Price checked Oct 9, 2026
Review · SEO & AI Search
OpenSEO Review (2026)
OpenSEO review: An open-source SEO tool built for your AI agent. $10 a month hosted, or $0 for the app if you run it yourself and pay DataForSEO for the data.
- Hosted: $10/mo, $10 of usage included
- Self-hosted: app $0, data billed by DataForSEO
- Free trial: $0.50 of credits
- Best for: SEO with Claude, Cursor or ChatGPT
No affiliate link. We are not in any OpenSEO or DataForSEO affiliate program, and no link on this page earns us money. Links to openseo.so and dataforseo.com are plain links.
Summary
Quick verdict: a cheap, honest Semrush and Ahrefs alternative if you do SEO through an AI agent. Just know that the $10 buys metered data, not unlimited use.
- OpenSEO does keyword research, competitor domain checks, backlinks, rank tracking, site audits and AI-search visibility, in a web app and through an MCP server.
- It is open source under the MIT license. The code is on GitHub at every-app/open-seo.
- It does not run its own web index. Its keyword, backlink, SERP and AI-visibility data comes from DataForSEO, a paid data provider. OpenSEO says so openly.
- Two ways to use it: the hosted app at $10 a month, or self-host it for free and connect your own DataForSEO account.
- The hosted version makes money by adding a 28% fee on top of DataForSEO’s price for each data request (OpenSEO’s own words, on its pricing comparison page and GitHub README).
- Launch traction we checked: #2 on Product Hunt’s daily leaderboard for October 8, 2026 (“The open source Semrush alternative”), and 22.9k stars on GitHub on October 9, 2026.
Watch: OpenSEO in 60 seconds
Made by SaaS Finder Hub from OpenSEO’s public screenshots. Voiceover is AI-generated.
Pricing
Sources: openseo.so/pricing (October 9, 2026, 10:33 AM ET), openseo.so/docs/self-hosting (10:33 AM ET) and dataforseo.com/pricing (10:33 AM ET). Prices in USD.
| What you get | Hosted (Base Plan) | Self-hosted |
|---|---|---|
| App price | $10/month | $0 (MIT open source) |
| Usage included | $10 of usage every month | None. You pay DataForSEO per API call |
| Extra usage | Top-up credits, never expire | DataForSEO credit, minimum payment $50 |
| Fee on data | 28% on top of DataForSEO’s price | No OpenSEO fee |
| Free to try | Trial with $0.50 of credits, no card | New DataForSEO accounts get $1 of credit (per OpenSEO’s docs) |
| Search Console data | Free, doesn’t use your $10 | Needs your own Google OAuth client |
| Hosting and updates | Done for you | You run Docker or Cloudflare yourself |
On a phone, swipe the table sideways to see both options.
Price snapshot: This is the price at the moment we wrote this review (October 9, 2026). The price may have changed by the time you read it, so check the official site for today’s price.
- There is one hosted plan. OpenSEO lists no yearly price and no team tier on the pricing page.
- The included $10 of usage resets each billing cycle. Top-up credits roll over, but you need an active subscription to use them.
- Per-action estimates on the pricing page: about $0.05 per keyword search, about $0.08 per domain overview with a year of history, and about $0.002 per AI prompt check.
- The page’s example month (100 keyword searches, 20 backlink checks, 50 keywords tracked weekly) comes to $7.52 of usage, inside the $10.
- DataForSEO’s own pricing page says it is pay-as-you-go and that “the minimum payment amount is $50.”
Not an affiliate link. We earn nothing if you sign up.
Hosted or self-hosted? (our math)
- The hosted price is DataForSEO’s price plus 28%. So OpenSEO’s $7.52 example month would cost about $5.88 at DataForSEO directly ($7.52 ÷ 1.28).
- Self-hosting at that pace saves about $4 a month against the $10 plan, but DataForSEO wants $50 up front, which covers roughly 8 months of that usage.
- Heavy users save more by self-hosting, because the 28% fee grows with usage while the hosted plan’s $10 stays fixed.
