Rank Math SEO Vs Yoast SEO: Which SEO Plugin Is Best For You?

In this objective product and service review, our Guest Contributor and SEO Expert, Shivansh Singh helps you decide between Rank Math SEO vs Yoast SEO plugins to help you optimize your site and rank high on Google!

You’ve created a self-hosted WordPress website, and although you have amazing content, your blog is an orphan. An island even! Nobody visits your website.

And although Google processes over 3.5 billion searches every day, your articles and posts do not rank anywhere near the front pages of Google.

So nobody clicks through to your site.

You’ve read somewhere that to rank your website on page #1 of Google you need to optimize your website. So you want to start by installing the best SEO plugin.

But which SEO plugin is best for you?

I guess, most of you are probably thinking it must be the Yoast SEO plugin and rightly so, as it is the award-winning plugin for WordPress SEO.

But, things constantly change with time, and change is the only constant in life. In fact, it was Herakleitos the Greek philosopher, who is credited with saying, “Everything changes and nothing stands still.”

Although relatively new to the SEO plugin scene, many WordPress users have switched to the Rank Math SEO plugin which is undoubtedly one of the best Yoast SEO Alternatives.

RankMath plugin has some vocal fans on Facebook and appears to be moving towards dominating the WordPress websites over Yoast SEO.

As an example, I used Yoast SEO almost for 1.5 years before I made the switch. I’m currently using the Rank Math SEO Plugin and used it for the last 12 months.

Having used both SEO plugins extensively, I’m in a great place to tell you the differences between Yoast SEO vs Rank Math SEO.

So, if you’re ready, let’s get started.

Everything To Know About Rank Math SEO Vs Yoast SEO

First a bit of history.

Let’s take a quick look at the origins of these amazing SEO plugins.

Yoast SEO Plugin

This plugin was launched in 2010 by Joost de Valk. He was an SEO Consultant before launching Yoast SEO.

Yoast SEO comes with almost all the essential features with its free version. There was a time when everyone (Blogger) wanted to install Yoast SEO plugin for their website.

But, currently, there are pretty no. of good SEO plugins available in the online market like RankMath, SEOPress and All In One SEO, etc.

It is one of the most popular plugins for WordPress SEO with over +5 million total active installations till now.

It works on the freemium model. It means, You can try its free version and for more outstanding features you can buy its premium version.

Rank Math SEO Plugin

It is a new WordPress SEO plugin founded in 2019. Rank Math plugin has active installations from 0 to 700,000 sites in less than 2 Years which is very impressive for a new WordPress plugin.

This plugin is built by the team of MyThemeShop which is a well-known brand for wordpress plugins and themes. 

In its initial days, It has only the free version which was enough for a beginner to start a website but recently in 2020, they have introduced their Pro Rank Math plugin which has unique features over Yoast SEO.

Now, Let’s take a deep look at Yoast SEO vs Rank Math SEO.

Rank Math SEO Vs Yoast SEO – An Unbiased Service Review.

1 – Features

Rank Math Plugin

I’m personally using the Rank Math SEO plugin for my website and, it works like a charm. Rank Math provides these fantastic features with its free plan:

• Set SEO titles/meta descriptions – It is the metadata which is shown to Google. You can create your SEO titles/descriptions for individual pieces of content or build a template for the same.
• Set social media descriptions – Control text and images for Facebook and Twitter.
• Focus keyword analysis (supports multiple keywords) – Enter one or more focus keywords and analyze your content to determine how much it is optimized for that keyword (or those keywords).
• XML sitemap – Build your XML sitemap instead of using the default WordPress sitemap. You can always customize your XML sitemap within the RankMath plugin.
• Structured data/schema – It is an essential SEO signal and with this feature, you can set up sitewide schema markup and also set up the schema for a single post or page content.
• Search Console – Connect your site to Google Search Console and then Rank Math will automatically submit sitemaps and notify Google and Bing about the new posts.  You can also view the Search Console data inside your WordPress admin.
• Local SEO and Knowledge Graph – Optimize your site for local SEO. Note that this is free for only one location.
• Image SEO – Improve image SEO and automatically set title and alt tags.
• Breadcrumbs – Add breadcrumbs to the site with just a single code.
• Link Counter – Count the number of internal and external links in your post or content.
• Redirections – Create and manage 301 and 302 redirects.
• 404 Monitor – Monitor your site for 404 errors. You can also redirect 404 errors to other posts/pages on your website.
• Google Analytics – Add the tracking code within the Rank Math plugin and view Google Analytics details in the WordPress dashboard.
• Basic WooCommerce SEO – Set up product/shop titles/descriptions.

