Semrush API Pricing: What Developers Pay in 2026

Semrush does not include API access on most plans. You need a Business subscription ($499.95/mo) or the newer Semrush One Advanced plan ($549/mo) just to unlock the door. Then you buy API units separately on top of that.

That pricing structure catches a lot of developers off guard. The Semrush web interface is expensive enough on its own. Adding API costs on top can push monthly bills past $600 depending on your usage.

I dug through the Semrush developer documentation, compared pricing across multiple SEO API providers, and put together everything you need to calculate your actual costs before committing. For the full breakdown of Semrush subscription plans, see my Semrush pricing guide.

How the Semrush API Unit System Works

Semrush uses a consumption-based model. Every API call costs a set number of "units." The cost depends on two factors: which endpoint you call and how many lines of data you request back.

According to Semrush developer documentation, 1 API unit costs approximately $0.00005. That works out to roughly $50 per 1,000,000 units. Serpstat published a comparison that pegs the actual cost between $20 and $250 per million units depending on the data type and request complexity.

Here is the key difference from other APIs: Semrush does not charge a flat rate per request. A simple traffic overview might cost 1 unit per line, while pulling historical paid search data costs 100 units per line. Pulling 1,000 organic keywords for a single domain costs 10,000 units on live data. Pulling the same data historically costs 50,000 units. That 5x multiplier on historical data catches people off guard.

Which Semrush Plans Include API Access

Not all Semrush subscriptions unlock the API. Here is which plans qualify:

SEO Classic Plans (Traditional)

• Pro ($139.95/mo): No API access
• Guru ($249.95/mo): No API access
• Business ($499.95/mo): API access available (units purchased separately)
• Enterprise (custom): API access included, custom unit allocation

Semrush One Plans (Launched October 2025)

• Starter ($199/mo): No Standard API access
• Pro+ ($299/mo): No Standard API access
• Advanced ($549/mo): API access available

The critical detail: even on the Business or Advanced plan, you start with zero Standard API units. You must purchase a unit package as a separate add-on. The purchased amount becomes a recurring monthly charge on top of your subscription.

API Unit Costs by Endpoint

Different endpoints consume different numbers of units. Some charge per line of data returned, others charge a flat fee per request. Here are the confirmed rates from the Semrush developer documentation:

Per-Line Endpoints (Cost Scales with Data Volume)

• Domain Organic Search Keywords (live): 10 units/line
• Domain Organic Search Keywords (historical): 50 units/line
• URL Organic Search Keywords (live): 10 units/line
• Paid Search Keywords (historical): 100 units/line
• Backlinks (detailed): 40 units/line
• Trends API (traffic summary): 1 unit/line

Fixed-Cost Endpoints (Flat Fee Per Request)

• Backlinks Overview: 40 units/request
• Trends API (traffic rank): 1 unit/request
• Single Keyword Query: 100 units/request

What This Looks Like in Practice

Suppose you run a marketing agency and want to pull organic keyword data for 100 competitor domains, fetching the top 1,000 keywords per domain.

• Live data: 1,000 keywords x 10 units x 100 domains = 1,000,000 units (~$50)
• Historical data: 1,000 keywords x 50 units x 100 domains = 5,000,000 units (~$250)

That is a single competitive analysis for 100 domains. If you run this weekly, you are looking at $200-$1,000/month in API units alone, on top of the $499.95 subscription.

For a SaaS company embedding keyword data into a product, costs compound even faster. If 500 users each trigger 10 API calls per day, you are burning through units at a pace that requires a conversation with Semrush sales.

Rate Limits and Restrictions

Semrush enforces strict rate limits on API usage:

• 10 requests per second maximum from a single IP address
• 10 simultaneous requests maximum per user account
• Data caching restriction: you cannot cache API data for more than 1 month without written consent from Semrush

Exceeding the rate limit returns a 429 Too Many Requests error. The 1-month caching restriction is particularly important for SaaS products. If you are building a tool that stores Semrush data for users, you need either a licensing agreement or a plan to refresh that data monthly.

Types of Semrush APIs

Semrush offers several distinct API products, each with its own pricing structure:

• Standard API (Analytics): Domain analytics, keyword analytics, backlinks, URL reports, advertising data. Requires Business plan + purchased units.
• Standard API (Projects): Manage Position Tracking, Site Audit campaigns. Same plan requirement as Analytics.
• Trends Basic API: Traffic summaries, visitor behavior, monthly visits, bounce rate, device split. Available on any paid plan with separate Trends units.
• Trends Premium API: Everything in Basic plus 16 additional data types including daily/weekly traffic, conversion rates, geo distribution, audience demographics, and social media data.
• Local API: Local SEO and listing management. Available to Semrush Local users without additional unit purchases.
• Map Rank Tracker API: Local rank tracking on maps. Available to all users without unit purchases.

