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Ahrefs Site Audit
Ahrefs Site Audit reveals technical SEO errors, crawl issues, and optimization fixes. Discover how to use its features to improve rankings and site performance.
A site audit is your technical SEO pulse check, surfacing the broken links, slow loads, and silent crawl blocks that quietly erode traffic.
I’ve run hundreds of them, and nearly every audit uncovers one hidden ranking drag that’s been overlooked for months.
The Ahrefs Site Audit stands out for how it pairs deep technical coverage with clean, actionable reporting. It’s fast, visual, and thorough.
I’ve used it on everything from lean SaaS sites to bloated ecomm platforms and always walk away with a clear roadmap.
One of the first times I used Ahrefs’ Site Audit tool, I found 4,000 orphan pages buried in a client’s blog archive. That fix alone bumped their blog traffic by 18 percent in six weeks.
Next, we’ll crack open the settings that decide what Ahrefs crawls.
Crawling & Scope Settings
The first thing I check before running a crawl in Ahrefs is the scope.
Getting this wrong means either missing big problems or wasting crawl credits on irrelevant pages.
You can set the scope by domain, subdomain, subfolder, or even a specific URL.
For example, crawling an entire domain will scan everything under the main site, while selecting a subfolder lets you isolate something like /blog/ or /products/. That control matters.
On large sites, I often limit the crawl to just a few key sections, which lets me catch major issues fast without burning through resources.
Ahrefs also lets you control protocols (HTTP vs HTTPS), adjust crawl speed, set depth limits, and apply include or exclude filters using regex.
Here's where it gets powerful. You can toggle JavaScript rendering on or off.
This is huge if you work with dynamic sites. But I learned the hard way that enabling rendering too early can burn through crawl credits quickly, especially if scripts are bloated or every route triggers multiple requests. Now I always test with a short crawl first.
Choose the right scope mode for your crawl:
- Subfolder mode is perfect when auditing a silo like
/blog/or/resources/ - Domain mode is a solid default for most small to mid-size sites
- Subdomains mode is best for full-site audits that include areas like
shop.example.com - Exact URL mode works for targeted debugging or one-off pages
That scope choice feeds directly into your Health Score.
Health Score
Health Score is the first number I look at after every crawl.
It gives you a quick gut check on overall site condition. The higher the score, the cleaner your internal URLs.
But it’s not just about chasing 100. What matters more is the pattern behind the number.
Ahrefs calculates Health Score by dividing the number of internal pages without errors by the total number of pages crawled.
Only errors factor into the score. Warnings and notices are listed but don’t drag the number down.
I’ve found this especially helpful when trying to triage with limited dev bandwidth. If the Health Score drops below 70, that’s usually a sign to dig deeper fast.
Here’s the formula and severity bands: Health Score = (error-free internal URLs ÷ total internal URLs crawled) × 100
- 91–100 = Excellent
- 71–90 = Good
- 31–70 = Fair
- 0–30 = Weak
A perfect score doesn’t mean a perfect site. I’ve seen “Excellent” ratings on sites with major indexability problems.
Use it as a directional signal, not a trophy.
Issue Types: Errors, Warnings, Notices
Not all issues in Ahrefs’ Site Audit are created equal.
That’s why the platform divides them into three levels: Errors, Warnings, and Notices.
This hierarchy helps you focus on what will actually move the needle.
Errors are the critical ones. These are things that block crawlers, disrupt UX, or kill indexability.
Warnings are important but not urgent. They often point to missing elements or conflicting signals.
Notices are more like suggestions. They can guide fine-tuning, but most won’t hurt performance directly.
Here are five top fixes I come back to again and again:
- Broken internal links: They interrupt crawl flow and create dead ends.
- Pages marked noindex that should rank
- Redirect chains: Two or more hops waste crawl budget and delay loading.
- Duplicate meta titles across important pages
- Missing alt text on key image assets: Especially important for accessibility and image SEO
The beauty of Ahrefs is that it gives you context.
You can click into any issue and get a full explanation of why it matters, how to fix it, and which URLs are affected.
Not everything needs fixing at once.
Start with the errors that impact visibility and crawlability. Then chip away at warnings and notices in line with your goals.
Site Structure, Depth & Internal Links
Site structure isn’t just about hierarchy. It’s about accessibility—for both users and crawlers.
The Ahrefs Site Structure report visualizes your site like a tree, showing how deep each section sits and how well it connects to the rest.
You get a collapsible map of subdomains and subfolders, complete with metrics like click depth, HTTP status codes, internal link counts, and estimated organic traffic.
I once ran an audit on a news site that had years of evergreen articles sitting five clicks deep, buried in an archive structure. They had traffic potential, but Google barely crawled them.
We reorganized the layout, added featured hubs, and slashed their average depth from 4.7 to 2.2. Traffic to those old pieces nearly doubled.
