Domain Rating Checker Online — Free Domain Rating Checker Tool
CodexFuse Team · 2026-10-28T19:34:07.548Z · 9 min read min read
Check estimated Domain Rating and URL Rating for up to 15 domains at once with CodexFuse's free bulk checker, and compare your site against competitors.
A domain rating checker measures how strong a website's backlink profile looks on a 0 to 100 scale, so you can judge authority at a glance instead of counting links by hand. Domain Rating (DR), popularised by Ahrefs, rises with the number of high-quality, relevant sites linking to a domain — and because the scale is logarithmic, moving from 20 to 30 is far easier than moving from 70 to 80. CodexFuse's free domain rating checker compares up to 15 domains side by side in one scan: a quick first check before you spend money on outreach, a guest post, or a link-building agency.
One honest point up front: CodexFuse's tool calculates estimated DR and UR scores locally from the domains you enter. It does not fetch live Ahrefs data, so treat its numbers as a fast comparative estimate, not an official Ahrefs score.
What is Domain Rating, and how is it different from Domain Authority?
Domain Rating estimates the strength of a site's backlink profile on a 0 to 100 logarithmic scale, based on the quantity and quality of referring domains pointing at it. Domain Authority (DA), Moz's similar 0-to-100 metric, uses a different model and data set, so a site's DR and DA rarely match.
Neither score is a Google ranking factor, but both are useful shorthand when comparing sites quickly, because strong backlink profiles tend to correlate with sites that rank well.
The key detail is referring domains: ten links from one website count as one referring domain, while ten links from ten different reputable sites count as ten. That is why a checker showing referring-domain counts tells you far more than a bare number.
How do you check domain rating for multiple domains at once?
To check domain rating for multiple domains at once, paste each domain on its own line into a bulk checker, run one scan, and compare the table by score, referring domains, and authority tier. CodexFuse's bulk domain rating checker accepts up to 15 domains per scan.
Each scan returns estimated DR and UR for every domain, plus referring domains, estimated organic traffic, and DoFollow percentage. Sorting by DR immediately shows which competitor is genuinely ahead — and which one only looks busy because it has many links from few sources.
Step-by-step: running your first bulk check
- List your domains: your own domain plus the 3 to 5 competitors you actually lose rankings to — not every site in your niche.
- Paste one per line: open the tool, paste up to 15 domains into the textarea, one per line, with no http:// or trailing slashes needed.
- Click Check Domain Ratings: the tool calculates estimated DR and UR on a 0 to 100 logarithmic scale for each domain.
- Read the comparison table: compare DR, referring domains, estimated organic traffic, and DoFollow percentage, and note each tier, from Tier 3 Growing to Tier 1 Elite.
- Copy Results: copy the whole table as JSON, ready for a spreadsheet or client report.
Try the preloaded samples first (airbnb.com, uber.com, spotify.com, slack.com) to see the table format, note how the tiers differ, then replace them with your own domains.
What does a good Domain Rating look like for a small business?
A good Domain Rating for a small business is one that beats the sites on page one for its target keywords, not any fixed number: a DR of 30 can dominate a local niche while a DR of 60 still loses nationally.
As a rough guide, new sites sit near the bottom, established local businesses often land in the 20 to 40 range, and national brands climb well above 50. The tool's tiers say the same in plain language: Tier 3 Growing means you are building; Tier 1 Elite means the profile is already very strong.
Judge your score against direct competitors, not the whole internet. If page-one rivals sit at an estimated DR of 35 to 45 and you sit at 18, backlinks are probably part of the gap. If you already match them and still trail, the problem is more likely content, page speed, or search intent — and buying links will not fix it.
| Situation | What the score suggests | sensible next step |
|---|---|---|
| Your DR trails rivals by 15+ points | Backlink gap is real | Outreach, guest posts, and digital PR around genuinely useful content |
| Your DR matches rivals but you trail | Links are not the bottleneck | Fix content depth, intent match, and technical issues first |
| High DR, low estimated traffic | Links exist, relevance may not | Check whether links come from topically relevant sites |
| Low DR, high DoFollow percentage | Profile is narrow or new | Diversify referring domains instead of adding links from the same sites |
A worked example: one scan that changed a link-building budget
Consider a fictional scenario. Sara runs a small Manchester bookkeeping practice (harbormoor-accounts.example) and has been quoted a monthly link-building retainer. Before signing, she wants to know whether backlinks are actually her problem, so she pastes four domains into the checker, one per line: her own site, two local competitors, and one national accounting brand.
