Free Moz Domain Authority Checker: What Your Score Really Means
SearchBlueprint · · 9 min read · scored 95/100
A free Moz Domain Authority checker gives you an instant DA score from 0 to 100, based on your site's backlink profile, with no Moz Pro subscription needed. Moz's own tool lives at moz.com/domain-analysis; third-party checkers like Ahrefs' Website Authority Checker offer the same read at no cost.
What Is Domain Authority, and How Does Moz Calculate It?
Domain Authority (DA) is a proprietary metric from Moz that predicts how well a site is likely to rank in search results, scored from 0 to 100. Moz pioneered domain authority metrics back in 2004, aiming to forecast ranking strength before search engines published any authority signal of their own.
A brand-new domain with no backlinks and no rankings starts at DA 0. From there, the score climbs as Moz's crawler finds more, and stronger, links pointing at the site. YouTube.com sits at the top of the scale with a DA of 100, backed by roughly 25 million referring domains and 46 million ranking keywords, according to Moz's own data. Most sites never get close: the distribution is logarithmic, so the bulk of the web scores below DA 10, and only a small number of domains break into the 90s.
That curve matters for how you read your own result from a free Moz Domain Authority checker. Moving from DA 8 to DA 10 usually takes a modest link-building push. Moving from DA 78 to DA 80 takes a far bigger one, because you are now competing against sites that already have deep, established link profiles.
How Moz's DA Score Is Actually Calculated
Moz uses a machine-learning model that finds the closest statistical fit between its own link index and real search rankings. In 2019, Moz rolled out what it called the "Domain Authority 2.0" update, folding in more signals: the number of linking root domains (referring domains), Moz's Spam Score, and an assessment of overall link quality, not just link count. That update is why two sites with a similar number of backlinks can carry noticeably different DA scores today.
How to Use a Free Moz Domain Authority Checker
Checking your DA score costs nothing and takes under a minute. Moz's own checker lives at moz.com/domain-analysis: type in any domain, and it returns your DA score alongside top pages, ranking keywords and a competitive comparison in the same report. If you want the number without leaving your browser, Moz's MozBar extension shows DA and Page Authority on every page you visit while you browse.
Moz is not the only source. Ahrefs runs a free Website Authority Checker that reports its own Domain Rating (DR) metric, and independent sites such as WebsiteSEOChecker offer bulk checkers built for agencies running dozens of domains at once. If you are building out a fuller free-tool stack, SearchBlueprint's free SEO and AI-search tools collection covers keyword, on-page and rank-tracking checks that pair naturally with a DA lookup.
| Tool | Best For | What You Get | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Moz Domain Analysis (moz.com/domain-analysis) | A one-off DA and PA lookup with context | DA, Page Authority, top pages, ranking keywords, competitive analysis | Free |
| MozBar browser extension | Checking DA while you browse any site | An on-page DA and PA overlay in real time | Free with a Moz account |
| Ahrefs Website Authority Checker | Comparing DA against Ahrefs' own Domain Rating | Domain Rating (DR) on a 0-100 scale | Free; Ahrefs' paid Starter plan for deeper competitor research is listed at $29/month |
| Bulk DA checkers (e.g. WebsiteSEOChecker) | Agencies checking many domains at once | DA, PA, MozTrust and Spam Score across up to 1,000 URLs, per the tool's own listing | Free tier advertised, with an account required for bulk export |
What Counts as a Good DA Score?
There is no fixed "good" DA. Moz and independent reviewers agree on this point: read your score against competitors in your own niche, not against an absolute number. A DA of 30 is strong for a three-year-old local service business and weak for a national media site that has been publishing for a decade.
A few reference points make the scale easier to picture:
- New domains with no backlinks and no rankings start at DA 0.
- Most websites on the internet sit below DA 10.
- Only a small number of domains reach the 90s; YouTube.com is one of the few at a full DA 100, built on an estimated 25 million referring domains.
- Because the scale is logarithmic, each additional point gets harder to earn as you climb. Two points near the bottom of the scale cost far less link-building effort than two points near the top.
Do not treat a single DA checker result as a verdict on your whole SEO program. It is one data point about your backlink profile, useful mainly when compared against the same metric on a competitor's site.
Moz DA vs. Ahrefs DR vs. Semrush AS: How the Metrics Differ
Moz was the first company to publish a domain authority metric, and DA served as the industry benchmark for years. That changed around 2017. Since then, competitors such as Ahrefs and Semrush have built their own authority scores, and many SEOs now check more than one number before drawing conclusions.
Ahrefs calls its version Domain Rating (DR), scored 0 to 100. Ahrefs calculates it from the number of unique domains linking to a site, the authority of those linking domains, and how many other sites each of those domains links out to. Unlike Moz's model, Ahrefs states that DR does not factor in link spam, traffic or domain age. As a real-world example from Ahrefs' own comparison, ahrefs.com carries a DR of 88, while moz.com carries a DR of 91, as measured by Ahrefs' methodology, not Moz's own scale.
