9 Best SERP Tracking Tools Reviewed

Alex Birkett

Apr 06, 202211 min read
An investigator measuring results from a url search box

TABLE OF CONTENTS

What Is SERP Tracking?

SERP tracking is the process of monitoring the ranking positions of a website's pages for specific keywords on Google or other search engines.

The primary goal of SERP tracking is to gauge the effectiveness of SEO (search engine optimization) efforts.

There are many tools to help you track your SERP rankings—typically called “rank trackers.” And they’re very commonly used in SEO.

Let’s look at some of the best SERP tracking tools on the market. 

1. Position Tracking 

Rankings Overview report

What it is: Position Tracking is a SERP tracking tool that lets you monitor a website’s daily rankings for a custom set of target keywords in Google, Bing, and Baidu SERPs. 

You can see how your rankings change over time, compare them against competitors, and analyze the impact of SERP features on your visibility. 

You can also get daily updates, customizable reports, and alerts on any significant changes.

Why we like it: Position Tracking has tons of unique benefits and features that make it stand out from other SERP tracking tools. 

Some of the most important are:

  • SERP features: You can see which SERP features (such as featured snippets, local packs, video carousels, etc.) are triggered by your keywords. And how they affect your rankings and click-through rates.
SERP features graph
  • Bing AI tracking: Along with classic tracking and monitoring on Bing, the tool also tracks unique Bing AI SERP features (like AI Summary, AI Stories, Ask AI, and AI Chat) and their presence on the SERPs.
AI Summary, AI Stories, Ask AI, and AI Chat options highlighted under "SERP features" drop-down
  • Device and location tracking: The multitargeting feature helps you track your site’s visibility across multiple devices (mobile, tablet, and desktop) and specific locations (down to the ZIP code level) to get an overview of your local and global SEO strategy.
Targets overview graph

How it works: Fortunately, Position Tracking is easy to set up and use. 

Here are the steps you need to follow:

First, enter the domain you’d like to monitor rankings for, and click “Set up tracking.” 

Position Tracking search bar

Then, configure your tracking campaign. 

Start by setting up the targeting setting. This means choosing the root domain, subdomain, or subfolder, search engine, device, and location. 

Targeting settings in Position Tracking tool

Once that’s done, add the keywords you’d like to track. 

You can add them manually or import them from a .txt or .csv file, an existing Position Tracking campaign, Semrush reports, or Google Analytics.

Setting up keywords in Position Tracking settings

Finally, select whether you want to receive weekly updates by email. 

These emails will give you a summary of the keywords you rank for in the top three, top 10, top 20, and top 100 results on Google. 

And hit “Start Tracking.” 

"Send me weekly ranking updates via email" box checked

The tool will start collecting data and then display the main dashboard. 

Browse around, and use the filters and widgets to analyze your rankings, visibility, traffic, SERP features, competitors, and more. 

Position Tracking main overview dashboard

How much it costs: Free to try.

2. SE Ranking

SE Ranking landing page

What it is: SE Ranking is an all-in-one SEO software that caters to agencies and SMBs. 

Their suite of SEO tools includes a keyword rank tracker, website audit functionality, on-page SEO analysis, backlink tracking, and keyword research and planning tools. 

Their keyword rank tracker, in particular, fits our definition of a SERP tracking tool. It allows you to upload a list of keywords and track their position as well as the SERPs over time. 

Why we like it: SE Ranking offers a buffet of great SEO tools for a wide range of audiences. It doesn’t take months to set up or learn how to use. The interface is friendly, and the rank-tracking functionality is simple. 

For SEOs and marketers who just want to get up and running with core SEO tools and SERP tracking functionality, this product is great. 

How it works: for the rank tracking functionality, you simply have to choose your keyword or keywords. You can upload various sets of keywords as campaigns and see aggregate metrics for your campaigns, such as % in the top 10 and your overall search visibility.

SE Ranking overview report

While this doesn’t give you a ton of data on other SERP positions, competitors, or SERP features, it does a very good job of giving you simple keyword rank tracking data—average position, traffic forecasts, and trends across time. 

How much it costs: plans start at $39.20/month. This is based on 250 keywords tracked for rank tracking. They also have discounts for how often you update your tracking. If you switch to weekly updates, your monthly cost goes down to $23.52/month. 

More detailed pricing estimates are available ontheir website.

3. Google Search Console

Google Search Console landing page

What it is: Google Search Console is the free SEO toolset that everyone running a website should be using. 

You can submit sitemaps to Google for crawling, measure keyword performance (which includes clicks and click-through rate from SERPs to your pages), and track based on location and device.