The table puts Sara and her two local rivals in the same ballpark — all Tier 3 Growing, with similar referring-domain counts — while the national brand sits a full tier above. But Sara's estimated organic traffic is noticeably lower than one local rival with a near-identical DR. That combination says her backlink profile is not unusually weak for her market; her content simply earns less traffic per link than a direct competitor's.
She copies the results as JSON, saves them as her baseline, and makes a different decision: instead of the retainer, she spends the next quarter publishing two genuinely useful guides (year-end tax checklists for freelancers) and pitching them to the local business sites that already link to her rival. Three months later she re-runs the same four domains and compares the new table against the saved JSON. The numbers here are illustrative — the tool's estimates, not live Ahrefs figures — but the workflow is exactly how the tool is meant to be used: compare, decide, save the baseline, re-check.
Never buy a link package on one DR number alone. Check referring domains, DoFollow percentage, and topical relevance first — a DR built on irrelevant directories is worth far less than a lower DR built on sites your customers actually read.
Why check referring domains and DoFollow percentage, not just DR?
DR alone can mislead, because it compresses a whole profile into one number. Referring domains show breadth: 500 links from 12 domains is narrow and fragile; 200 links from 180 domains is broad and resilient. DoFollow percentage matters because followed links pass ranking signals and nofollowed links generally do not.
Estimated organic traffic is the reality check — a high-DR site earning almost no search traffic may hold links from pages nobody visits.
CodexFuse hosts, secures, and backs up your site — fully managed, on pay-as-you-go credits, no subscription, no server babysitting — so the authority you build turns into rankings and enquiries.
Get Started with CodexFuseWhat a domain rating checker does not do
DR tools are easy to over-trust. CodexFuse's checker does not fetch live Ahrefs data, so its figures are local estimates that will differ from Ahrefs' numbers. It does not show which pages link to you, whether a link is toxic, or whether a linking site is penalised — that needs a full backlink audit in a dedicated suite.
Nor can it explain why a competitor ranks: content, page experience, and search intent all sit outside any DR number.
Use the checker as triage: it answers "where do I stand, roughly, against these competitors?" in under a minute. For "which exact links should I replicate or earn next?", follow up with a backlink checker and a competitor backlink checker, and compare the linking domains themselves — not just their scores. If the domain is newly registered, a domain age check adds useful context on whether its profile grew naturally.
New to authority metrics? Our domain authority checker guide explains how DA differs from DR and when each is the right one to watch.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is the CodexFuse domain rating checker free?
Yes. The tool is free and unlimited, checking up to 15 domains per scan, with results you can copy as JSON — no paid account needed.
Are the scores the same as Ahrefs Domain Rating?
No. The tool calculates estimated DR and UR locally; it does not fetch live Ahrefs data. Use it for fast comparison, and confirm costly decisions (such as paying for a link placement) in Ahrefs or another paid suite.
What is URL Rating (UR)?
URL Rating measures a single page's backlink profile, while Domain Rating measures the whole domain. A page can carry a high UR on a modest-DR domain if that page itself attracted strong links — which is why the tool reports both.
How many domains can I check at once?
Up to 15 domains per scan, one per line. For more, run a second scan and combine the JSON exports in a spreadsheet.
Can a high DR guarantee a number-one ranking?
No. DR is not a Google ranking factor; content relevance, search intent, page speed, and user experience all matter alongside links. Treat DR as one diagnostic signal, never a promise of rankings.
How often should I check my domain rating?
Monthly is plenty. Backlink profiles change slowly, so weekly or daily checks mostly show noise. Save each month's JSON export to measure genuine movement.
Check your rating, then fix what actually holds you back
Run your own domain and your real competitors through the free domain rating checker today, save the JSON baseline, and look honestly at what the table says: a backlink gap, a relevance gap, or a content gap. Each has a different fix, and guessing wrong wastes the budget that would have fixed the right one. Then protect the work: move your site to CodexFuse, where hosting, security, backups, and business email are fully managed on pay-as-you-go credits — no subscription, no server babysitting.