Three common structure pitfalls to look out for:
- Too many orphan pages: Content with no internal links wastes potential
- High-value pages buried 4+ clicks from the homepage
- Flat structures with no topical grouping: Makes it hard to establish relevance
A well-structured site gives search engines a clear roadmap.
Ahrefs also suggests internal link opportunities, using anchor text and topic matches, which makes tightening your structure a lot easier.
Next, we’ll break down the technical categories covered in Ahrefs Site Audit. This is where the depth really shows.
Technical SEO Categories Covered
Ahrefs’ Site Audit organizes findings across several key technical SEO categories.
Each one gives you a different lens on how your site performs, how it’s interpreted by crawlers, and where the bottlenecks are hiding.
Performance
Speed is one of the first things flagged.
You’ll see alerts for slow load times, oversized CSS or JS files, and Core Web Vitals failures.
If you integrate PageSpeed Insights, Site Audit pulls in LCP, FID, and CLS metrics directly into the report.
Impact: High
HTML Tags
Next, it checks the basics. Missing or duplicate title tags, meta descriptions, and H1s are all highlighted. It also flags headings that are too long, too short, or misused.
These might seem minor, but across hundreds of pages, they can add up fast.
Impact: Medium
Content Quality
This category reveals thin content, duplicate pages, and keyword cannibalization.
It’s especially useful for diagnosing issues in templated content or older blog archives.
- Helps spot near-duplicates across paginated content
- Lists exact pages that need consolidation
Impact: High
Links
From broken internal links to redirect chains, this category surfaces crawl blockers and poor UX signals.
You’ll also get alerts on nofollow tags, mixed content, and orphaned URLs.
One audit I ran flagged over 300 redirects inside a sitemap—the fix cleaned up the crawl path and improved indexation.
Impact: High
Indexability
Here’s where Ahrefs really proves its depth. It reports on blocked pages, noindex tags, and misconfigured canonicals.
I rely on this view to catch template-level mistakes, like a noindex accidentally applied across a full content type.
Impact: High
Experience & Accessibility
Mobile rendering, AMP errors, and structured data misfires show up here.
Ahrefs even checks your schema markup against Google’s supported properties to help maximize eligibility for rich results.
Impact: Medium
Images & Media
Finally, the tool calls out oversized images, missing alt text, and HTTP content loaded on HTTPS pages.
These tend to be low-impact issues but are easy wins for site hygiene.
Impact: Low
Altogether, these categories cover more than 170 distinct checks.
What really sets Site Audit apart, though, is how it brings these insights together in a way that’s both thorough and actionable.
Next, we’ll dig into the advanced features that separate casual audits from real-time technical monitoring.
Advanced Crawling Use Cases
Once you’re comfortable with standard crawls, Ahrefs opens the door to more surgical approaches.
One of my go-to strategies is segmenting by subfolder. I’ll often isolate /blog/, /docs/, or /product/ to zoom in on performance by section.
You can define these segments ahead of time and track them separately across crawls.
It’s ideal for large sites or teams managing different areas.
Ahrefs also lets you start crawls from custom URL sets.
I’ve used this for backlink audits, where I upload a list of inbound links and crawl only those pages.
It’s the fastest way to surface orphan content with authority but no internal links.
You can also combine crawl sources—like a sitemap plus homepage seed—to make sure nothing slips through.
Pro Tip: For million-page sites, set a custom crawl depth and sample only key templates.
This catches issues faster without wasting crawl credits.
With the Always-On Audit mode now available, these segmented crawls can run on a schedule and alert you if anything breaks in just one section.
It’s a smarter way to monitor without the noise of full-site scans.
Always-On Audit & IndexNow
Always-On Audit is one of the biggest upgrades Ahrefs has rolled out recently.
When enabled, it runs in the background 24/7, constantly crawling your site and flagging new issues as they appear.
I treat it like an early-warning system. It prioritizes important pages by crawl depth, traffic, and link equity.
So if your robots.txt breaks or a noindex tag goes live on your homepage, you’ll know within minutes.
Pair this with Ahrefs’ integration with IndexNow, and you’ve got real-time SEO feedback and instant indexing cues firing together.
When Always-On detects a change, it can ping search engines to re-crawl immediately.
That keeps your site agile without relying on full audits every time something shifts.
Here’s how the three crawl modes stack up:
- Manual Crawl
- Frequency: You trigger it on demand
- Alerts: Only after the full crawl is complete
- IndexNow: Requires manual submission
- Scheduled Crawl
- Frequency: Runs on a set schedule (weekly or monthly)
- Alerts: Sent once the scheduled run finishes
- IndexNow: Limited support via webhook
- Always-On Audit
- Frequency: Crawls continuously in the background
- Alerts: Real-time notifications when issues are detected
- IndexNow: Fully integrated, with automatic updates sent on changes
Patches: Fixing Issues Inside Ahrefs
Ahrefs didn’t stop at finding problems. With Patches, it now helps fix them too.
This feature lets you update titles, meta descriptions, and robots directives directly from the dashboard.
