What's the point of having a well-thought-out, clear, and interesting website… if you don't work on SEO? Fortunately, many WordPress plugins are available to help you optimize the SEO of your pages and their ranking on Google. In this article, we will examine and compare three of the most popular SEO plugins for WordPress: SEOPress, YoastSEO, and Rank Math SEO. What is the best WordPress plugin for increasing SEO? Let's get started!
What is the purpose of an SEO plugin?
Before delving into the meat of the issue, it is necessary to define what can be expected from a WordPress SEO plugin. How can an SEO plugin help a website rank higher in search results?
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You should be aware that an SEO plugin serves several purposes. A reporting and auditing feature is available in SEO plugins such as Yoast SEO, Rank Math, and SEOPress.
Indeed, all SEO plugins will provide you with additional information about the SEO quality of a page. Thus, SEO plugins analyze various technical and editorial criteria to provide an SEO optimization indicator via a rating system: traffic lights, a score out of 100, and so on. These plugins will thus enable the SEO to perform a quick pre-audit because he will receive a list of all the elements where the plugin predicts that an improvement could be beneficial for the page's ranking.
However, keep in mind that we are discussing a pre-audit: in no case should you believe that an SEO plugin for WordPress can replace an SEO professional in this area, especially since as Google's algorithm updates, more and more checkpoints are added. However, the field of action of an SEO plugin frequently focuses only on the editorial aspect of one page at a time, as well as the presence of necessary tags for proper content referencing on SERPs.
Another purpose of SEO plugins is to make certain options more accessible. Indeed, some options can be difficult to implement without the use of a plugin; I'm thinking specifically of redirections and the updating of meta-descriptions, title tags, and so on. The role of these SEO plugins for WordPress is thus to facilitate access to these functions: they are frequently made available directly at the bottom of the page, which couldn't be easier!
Now that we've defined the purpose of a WordPress SEO plugin, it's time to get to the meat of the matter: which SEO plugin to use among SEO Press, Yoast SEO, and Rank Math SEO? We will compare the functionality of these plugins both paid and free versions.
Let us begin our investigation with SEOPress, a French alternative to Yoast SEO.
SEOPress, which has been available in full version since 2017, now has over 100,000 active installations on WordPress. It also has a very nice 5-star rating in the official WordPress SEO plugin catalogue.
SEOPress includes a number of crucial SEO plugins for WordPress features in the Free Version!
For example:
- A content analysis with an SEO perspective, using numerous keywords from the free edition (Yoast only allows one at a time…). The plugin estimates the editorial quality of the content using a colour system and, more lately, simple annotations: good, can be improved, terrible. It's easy… Perhaps too simple?
- Creating a sitemap with images
- Meta robot administration (no-index, no-follow and others)
- Google Knowledge Graph Administration
- Redirecting in posts, pages, and custom content kinds
- The title and meta-description changes, of course.
- The incorporation of a WooCommerce optimization plugin
- An overview of social media material
- The complete lack of advertising
- Assistance for directly modifying image data such as the Alt tag, title, and so on…
There is nothing exceptional in this free version: nothing that we cannot find elsewhere. Except for the WooCommerce optimization, which may be useful for some users, and the preview of the material on social networks, this plugin is well thought out and highly useful for all bloggers who post automatically on the networks. Even if we can easily do without in both circumstances…
It should be mentioned that SEOPress' editorial analysis is pretty thorough: at the bottom of the article page, you can directly access many drop-down options representing optimization themes. In addition to the overall score, there is a score for each of these topics. As a result, the note in merely three colours is fairly well explained.
What about SEOPress Pro edition?
However, SEOPress distinguishes itself by charging $49 per year for an unlimited number of sites in its pro version. This is pretty reasonable pricing; let's examine what it has to offer in terms of extra features:
- Structured data management that is automated (schema.org)
- The ability to import and export metadata from and from a CSV file
- A sitemap in video format
- When you write your material, Google suggestions are automatically integrated.
- Google Page Speed Insights integration into the dashboard
- Google Analytics integration directly onto the dashboard
- A broken link checker for 404 errors.