Also, it’s great for identifying technical SEO issues like site crawling, site speed and page speed, security, indexation, mobile usability, and structured data.

Why we like it: to start, it’s free. And because it’s from Google, you can get the data straight from the source. Also, webmaster tools like submitting sitemaps and auditing your mobile friendliness, site speed, and crawl issues are great quality assurance and management tools. 

However, the data and visualizations it provides are limited on their own, so I recommend using this tool in conjunction with other SEO tools and data visualization platforms. 

How it works: Use Data Studio, DashThis, and Databox to visualize. 

How much it costs: $0.

4. Serp Api

Serp Api landing page

What it is: serpapi.com is different from others on this list. It’s an API that gives you raw data and access to the search results page. 

This is great for technical SEOs and marketers who have custom use cases.

However, using a tool like this, you won’t get summarized metrics like average position or SERP visibility out of the box. You’ll have to do complex data processing. 

Why we like it: having raw access to an API can be remarkably useful. 

It can allow you to build your own tools if the ones on the market don’t suffice. 

Specifically for this API (because there are many), it’s nice because you won’t be blocked by Google from scraping their pages, it’s relatively affordable, and the data is accurate and location specific. 

How it works: It depends on what technical stack and programming language you use. It’s basically just raw data, so you decide how to use it. 

A good high-level illustration is available on their homepage. 

You can enter a location and a keyword, and it shows you what the SERP looks like as well as the metadata that it will give you related to that search:

SERP (left) and metadata (right) shown for "best seo software" in Austin, Texas, US

When you use the API, you’ll likely be either integrating this with an existing tool or requesting the API via a programming language. 

The homepage also walks through various ways to do that, depending on which language you use:

API integration options

How much it costs: costs start at $50 / month for up to 5,000 searches a month. When you want to upgrade, it’s $150/mo for up to 15,000 searches. This scales up to enterprise use cases. 

5. Zenserp

Zenserp landing page

What it is: Zenserp is another API that allows you to scrape search engine results pages directly and access the raw data. Again, this by itself doesn’t give you any summary metrics or position tracking, but lets you access and own the data yourself so you can build upon it in the ways you choose. 

Why we like it: Zenserp is one of the most affordable direct search APIs I’ve found, starting at just $29/mo. It scales incredibly well, going upwards up 1,000,0000 searches a month. 

It includes various search APIs, including Google Image API, Google Trends API, Google Maps API, Google News API, YouTube API, Bing Search API, and many more. 

It’s really a complete package when it comes to directly accessing search results page data. 

How it works: Similar to serpapi.com, how you use Zenserp depends on your technology stack, your use case, and your preferred programming languages. 

You can try it out on a limited basis on their website and see what kind of metadata it gives you:

Try out Zenserp on a limited basis

You can access your API endpoint with pretty much any programming language, from Javascript to Python (and R—but no one ever mentions R). 

How much it costs: starts at just $29/month for up to 5,000 searches (this includes all SERP types). 

Enterprise pricing is $1599 /mo, and this includes a whopping 1,000,000 searches per month plus “custom features.”

6. SEOMonitor

SEOMonitor landing page

What it is: SEO Monitor is an all-in-one SEO software marketed towards agencies. This includes a rank tracker, organic traffic analytics and dashboards, SEO forecasting, and keyword research tools. They also have agency-specific features, such as dashboards and reporting tools for clients. 

Why we like it: SEO Monitor has a powerful and comprehensive set of tools, but what makes it stand apart is its focus on agencies. There are many products that lean more towards a specific feature set and have more customizable and powerful features, but for the specific things SEO agencies tend to care about, SEO Monitor offers a great solution. 

How it works: Their rank tracker offers various levels of reporting, from keyword level (“best SEO software”) to keyword group level (content clusters or tagged keywords) all the way to smart keyword groups and landing page tracking. 

For the basic keyword and keyword group reporting, it’s pretty similar to how other tools work. You pick your keyword, or set of keywords, and SEO Monitor gives you desktop and mobile rankings every 24 hours. This includes search volume estimates as well as SERP features, giving you a bit more holistic data than some other simple rank trackers. 

How much it costs: you can check out the pricing calculator on their page (it’s based on keywords tracked). Starting price, with a minimum of 4,000 keywords and just one website, is $217/month. Pricing changed based on keywords and the number of websites.

7. Accuranker

Accuranker landing page

What it is: Accuranker is one of the most powerful keyword rank trackers and SERP tracking tools. 

Unlike some others on this list, they’re not an all-in-one SEO suite and specialize purely in rank tracking and SERP analytics. 

