Domain Authority Checker
Verified Tools checks a domain's authority free, using Ahrefs Domain Rating on a 0–100 scale — not Moz's DA, and not rescaled to look like it — with referring domains, total backlinks and a backlink spam score beside it. One domain at a time, no signup. Checked 2026-09-02.
What is Domain Authority?
Domain authority is a third-party estimate of how strong a website's backlink profile is, usually expressed on a 0-100 scale. It is not a Google ranking factor — Google publishes no site-level authority score — but it is the fastest way to compare two sites before you spend time on outreach, guest posts, or a link exchange. The scale is logarithmic, which is the part most people miss: moving from 20 to 30 takes a handful of good links, while moving from 70 to 80 can take thousands. Sitting at 0-20 is normal for a new site, 20-40 means links have started to arrive, 40-60 is strong for an independent product, and 60+ is the range where other sites and AI answer engines cite you by default. Only one thing moves the number: links from other domains that are themselves trusted. That is why this checker shows referring domains beside the score — the count of distinct sites linking to you is the input, and the score is the output.
How to Use the Domain Authority Checker
- Enter a domain name (e.g., example.com) in the input field.
- Click 'Check authority' to look it up.
- Read Domain Rating first, then referring domains — a low DR with few referring domains means the site simply has not earned links yet.
- Compare against a direct competitor rather than an industry giant; the gap is what tells you anything.
100% Free — No sign-up and no email. Lookups are capped at 40 a day per IP because each one is a paid call to Ahrefs and DataForSEO.
DA, PA, DR: which one you are actually looking at
These names get used as if they were one metric. They are four different companies' estimates, and one of them does not exist.
| Metric | By | Scale | Scope |
|---|---|---|---|
| Domain Authority (DA) | Moz | 0–100 | Whole domain |
| Page Authority (PA) | Moz | 0–100 | A single page |
| Domain Rating (DR) ← shown here | Ahrefs | 0–100 | Whole domain |
| Authority rank | DataForSEO | 0–1000 | Whole domain |
Google is not in the table because Google has no entry: there is no official domain authority. Every score above is a vendor's reconstruction from its own crawl, which is why the same site can read 41 in one tool and 35 in another without either being wrong.
The score is the output, referring domains is the input
If you only take one thing from this page, take the order of those two. Authority scores are calculated almost entirely from how many distinct domains link to you and how trusted those domains are. So a site with an authority score of 8 and six referring domains does not need better content to move the number — it needs a seventh site to link to it. Publishing more on a domain nobody links to moves nothing, which is the most expensive mistake this metric causes. Check the two numbers together and you will usually know which of the two jobs you are actually on.
Frequently asked questions
- What is Domain Authority (DA)?
- Domain authority is a score that estimates how strong a website's backlink profile is, on a 0–100 scale. It is not produced by Google and is not a ranking factor — it is a third-party estimate built from one company's crawl of the links pointing at a site. Higher means more, and more trusted, sites link to you, which is what search engines and AI answer engines lean on when deciding whether to treat a domain as a source.
- Which authority score does this checker show?
- Ahrefs Domain Rating on a 0–100 scale, alongside referring domains, total backlinks and a backlink spam score from DataForSEO. It is not Moz's Domain Authority, and we do not rescale another vendor's number to look like one. Every authority score is a single company's estimate from its own crawl, so two tools rarely agree on the exact figure. They do agree on the ordering, which is what you use them for.
- What is a good domain authority score?
- New sites start near 0 and almost all sit under 20. Roughly 20–40 is average, 40–60 is strong for an independent product, and 60+ is where other sites and AI engines cite you by default. The scale is logarithmic, so each band is far harder to reach than the one below it. Compare against a direct competitor rather than an industry giant — the gap is the only part that tells you what to do.
- Is DA the same as DR?
- No. Domain Authority is Moz's metric and Domain Rating is Ahrefs'. Both run 0–100 and both estimate backlink strength from their own index, which is why the two numbers for one site are often several points apart. Neither is a Google metric. Pick one and stay with it when you track your own site over time; switching tools mid-way produces a change that is not real.
- Does domain authority affect Google rankings?
- No. Google publishes no site-wide authority score and has said repeatedly that it does not use third-party ones. These metrics correlate with sites that rank because links correlate with ranking, but the score itself changes nothing. It is useful for deciding who is worth pitching and for watching whether your own link building is moving — not as a target to hit.
- How can I improve my domain authority?
- Earn links from more distinct domains that are themselves trusted. Referring domains is the input and the authority score is the output, which is why both appear here. Original research, free tools and hand-reviewed directory listings all work, and all take months. Bought links and low-quality volume tend to raise the spam score instead, which is the number moving in the wrong direction.
- Where does the data come from, and how fresh is it?
- Domain Rating comes from Ahrefs; referring domains, backlinks, broken backlinks and the spam score come from DataForSEO's backlink summary. Results are cached for up to seven days, so a figure can be a few days behind. When a source cannot be reached the page prints 'Couldn't read' rather than 0 — having no backlinks and being unable to check are different answers.
- Is this authority checker free?
- Yes, free with no signup. It checks one domain at a time rather than a pasted list, because it is built for founders checking their own site rather than for bulk prospecting. Each lookup is a paid API call on our side, so requests are capped at 40 a day per IP address.