- The personalized breadcrumb display
- Backlink analysis (using Majestic's API, roughly $99/year!)
- A more comprehensive redirection manager, for example…
Clearly, the list is meant to be ambitious, but thinking about it, we can conclude that many of these characteristics are unnecessary and not always ideal for everyone.
The video sitemap, for example, will only be beneficial to a small number of users. And the integrations of Google tools do not provide as thorough data as when you consult them on the tools in question… Furthermore, some of these features, such as the extensive XML sitemap functionality featured at YoastSEO, are accessible for free from competitors.
Editing the numerous XML sitemaps is actually quite simple, though certainly not everyone will find it interesting.
However, another feature that distinguishes SEOPress is its interface, notably its installation process. Thus, when you launch SEO Press, you will be presented with a wizard that will allow you to import your data and settings from other WordPress SEO extensions. Then you'll determine whether or not to index the contents. This is an excellent point because these are crucial SEO parameters that you should search for in other plugins. Here, a newcomer is compelled to encounter them and, as a result, can arrange them without forgetting them.
Finally, SEOPress offers a simple but powerful idea: you don't utilize a feature, but it still takes up visible space on your interface? SEOPress recommends disabling it to improve clarity and efficiency. It's a basic idea, but it can help both pros and beginners better structure their interface so that just the important are visible.
SERP Rank tracking: SEOPress Insight
What if I want position tracking as well as more statistics on search volumes based on several keywords? SEOPress Insights is a new product from SEOPress. This new tool so allows you to track the positioning of various of your pages based on multiple keywords, to be notified of a loss in position on the SERPs, to determine the degree of competition for a keyword, and so on.
Not quite, because this service is a stand-alone product that will cost you $118.80 including tax every year (in addition to the cost of the Pro version) to use! Not a sensible decision on the part of SEOPress, which offers a paid alternative for a product whose functions can be found in Rank Math's paid subscription! We can only regret such a price positioning, especially when the additional functionality given are so limited…
Conclusion: SEOPress's greatest strength is its versatility at the UI level. We also believe that tremendous effort has been made to please both SEO/WordPress novices and experts.
As we see they are the lowest cost for the complete version, even though this is definitely not the strong suit of this French SEO plugin. As a result, we will be really disappointed with the new SEOPress Insights solution, which is unconvincing, especially given the price displayed! Its plethora of options may also turn off some users, particularly the inexperienced.
It should also be mentioned that the SEOPress staff appears to be quite sensitive to its community: updates are frequent and appear to conform to consumer expectations. Let us hope this trend continues! Finally, the application's French origins are advantageous because you will have no trouble locating French-speaking assistance if you require it.
Yoast SEO: Well-known SEO plugin for WordPress with the longest history
Yoast SEO, for its part, is no longer really to be offered… By far the most popular SEO plugin with over 5 million active installations, everyone knows it for its famous traffic light that shows you the method to take to enhance the natural referencing of your WordPress pages. It is the number one natural referring on WordPress, despite having a lot of competition!
What does Yoast SEO's free edition include?
You may find it here:
- Analysis of your text based on a single keyword
- Only Google is used to preview your material (so no social media here)
- A check for duplicate content and the canonical URLs associated with it.
- The standard technical choices include robots.txt, complete sitemaps,.htaccess, and so on.
- A calculation of your content's readability based on statistics such as the average length of your sentences or the richness of your language is rather useful.
Again, nothing really unique for a free version. Yoast SEO does an excellent job. The editorial suggestions are very similar to those of its competitors, with a red, orange, and green signal indicating the worst to the best (the famous traffic light present even up to the logo of the SEO plugin). The layout isn't excellent and is a little blocky, yet we find ourselves there quite naturally by force.
The information provided by Yoast is directly visible on the right side of the screen. However, we can criticize it for a sloppy layout that is less clear than at SEOPress. Furthermore, the lack of progressiveness between the notes (red, yellow, or green) makes it difficult to determine whether we are nearing green.