Paid Version Features

• Keyword rank tracking – You can track your site’s keyword rankings and performance for the last 12 months, which I think is very unique.
• Google Trends integration
• Google Video SEO sitemap
• Google News SEO sitemap
• Multiple locations for local SEO
• More predefined schema types (20+)
• Google AdSense earning history
• Automatically watermark social media images

These are the paid features you will get with the RankMath pro version. One thing that I like about RankMath is these features are modular, which means you can enable or disable these features anytime. 

Same applies to Yoast SEO.

Yoast SEO also provides good features and which is why it is still on the top of the best SEO plugins list.

But it is not as feature rich in comparison to the Rank Math SEO plugin.

Yoast SEO Plugin

With over 288 million downloads, Yoast SEO is undoubtedly on top of the best SEO plugins list. However, it provides limited essential features in its free version.

These features are –

• Set SEO titles/meta descriptions – Set up your SEO titles/descriptions for the individual pieces of content. Alternatively, you can create the SEO title/descriptions by default template. 
• XML Sitemap – Build your XML sitemap instead of using the default WordPress sitemap. You can also customize your XML sitemap from the Yoast SEO plugin.
• Focus keyword optimization (only one keyword) – You can optimize your content for one particular main keyword and see how optimized your content is.
• Sitewide schema – Add sitewide schema markup.
• Content schema type – Set up a custom schema type for post/page content or you can also set a site-wide default.
• Search Console – Add your site to Google Search Console.
• Set social media descriptions – Control text and images for Facebook and Twitter share.
• Basic WooCommerce SEO – You can do the basic WooCommerce SEO, like setting up the titles/descriptions for products and shop pages.
• Cornerstone content – Mark important pages as “Cornerstone” to optimize them more and get more internal links to those pages.
• Breadcrumbs – Add breadcrumbs to your site by pasting the one-line simple code.
• Link Counter – It will count the internal links in your content.

Paid Version Features

• Redirect Manager – You can create and manage 301 and 302 redirects.
• Internal link suggestions – Yoast SEO will auto-suggest the best internal links to the content that you are currently writing or editing.
• Multiple focus keywords – See the Yoast Optimization tips for more than 1 keyword to make your content more SEO friendly . 
• Related keyphrases – It will suggest the most relevant key phrases based on data from Semrush (formerly SEMrush).

You can also optimize your content for different types of SEO with paid add-ons. Let’s say, you want to rank on the Google videos or on the Google news, then you can use these paid add-ons to rank higher. 

These local features and add-ons are available in the premium version of the Yoast SEO plugin.

• Local SEO – Rank your website content for the local SEO. You can add structured data for local businesses and enhance your contact page. It also supports multiple physical locations.
• Video SEO – You can rank your videos in the Google Videos and add other video SEO enhancements.
• News SEO – If you are working on a news website then you only need this addon to rank your news article in Google News. Plus, there are many more Google News enhancements.
• WooCommerce SEO (Advanced) – Get full control over Advance WooCommerce SEO features.

2 – Setup Configuration

User Interface is one of the most important factors for a product’s success. It contributes to user experience. If you’ve got a lot of good features in your plugin but your user interface is very tough to scroll then the audience will ignore your product.

The good news is both Yoast SEO and Rank Math SEO plugins provide quite good and easy to use interface. Even beginners will find it easy to use these plugins efficiently.

