Top 5 Free SEO Tools Every Beginner Should Use in 2025

If you're new to SEO or starting a small business and trying to get your website to rank higher in search results, you're in the right place. This guide will walk you through 5 of the best free SEO tools you can use immediately to boost your visibility and grow your business.

Here are the top 5 SEO Tools:

Google Search Console

This tool is the foundation of SEO. If you are starting to optimise your website, then this is the indispensable tool. It can provide clicks, impressions, CTR, search queries, and more. It can also offer insights about web vitals and issues with your website when considering the ranking and indexing. Since AI is taking over search engines, it can provide insights regarding the authority of your content.

How to get started:

• Verify the domain

• Submit the sitemap

• Monitor the performance, fix errors, and much more.

Google Keyword Planner & Trends

This tool is one of the most powerful and still free tools available. Keyword Planner provides search volume, estimate data, competition levels, and more. The Trends tool can show trending topics over time. By understanding these trends, you can optimise your website by writing relevant blogs and attracting high-quality traffic.

Combining both tools can create a strong keyword strategy to target high-quality, niche audiences. Google Trends can also break out topics faster, helping you easily catch emerging trends.

PageSpeed Insights

PageSpeed Insights is one of the essential tools that can't be ignored when working on SEO. It provides in-depth insights into a website's underlying technologies and suggests various ways to optimise the site for a better user experience. It also offers detailed reports on site speed, image optimisation, and more.

Since it's a free tool from Google, there are no limitations on the number of website checks—you can analyse as many websites as you like without restrictions.

Ahrefs Webmaster Tools

Ahrefs is one of the most essential tools among SEO experts because of its powerful features. While it's a paid tool, Ahrefs Webmaster Tools offers a free tier. For beginner SEO users, the free version is sufficient for basic optimisation. It provides website explorer data, backlink profiles, free web analytics, and more.

How to get started?

• Add and verify your domain

• Run a site audit

• Analyse backlinks and top linking domains

• Track traffic analytics

Yoast SEO (WordPress Plugin)

If your website is built with the WordPress CMS, Yoast SEO is a must-have plugin for SEO. Even the free version comes with many useful features. With this tool, you can automatically generate an XML sitemap, configure the robots.txt file, and add focus keywords, SEO titles, and meta descriptions for individual pages—including posts and custom pages. It also provides suggestions to improve content quality and SEO metadata.

Yoast's latest paid version includes AI-powered features that recommend how to write and optimise your content more effectively. If you're using WordPress, this plugin is a must.

Emerging Trend: AEO in 2025

SEO in 2025 isn't just about traditional search rankings anymore. With AI tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini pulling answers directly from the web, Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO) is becoming increasingly important. That means it's no longer enough to optimise only for SEO—you also need to optimise for AEO.

How to Optimise for AEO:

• Structure your content around answer clusters and related questions—not just keywords.

• Use tools like Ahrefs and Google Search Console to identify high-quality, frequently asked questions.

• When creating content, use FAQs, clear headings, and structured data to help AI tools extract accurate, helpful answers.