Price history
| Checked | Hosted | Self-hosted |
|---|---|---|
| $10/mo incl. $10 usage · 28% data fee | $0 app · DataForSEO $50 minimum payment |
We re-check this page every month and add a row.
Features
From openseo.so, its MCP docs and the GitHub README, October 9, 2026.
- Keyword research: keyword ideas, search volume, difficulty, intent and live Google results. Saved Keywords keeps the good ones in a list.
- Domain overview: estimated organic traffic and ranking keywords for any competitor’s site.
- Backlinks: backlinks, referring domains and link quality for a domain.
- Rank tracking: keyword positions over time. OpenSEO says scheduled checks use DataForSEO’s task queue, which costs about a third of the live API.
- Site audit: crawls your pages and flags technical SEO issues.
- AI Visibility and Prompt Explorer: checks how AI assistants mention and cite your brand for chosen prompts, and compares answers across supported models. ChatGPT is the default model.
- MCP server: connects Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor, Codex and other MCP clients to the same data. The docs give a one-line setup for Claude Code and a
mcp.jsonentry for Cursor. The repo also ships plugins for Claude Code, Codex and Cursor. - Agent skills: ready-made workflows such as keyword research, competitor analysis, SEO audit and an SEO coach.
- Projects and reports: your agent saves context about your business and its finished research as reports, so a new chat session doesn’t start from zero.
- Google Search Console and Google Analytics: sign in with Google on the hosted app. Search Console data doesn’t use credits.
Who it’s for
- A founder or small business owner doing their own SEO who already works in Claude, Cursor or ChatGPT: the hosted $10 plan. Light research stays inside the included usage.
- A developer or tinkerer who is happy running Docker or Cloudflare: self-host and pay DataForSEO directly, with no 28% fee.
- A freelancer or small agency priced out of Semrush or Ahrefs: worth testing on the trial, then watching what each client project costs in credits.
- Not for you if you want a flat price for unlimited research, or a big all-in-one suite with content writing, ads data and social tools in one subscription.
Related & alternatives
-
Our review
Writesonic review
Now an AI search visibility platform: tracks how ChatGPT and Gemini talk about your brand. Far pricier, from $79/month yearly.
-
Our guide
When a free preview becomes a bill
What to check before a trial or usage-based tool starts costing money.
-
Our guide
Find the cancel button first
What to check before a free trial turns into a bill.
The catch
“$10 a month” and “free to self-host” both mean paying for data by the call.
- The hosted $10 is not unlimited. It includes $10 of usage, and every keyword search, backlink check, audit and rank check draws it down at DataForSEO’s price plus 28%. Past that, you buy top-ups.
- Self-hosting makes the app free, not the data. You need your own DataForSEO account, and DataForSEO’s minimum payment is $50.
- An AI agent can run many lookups in one session. OpenSEO says its tools tell the agent the rough cost before each call, but your bill still depends on how much research you ask for.
Verdict
- Hosted ($10/month): the easy start for most people. Use the $0.50 trial first, then watch the usage meter in your first month.
- Self-hosted ($0 app + DataForSEO): right if you’re comfortable with Docker or Cloudflare, or your usage is high enough that the 28% fee adds up.
- Against Semrush or Ahrefs: far cheaper for light, agent-driven research. OpenSEO’s own pricing page cites Ahrefs Lite at $129/month for comparison; we didn’t check Ahrefs’ price ourselves.
Worth it if: you do SEO with an AI agent and want real keyword and backlink data without a $100-plus subscription.
Skip it if: you want one flat price for unlimited lookups, or you need a full marketing suite rather than focused SEO research.
Not tested hands-on. No SEO tool can promise rankings or traffic.
OpenSEO FAQ
How much does OpenSEO cost?
Hosted is $10 a month with $10 of usage included. Self-hosting the app is free, but you pay DataForSEO for the data (minimum payment $50). Prices as of October 9, 2026.
What is the main downside of OpenSEO?
Both options mean paying for data by the call: hosted usage is DataForSEO’s price plus 28%.
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