Semrush publishes a comparable score called Authority Score (AS). None of these numbers are interchangeable: a domain can carry a DA of 40, a DR of 55 and a different Authority Score at the same time, because each company builds its number from its own link index and its own weighting.
| Metric | Provider | Scale | Core Inputs | Free to Check |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Domain Authority (DA) | Moz | 0-100 | Referring domains, Spam Score, link quality (since the 2019 DA 2.0 update) | Yes, at moz.com/domain-analysis |
| Domain Rating (DR) | Ahrefs | 0-100 | Number and authority of linking domains; excludes spam, traffic and domain age | Yes, via Ahrefs' Website Authority Checker |
| Authority Score (AS) | Semrush | 0-100 | Semrush's own backlink and organic traffic index | Limited free lookups |
Does a High DA Score Actually Help You Rank in Google?
Google has repeatedly said it does not use Domain Authority, Domain Rating or any third-party authority score as a ranking factor, since none of them come from Google's own index. Google's John Mueller has acknowledged that Google does track some kind of sitewide quality signal internally, even though it is not DA.
Ahrefs ran a correlation study across 218,713 domains and found that Domain Rating and keyword rankings move together often enough to be useful as a proxy, while stressing that correlation is not proof of causation. In practice, that is how most SEOs treat a domain authority checker: not as a lever Google pulls directly, but as a quick read on whether a site has the kind of backlink profile that tends to accompany strong rankings.
How to Raise Your Domain Authority Score
A low score is not a life sentence. DA moves slowly by design, since it is built entirely from your backlink profile, but a handful of habits reliably move it over time.
Earn Backlinks From Relevant, Reputable Sites
Quality outweighs quantity. A handful of links from established sites in your industry does more for your score than dozens of links from unrelated, low-authority pages. Check a prospect's own DA or DR before you pitch it, so you are not spending outreach time on a site that will not move your number.
Publish Content Other Sites Want to Cite
Backlinks follow content that answers a real question better than what is already ranking. Original data, clear how-to guides and genuinely useful tools attract links on their own; thin or reworded content rarely does.
Clean Up Your Internal Linking
Internal links do not build DA directly, but they spread the authority you already have across more of your site, and they help Moz's crawler, and Google's, find your best pages faster. A site with no internal linking plan wastes whatever external links it earns.
Fix the Technical Issues Holding You Back
A site riddled with broken links, orphaned pages or blocked crawl paths makes it harder for any crawler, Moz included, to find and credit your backlinks. A full technical and on-page pass, of the kind covered in SearchBlueprint's roundup of free SEO tools, clears the technical debt that quietly caps your score.
Do's and Don'ts for Reading Your DA Checker Result
| Do | Don't |
|---|---|
| Compare your DA to competitors in your own niche | Read your DA score in isolation, with no benchmark |
| Track your own DA over time to gauge progress | Chase a perfect DA of 100 as a goal in itself |
| Use DA to vet link-building prospects | Mistake DA for a confirmed Google ranking factor |
| Check more than one authority metric (DA, DR, AS) when vetting a partner site | Assume every checker's score will match exactly, since each tool uses a different index |
FAQs
Is Moz's Domain Authority checker really free?
Yes. Moz's checker at moz.com/domain-analysis returns your DA score, top pages and ranking keywords at no cost and with no Moz Pro subscription required. Ahrefs' Website Authority Checker offers a comparable free lookup for its own Domain Rating metric.
What is a good Domain Authority score?
There is no universal "good" number. A useful DA score is one that is higher than the sites you are actually competing against in search results, since DA is a relative metric, not an absolute grade.
Does Domain Authority affect my Google rankings?
Not directly. Google does not use DA, DR or any third-party authority metric as a ranking factor. Ahrefs' correlation study across more than 218,000 domains found that authority scores and rankings tend to move together, which is why many SEOs still treat DA as a useful proxy.
Why is my DA score different on Moz versus Ahrefs?
Because each company builds its score from its own backlink index using its own formula. Moz's DA factors in referring domains, Spam Score and link quality; Ahrefs' DR deliberately leaves out spam, traffic and domain age. Different inputs produce different numbers for the same site.
How often does my DA score update?
Moz recrawls and recalculates DA on a regular cycle as its link index refreshes, so your score can shift even if you have not built a single new link, simply because Moz found, or lost, links elsewhere on the web. Check it periodically rather than after every single change you make.
See Where Your Site Actually Stands
Run your own domain through Moz's free checker at moz.com/domain-analysis, then compare the result against two or three competitors in your niche. If the gap surprises you, a sample SEO report from SearchBlueprint shows the backlink gaps and technical issues a DA score alone won't.
Resources / References
Related reading: Free Domain Authority Checker: What Your Score Really Means.
Sources
About the author
SearchBlueprint researched, wrote and scored this article with the content pipeline our customers run on their own sites. The score in the byline is what our content engine gave this page before it published. Nothing here is reviewed by hand, which is the point: it is the product's output, published where anyone can check it.