You can publish those changes to your live site using a lightweight JavaScript snippet or Cloudflare Workers.
I’ve used it on client sites where dev cycles were slow, and it made a measurable difference.
The “Ask AI” and “Batch AI” tools are also built in to speed up fixes at scale.
- Identify issues like missing or duplicate metas
- Apply fixes directly using the Patch interface
Just know this isn’t a replacement for clean CMS templates.
Patches are great for quick wins, testing, or emergencies—but they add a layer of script-based overrides.
You’ll want to track changes and eventually bake permanent fixes into your actual codebase.
Power-User Tips
Once you’ve run a few audits and know your way around the interface, Ahrefs starts to feel less like a scanner and more like a technical command center.
Here are a few ways I stretch it further:
- Use regex filters to isolate page patterns or URL templates
- Authenticate crawls behind HTTP login for staging audits
- Run segmented audits from sitemap-only sources or backlink URLs
- Save custom filter presets for things like orphan pages or noindex flags
There’s also the Data Explorer, where you can slice crawled data by over 250 parameters.
It’s ideal for advanced QA tasks like verifying whether a global change actually rolled out, or finding all pages using a specific schema markup.
I rely on this tool when auditing migrations or reviewing client templates after a redesign.
That wraps up the deeper functionality.
Next, we’ll step back and look at how the tool has evolved—and what that means for SEO workflows in 2025.
Historical Context and Key Updates
Ahrefs’ Site Audit didn’t start out as the powerhouse it is now.
When it first launched in 2018, it was a modest crawler focused on technical basics.
Over the years, it’s grown into a full-scale diagnostic platform that rivals and in some areas surpasses legacy tools.
The evolution has been steady and intentional. In the early years (2019 to 2021), Ahrefs added a visual site structure report and segmentation tools.
These features made it easier to understand not just what was broken, but where and why.
Around 2020, user demand pushed them to improve filtering, add crawl comparisons, and enhance issue explanations.
That’s when it started becoming beginner-friendly, without losing depth.
The 2020 launch of Ahrefs Webmaster Tools was a key moment. Suddenly, smaller teams and solo SEOs could run free audits on their own domains. That opened the gates.
By 2023, the issue catalog had grown to cover 170+ checks. Crawl speeds skyrocketed, Core Web Vitals were integrated, and Always-On Audit went into beta.
Each update built on the last, tightening the tool’s feedback loop and positioning it as more than just a scanner.
Then came 2024 and 2025. Always-On Audit went public, IndexNow was fully integrated.
But the big shift was Patches. That changed the game entirely. Ahrefs was no longer just diagnosing problems—it was actively fixing them.
This marked a new direction: SEO automation inside the audit interface itself.
Combined with real-time alerts and API integrations, Site Audit now feels like mission control for technical health.
I’ve followed these updates closely, not just as a user, but as someone who advises clients on tooling decisions.
The pace of iteration has kept Ahrefs competitive with platforms like Semrush and Screaming Frog, while adding unique strengths in monitoring and remediation.
So what does all this history mean for day-to-day audits in 2025?
Putting It All Together
Ahrefs’ Site Audit is far more than a checklist generator.
It’s a full-cycle platform that handles everything from crawl setup to issue detection, prioritization, and even on-page fixes.
Whether you’re cleaning up messy site architecture, dealing with bloated templates, or uncovering deep indexation problems, this tool helps you move fast and with clarity.
I’ve used it across all types of projects—large-scale ecommerce builds, early-stage startup launches, and midlife redesigns.
In each case, it helped turn technical confusion into clear next steps. The key is matching the right features to the kind of lift your site needs.
Here’s how I break it down:
- Quick wins (days to implement): Use Patches or Internal Link Opportunities to clean up tags, fix orphan pages, and test meta updates directly inside the tool.
- Medium lifts (1 to 2 weeks): Segment your crawl by folder or issue type. Use Health Score trends to prioritize what needs action.
- Long-term improvements (1 to 2 quarters): Restructure your internal linking and flatten page depth using the Site Structure view. This is where lasting gains often come from.
Used the right way, Site Audit takes the pressure off technical reviews and reframes them as high-leverage growth opportunities.
Now let’s bring this home with a personal takeaway and a forward-looking insight.
Final Thoughts
A few months ago, I ran a full audit for a SaaS client who was struggling with organic growth despite solid content.
Within minutes, Ahrefs flagged a noindex tag on their entire knowledge base.
It had been active for weeks, and no one had caught it. We fixed it the same day.
Four weeks later, they were back in the index and traffic was up 35 percent. That one crawl changed the momentum of their entire quarter.
As technical SEO gets more complex, tools like Site Audit are no longer optional, they’re foundational.
But what sets Ahrefs apart isn’t just what it finds—it’s how quickly it helps you act.
In 2025 and beyond, that speed and clarity will be the difference between keeping up and leading.
This content is not sponsored or affiliated with Ahrefs in any way.
You do not need a perfect site. You just need one that’s always improving.