The Yoast SEO SEO plugin's Premium version
But first, let's take a look at what the paid edition of Yoast SEO has in store for us, which is priced at $99 per year and per site:
- Yoast analyzes your text and proposes internal linking to some of your older posts.
- Analysis of your content's insights: are the five most prevalent expressions in your text relevant to your major subject?
- A simple and quick reroute manager
- Removal of advertising from the plugin
- Email help is available.
Yoast SEO Premium is it worth it?
We may have hoped for a little more for $99 per year for a single site. The new features in this case do not incentivize upgrading to the premium version.
The proposal of internal linkages is the single aspect that demands special attention. Indeed, even on a site specialized in a matter like this, it's easy to become lost in the plethora of topics covered on a website with numerous articles! On this point, the internal link recommendation saves a lot of time.
The Insights analysis is also not boring, but it is more of a gimmick than a true optimization: it is evident that on an article on the best SEO plugins for WordPress, the most represented terms will be expressions such as "SEO plugin WordPress" or variants. It is nevertheless uncommon to stray from your core topic when writing an essay! As a result, it is totally unnecessary…
The remainder is either utterly unnecessary (e-mail support…) or can be done far better by another specialist plugin!
However, the premium subscription will instantly get you access to all Yoast SEO Academy training: there are hours of courses on the program created for both beginners and veterans. Taken separately, this access costs $99/year, therefore you save that much by opting for the premium edition of the plugin. This can be a significant benefit for certain users, and it must be acknowledged to Yoast SEO.
Yoast SEO's interface is still incredibly simple to use. The majority of the options for each post are near the bottom of the page. Otherwise, more basic choices, such as sitemap maintenance, will be handled via the Yoast SEO menu. You may choose which material will be indexed and which will not with only a few clicks.
Using Yoast SEO, you can easily edit the meta description on WordPress.
It's basic, and it fulfills the job that the free version is supposed to do: what do people want?
If you're seeking for a WordPress SEO plugin that won't let you down, this is it!
Rank Math SEO: the competitor that provides a lot of SEO features for free!
For a plugin that is just two years old, Rank Math already provides quite strong statistics with over 500,000 sites using it!
For a plugin that is just two years old, Rank Math already provides quite strong statistics! erything in its way. Indeed, its statistics are impressive: there are now over 500,000 active installations and a rating of 5 gorgeous stars. On November 12, 2020, the plugin's premium version was published. Or, more precisely, its premium variants. Beautiful promises had been made on this topic: had they been kept? In any case, Rank Math is a strong challenger to Yoast SEO, the market leader in this industry. So, is infatuation genuine or not?
What does Rank Math's free edition of its SEO plugin for WordPress offer?
As with SEOPress and Yoast, let's start with a list of SEO features available in the free version:
- A straightforward and user-friendly setting wizard, similar to SEOPress
- Complete SEO study with a score out of 100 based on 40 SEO criteria analysis
- Metadata personalization
- Page status analyzer for automated detection of 404 errors
- A redirect manager, located at the bottom of the page where you're working on Google Search Console integration.
- Google Keyword Ranking is a tool for tracking your keyword rankings.
- The availability of an SEO audit tool on the website.
- Optimization of Local SEO
- The idea for internal connecting (as with Yoast, in the premium version)
- Support on several sites
- Creating an XML sitemap
- A suite of WooCommerce-specific utilities.
- Optimization of the Knowledge Graph
- Implementation of a breadcrumb trail
- Access to picture optimization settings has been simplified.
- Access to picture optimization settings has been simplified.
- Sharing options for social networks
- Elementor SEO, Divi, WPBakery, and other major page builders provide full plugin integration.
In summary, you would have realized that Rank Math SEO sends heavy, and even extremely high, traffic! This free version of Rank Math contains the great majority of the functionality seen in other plugins.
It's evident that Rank Math SEO is the most enticing of all the SEO plugins for WordPress. The SEO tips are exact, and the many tools are all of high quality.