Rank Math SEO Plugin

When you install and activate the RankMath Plugin, it automatically redirects you to the setup page. 

You can also optionally link your free Rank Math account to activate some more features. However, please note that a RankMath account is not necessary to use this plugin.

Now to the setup.

As you can see from the image below, the Rank Math setup wizard is quite simple and beginner-friendly.

If you have just started and you don’t have any SEO knowledge then you can select the “Easy” option while the “Advanced” option is for those who want to personally control every aspect of the SEO for their website.

In the setup wizard, you can set up the following:

• Basic schema information.
• Google Analytics and Google Search Console integrations (Optional).
• XML sitemap.
• Other settings, such as whether to noindex empty category and tag archives, etc.

The above setting is for basic users. However, if you selected the Advanced option in the setup wizard then you will land on a completely different page.

 The Advanced setting will unlock some more options and steps. These additional steps are as follows:

• Role manager (to control which WordPress roles can access Rank Math).
• 404 error monitoring.
• Redirection.
• Detailed schema markup settings.

When you finish with the Advanced option you will be redirected to the module manager page where you can control all the modules of the Rank Math SEO plugin.

Module Manager will help you to do the –

• Enable/disable each module.
• Configure all the modules that you’ve enabled.

You will only get this option to enable or disable modules in Advanced mode.

Yoast SEO Plugin

Yoast SEO plugin also provides you the configuration wizard to help you set up the plugin efficiently.

It’s setup wizard is beginner-friendly so whether you are a starter or a professional, you can easily set up the Basic and Advanced SEO settings within the Yoast SEO plugin.

You can customize these settings in the configuration wizard –

• Basic sitewide schema data
• Whether or not to index your site
• SEO title templates

Yoast SEO will notify you if your website faces any SEO-related or bad configuration setting problems.

Yoast SEO also provides you the modular approach so that you can enable or disable any features you don’t need.

If you are using a fast loading wordpress theme then a modular approach can also help your website to load fast, as your SEO plugin works on less code.

More on the Review of Rank Math SEO Vs Yoast SEO

Here’s the rest of the review of these 2 amazing SEO plugins.

3 – Keyword Optimization Analysis

It is a very important analysis as it will directly affect your ranking in the search engine.

If you have optimized your content based on either the Yoast SEO or Rank Math SEO recommendations, it doesn’t automatically guarantee you will rank on top of the Google search engine results pages (SERPs).

However, it means you have optimized your content well for the best SEO outcomes.

Rank Math gives you one distinct advantage over Yoast SEO in their free version. With Rank Math you can optimize your content for multiple keywords, while Yoast SEO allows optimization for only one keyword.

Rank Math Plugin

It offers the optimization recommendations for a maximum of 5 keywords in its free plan. All you have to do is enter your keyword(s) there.

1. It will give you a score from 0-100 along with some colors, red, amber and green. If you score 80 or above, you’ll get the green color, which is good.
2. Suggest specific SEO tips. For example, including your focus keyword in the SEO title and how many times you’ve used it in the content.

Note: Do not focus on covering all the tips to make the SEO score 100. Just make sure it is more than 80.

Basic SEO, Additional SEO, and Title Readability are important in Rank Math SEO. You have to make all the ticks green.

Yoast SEO Plugin

I must say, Yoast SEO is a plugin trusted by millions of people and, which generally fulfills website owners’ expectations.

Note that you can only optimize one keyword in the Yoast SEO free version. However, you can enter multiple key phrases in its free version.

It is important to bear in mind that SEO plugins generally follow the same ranking guidelines to make contents more SEO-friendly. 

Yoast SEO recommendations SEO are basically the same as Rank Math SEO optimization ideas.

It applies its SEO algorithm to your content and indicates the result from three colors:

• Green means good
• Amber means ok
• Red means bad

You don’t have to fulfill all their SEO recommendations but focus on making your content more natural and qualitative.