Why we like it: First off, instead of updating your positions and rankings daily or weekly, you can update your data on demand. This real-time tracking is powerful, especially if you’re an agency working with several clients or if you run a large content operation with several subsets of keywords. 

They also give you historical data about the SERP, including changes in SERP features as well as rankings. 

Finally, they track at scale, allowing multiple sites and upwards of millions of keywords (though that will get pricey).

How it works: Their basic reports are like many other rank trackers: just input your list of keywords, and track them over time. 

Simple UI, which you can use to explore your reports, and you can also email your team updates at a regular cadence.

Accuranker competitors report

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How much it costs: pricing starts at $109/mo, and this allows you to track up to 1,000 keywords. If you want to scale up to 50,000 keywords, this will cost you $2,149/mo. Anything more than that is enterprise custom pricing and you’ll have to talk to sales. 

Pricing is based on the number of keywords tracked.

8. Ranktracker

Ranktracker landing page

What it is: The name is “Ranktracker” so it's obvious that it tracks the rankings of keywords. 

But they also have other tools, like “keyword finder” where you can get a list of related keywords from a single input keyword. 

They also have website audit and project management functionality. Finally, they have a “SERP checker” where you can analyze the current state of any search results page. 

Why we like it: First off, the tools are simple and useful. While they may not have every SEO tool you need, their keyword research tool is easy to use and gives you a ton of ideas you may not have considered. 

Their SERP checker is also a great and simple tool to see if it’s worth competing for a given keyword. 

Finally, their rank tracker is also simple and gives you nice clean reports.

Ranktracker report for "spacex.com"

How it works: It all starts with your list of keywords, but branching out from there, you can enter your website and the country, region, or city you’re interested in. This lets you see what you rank for in which locales. 

They also let you toggle between mobile and desktop views, so you can check your SERP rankings on different platforms

Two cool features: daily email alerts and white-label reports. 

Daily email reports, because who has time to manually check this stuff all the time? And white label reports are a really excellent feature for agencies looking to add a nice branding touch. 

Finally, it’s the most affordable tool on our list, so it’s great for solopreneurs and those on a budget. 

How much it costs: This one is the most affordable on our list, starting at just $7.20/month. This only allows you to track up to 100 keywords, but it’s a great starter price point. 

You’re locked into several other limitations too, such as only 2 users on this plan, and only 50 keyword difficulty checks. 

If you’re at scale, I could see these limitations start to bog you down.

But luckily, you can scale up to their Hex Data plan at $83.60/mo, which allows up to 2,000 keywords tracked.

9. SERPStat

SERPStat landing page

Image Source

What it is: SERPStat bills itself as a “growth hacking tool.” It’s made up of a few different modules catered mostly towards SEOs—rank tracking, backlink analysis, keyword research, site audit, and competitor research. 

When you break it down, they do offer a lot of interesting features within those modules, including:

  • Competitor analysis in paid and organic search
  • In-depth keyword analysis
  • Batch analysis of keywords and domains
  • Analysis of contextual advertising
  • Text analysis
  • Clustering
  • SERP crawling
  • Team management

For our purposes, though, it does two SERP tracking things: crawls SERPs and tracks your keyword rankings.

Why we like it: As mentioned, it’s very feature-rich. For the small SEO or marketing team, it gives you a ton of the tools you might want all in one bundle. 

For its rank tracking, you can get pretty granular as well. It shows you historical data. You can split by local search and device types. 

And interestingly, you can see the distribution of traffic for your keyword set:

Traffic share for the tracked keywords graph

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How it works: All you have to do is add your keywords and tag them to whichever category you’d like to.

Rankings Overview: Settings page

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From there, you can see your reports in different formats, such as aggregate, or my favorite, time series:

Rank distribution history report

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How much it costs: basic pricing starts at $69/month. This gets you 15,000 position checks per month as well as access to their API (all plans include API access, with the basic plan giving you 100,000 credits). Enterprise pricing goes up to $499/month.

Start Tracking the SERPs

SERP tracking helps you measure the effectiveness of your SEO strategy, understand how search engines rank your site, and optimize your content for the best results.

Which means:

You should start tracking right away. 

Sign up for a free Semrush account and track up to 10 keywords with Position Tracking.

Rankings overview report in Position Tracking tool

Plus, a free account will also give you access to nine other tools, including:

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Alex Birkett is the co-founder of Omniscient Digital, a premium content & SEO agency. He lives in Austin, Texas with his dog, Biscuit, and writes at alexbirkett.com
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