We will enjoy the existence of a score out of 100, which is more exact than a basic traffic light and helps us to better understand what the plugin deems to be highly significant. Nothing precludes you from changing just one thing and comparing your note before and after the modification. It's a minor aspect, but it's crucial for understanding how SEO works, which is seldom overlooked by a newcomer.
Rank Math analyzes your pages thoroughly and assigns you a score out of 100 to assist you grow. The study is quite thorough and provides useful advice on how to tackle difficulties. And the note's progressiveness allows you to do testing!
Fans of page builders will be delighted to find all of the possibilities provided by Rank Math SEO straight in the interface of their preferred builder. It saves a lot of time to not have to load more pages than required. This is a useful option during the development phase of a site with a large number of pages to produce.
What about Rank Math PRO, the premium version of Rank Math?
The premium PRO version of Rank Math costs $59 per year and supports an infinite number of websites. Take note that this is a limited-time offer to commemorate the offer's introduction! Finally, the tool should be available for $129 per year. There is also a BUSINESS edition for agencies who operate with a large number of clients.
This premium version for web companies differs mainly in the number of keywords that may be tracked and is priced at $199/year in the current deal and $429/year at the conclusion of the promotion. Because, sure, we can use Rank Math PRO to track positions on specific searches!
But first, let's take a closer look at the PRO version's content:
- Improved Google Analytics integration (Rank Math promises us here more statistics directly visible on the dashboard)
- Tracking of your placements on hundreds of keywords, including a 12-month history.
- In its BUSINESS edition, the special deal now allows you to track 1000 words (20,000).
- However, it should eventually be 500 for the PRO edition and 10,000 for the BUSINESS version.
- Sitemap integration for news and video
- Integration with Google Trends
- Improved Schematics integration and a tool for creating bespoke Schematics
- An image SEO management tool that automatically fills in Alt attributes, title, and so on…
- WooCommerce schemes and specific improvements
- Automatic video detection and generation of schemas to go with it
- A dashboard for tracking various placements across many websites.
This list of features, which is meant to make the life of an SEO professional easier, is impressive. At this price of $59/year (even if it is just temporary), we don't see why we would select one of the commercial versions of the other plugins in this test: especially not Yoast SEO, which makes dream even less likely!
Integrations provide rapid access to extra information. Video sitemaps were missing, but that's another feature that's definitely not going to be valuable to everyone.
However, one can be concerned about the diagrams' over-representation in this PRO edition. Rank Math would have us believe that schemas are not as beneficial for SEO as they are: most of the time, they are merely used to appropriate an extra SERP feature, but not all SERPs give these features!
Even though we have some misgivings about this list, we must acknowledge that watching the ranking of the site's pages is worth the trip in and of itself. With this Google Tracking, you can track the positioning of your pages based on several keywords and display all of the terms for which your sites are ranked. This helps you to determine which keywords require your attention in order to improve your ranking. This capability may be considered a standalone tool (like with SEOPress lately), but it is only available in the PRO edition.
Thus, Rank Math SEO is really fascinating, and the commercial edition appears to follow its claims of not detracting from the free version… To see if it stands up in the long run! We must face the facts: Rank Math SEO is now the only SEO plugin for WordPress that provides so many functions for free! Enjoy it while it lasts
Rank Math vs. Yoast vs. SEOPress vs. AIOSEO: The Verdict
I don't want to say "it depends," but there won't be a simple solution here.
If you simply have one website, the price is very similar (especially if you use the free version). If you work on many websites, the Yoast membership might quickly become expensive, whereas the others offer multiple sites in their rates.
Also, what are you going to use it for? If you're a blogger who's doing SEO just because you know it's good for traffic, I'd recommend picking the platform that's simplest for you to use to optimize your content. Whether you're a "SEO-er" with a specific need, you should go over their wide feature set to see if it addresses it.
What's the good news? You just can't go wrong with any of these selections. We use Yoast SEO at Growth Marketing Pro and are fairly enamored with it. Please share your thoughts on Rank Math, SEOPress, Yoast SEO, and All in One SEO in the comments section below.