In my view, a quality post means:

• Your content covers all the related topics
• The content should be in easy language

Yoast SEO gives you the separate Readability Analysis for your content. It will suggest some basic things to make your content more readable.

On the next navigation, you can also setup the SCHEMA type for the individual piece of content.

4 – Price Plans

The Yoast SEO and RankMath SEO plugins are both available in the free version.

However, if you want to purchase their premium versions then both plugins have different pricing.

When Rank Math was launched in 2019, it’s free version provided all the important and essential features like multiple keyword optimization, etc.

But in 2020, it launched its paid version with some unique features to compete with the Yoast SEO premium plugin.

The Rank Math premium has some unique features that Yoast SEO doesn’t provide even in their paid plan.

I will discuss Rank Math’s unique features later on in this article.

So keep reading 🙂

As I said earlier, pricing is completely different for these 2 SEO plugins.

It is worth pointing out at the outset, that the Rank Math SEO plugin is more affordable than the Yoast SEO plugin.

Rank Math Plugin

Rank Math currently offers two price plans –

• Pro – $59/year. For unlimited personal websites and where you can track up to 1,000 keywords.
• Business – $199/year. For use on unlimited personal and client websites. And you can track up to 20,000 keywords for the last one year.

These prices are currently under the offer. When the special offer is over, Rank Math will cost:

• Pro – $129/year
• Business – $429/year

I think is affordable and much cheaper than Yoast SEO.

Now let’s take a look the Yoast SEO pricing.

Yoast SEO Plugin

Yoast has 2 price plans. One is a single site license, while the other is a multiple site license. And you will also get some extra discount if you purchase multiple site licenses.

• Single Site License – $89/year with 1 year free updates and support

• Multiple Site License – It varies, depending on the number of websites you have in mind.

If you are buying Yoast SEO premium for a specific type of SEO, then there are also four premium extensions for the same –

1. Video SEO License – from $69 for a single site.
2. Local SEO License – from $69 for a single site.
3. News SEO License – from $69 for a single site.
4. Yoast WooCommerce SEO – from $69 for a single site.

Unique Features of Rank Math SEO Vs Yoast SEO

Feature	Rank Math SEO	Yoast SEO
Google Analytics Integration	✔️	❌
Keyword Rank Tracker	✔️	❌
Import Schema From Any Website	✔️	❌
Google Trends Integration	✔️	❌
Track Top 5 Winning Keywords	✔️	❌
Track Top 5 Losing Keywords	✔️	❌
Google AdSense Earning History	✔️	❌

As you can see from the above table, Rank Math SEO has many more unique features than even the Yoast SEO premium.

However, it is up to you which SEO plugin you want.

I recommend you install the Rank Math SEO plugin free version and, when you want to track your top performing and losing keywords then purchase its Premium License.

FAQs Related To Rank Math SEO vs Yoast SEO

Now to the frequently asked questions.

You May Also Be Interested In…

Here’s a selection of some of our best resources on SEO to move you to the next level:

• SEO For Bloggers: 48 Experts Share Website Optimization Tips
• Your Free Guide To The Best Yoast SEO Alternatives
• Yoast SEO Meta Tags – What They Are, And How To Use Them To Your Advantage
• 38 Experts Reveal Best Keyword Research Tools For SEO (Top 10 Leaderboard Included)
• Best SEO Tips for Beginners and New Websites
• 7 Proven Tips to Instantly Improve Content Readability for SEO
• The Actionable On-Page SEO Guide on How to Rank in Google
• Semrush Vs Ahrefs: Which SEO Tool is Best?
• SEO Certification Through Free Online Courses
• SEO For Dummies: What Is SEO And How It Works

Rank Math SEO Vs Yoast SEO – Your Turn

Are you a blogger or webmaster?

Which is your preferred SEO plugin? Do you use Yoast SEO or are you with Rank Math SEO?

Or perhaps you’re not with any of these 2, but you’re with one of the other 10 Yoast alternatives reviewed in our detailed product review on the best Yoast SEO Alternatives.

Why not join our conversation by leaving a comment?