The Trends API is sold as a quarterly subscription, separate from the Standard API. Semrush does not publicly list Trends pricing. You need to contact their sales team for a custom quote.

Semrush API vs Alternatives: What Else Is Out There

The Semrush API is not the only option for programmatic SEO data. Here is how it stacks up against the main alternatives.

Semrush vs Ahrefs API

Ahrefs launched a revamped API (v3) in late 2025, replacing the older v2 version. Their API pricing page lists plans starting at $500/month for the Standard tier, scaling up to $10,000/month for enterprise usage.

Combined with the minimum Ahrefs subscription (Advanced at $449/mo), the total entry point for Ahrefs API access is roughly $949/month. That is significantly more expensive than Semrush for comparable data volumes. However, Ahrefs has a stronger backlink database, so for link-focused use cases, it may justify the premium.

Semrush vs DataForSEO

DataForSEO is the budget option. It uses a pure pay-as-you-go model with a $50 minimum deposit. SERP requests cost $0.0006 per request ($0.60 per 1,000 requests). Backlinks API charges $0.02 per request plus $0.00003 per row.

According to Serpstat, DataForSEO costs agencies 70-90% less than Semrush at equivalent data volumes. The tradeoff: DataForSEO is a raw data layer. There is no web dashboard, no position tracking interface, no site audit tool. You get API access and nothing else. For developers building custom tools, that is often exactly what you want.

Semrush vs Moz API

Moz API access starts at just $5/month, making it the cheapest entry point by far. Moz Pro plans range from $49-$299/month. The catch: Moz has significantly less data depth than Semrush for competitive analysis, keyword research, and traffic estimation. If you only need domain authority metrics and basic link data, Moz is a cost-effective choice.

Quick Comparison

Based on data from Serpstat and provider pricing pages:

• DataForSEO: ~$30 per 1M credits, $100/mo minimum. Best for: raw data at scale.
• Serpstat: ~$180 per 1M credits. Best for: mid-range budgets wanting both UI and API.
• Semrush: ~$20-250 per 1M credits + $500/mo subscription. Best for: teams already using Semrush who want to extend it programmatically.
• Ahrefs: ~$999/mo for API access + subscription. Best for: backlink-heavy workflows.
• Moz: ~$2,080 per 1M credits but much lower minimums. Best for: basic DA/link metrics on a budget.

Who Should Pay for the Semrush API

The Semrush API makes sense for specific use cases. If any of these describe your situation, the cost is likely justified:

• Marketing agencies building automated client reporting dashboards. Pulling rank data, traffic estimates, and competitor metrics into Looker or Google Data Studio eliminates hours of manual reporting each week.
• SaaS companies embedding SEO metrics into their own products. If your tool needs keyword difficulty scores, domain authority comparisons, or traffic estimates, Semrush data is among the most comprehensive available.
• In-house SEO teams managing multiple brands or regions who need a single programmatic data source across all properties.
• Automation workflows: auto-building competitor research packs for leads, refreshing daily rank tracking dashboards, pushing Site Audit issues into Jira or Asana, or flagging new and lost backlinks daily.

When to Skip the Semrush API

If you are a freelance SEO consultant or a small business owner, the API is almost certainly overkill. The Semrush web interface already does everything the API does, just without programmatic access. You would be paying an extra $100+ per month for automation capabilities you may never use.

If budget is a concern, consider SE Ranking (starting at $44/mo) or other Semrush alternatives that include API access at lower price points. DataForSEO is also worth evaluating if you only need raw data and are comfortable building your own interface.

Bottom Line

Semrush API access costs a minimum of $499.95/month (Business plan) before you buy a single API unit. Units cost roughly $50 per million, but historical data and keyword queries burn through them 5-10x faster than basic traffic lookups. For a marketing agency running competitive analyses across dozens of client domains, expect total monthly costs between $550 and $800.

That is expensive compared to DataForSEO ($100/month for equivalent data) but cheaper than Ahrefs API ($949/month minimum). The value proposition depends on whether you already use Semrush. If your team lives in the Semrush dashboard and wants to automate reporting or embed data into custom tools, the API is a natural extension. If you are starting from scratch and only need API access, DataForSEO gives you more data per dollar.

For a full breakdown of Semrush subscription plans (not just the API), read my Semrush pricing guide. To see how Semrush compares to other SEO platforms overall, check out my best SEO software roundup or the Ahrefs vs Semrush comparison.