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Both cover seo & discovery and research & trends. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
| Semrush | SpyFu | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | From $139 | From $39 |
| Pricing model | Paid subscription | Paid subscription |
| Free tier | No | No |
| Billing | Monthly or annual | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | Not stated | Not stated |
| API | Not stated | Yes |
| Data export | Not stated | Not stated |
| Their cut | Not stated | Not stated |
| Runs on | Web | Web |
| Covers | SEO & Discovery, Research & Trends | SEO & Discovery, Research & Trends |
| Works with | Nothing in particular | Nothing in particular |
| Founded | Not listed | Not listed |
| Reader rating | No reviews yet | No reviews yet |
| Live deals | None right now | None right now |
Keyword and competitor research at agency depth
Semrush is the tool an SEO reaches for when they need to know what a competitor ranks for and what it is worth. Position tracking, site audits and keyword gaps are all there, along with newer reporting on how brands surface in AI answers. It costs more than most creators can justify, and the entry plan tracks five sites and 500 keywords.
Every keyword a competitor has bought or ranked for
SpyFu is built around one question: what is the other site doing. It keeps more than a decade of history on which keywords a domain ranked for, which ads it ran and what it paid, which is the part the general SEO suites treat as a side feature. For research on a competitor rather than maintenance on your own site, it is the cheaper specialist.
Our note
SpyFu is the cheap way to answer one question well: what is the competition ranking and bidding on. Pair it with a free rank tracker rather than treating it as a replacement for a full SEO platform.
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.