Yoast vs Rank Math- Which is Better WordPress Plugin for SEO?

Do you want to know which SEO plugin is better between Yoast vs Rank Math? If yes, then you’re at the right place.

The Search Engine Optimization (SEO) of any site is crucial for business growth. In WordPress, that’s possible with WordPress SEO plugins. Among a handful of good ones, Yoast and Rank Math are the most preferred and popular ones. But, here’s the real question! Which one is suitable for you?

So, here we have the article on the comparison between the two great SEO plugins Yoast and Rank Math. We’ll compare them based on their features, ease-of-use, user experience, pricing, support, and so on.

At first, let’s start with a brief introduction to both of the plugins.

Yoast SEO Overview: The Most Popular and Trusted SEO Plugin

Yoast SEO is a WordPress plugin used for making your site SEO-friendly and optimized for search engines. It’s one of the most important plugins that you can have on your WordPress site. To talk about popularity, it’s been installed on over 5 million active sites.

This super SEO plugin was developed by a Dutch citizen Joost de Valk. He’d been working on it for a few years, and it was officially launched in 2010. Since then, it’s been evolving and no doubt it’s everyone’s favorite plugin.

This plugin basically scans and observes your pages and posts for various factors affecting SEO. For example, it checks image alt tags keyword density, links, titles, descriptions, etc. Importantly, it’ll suggest how you can improve your page content and optimize it better.

On top of that, it also checks the readability of your content for ensuring that it’s readable. Moreover, it helps you generate XML sitemaps and verify your site on major search engines. In addition, it also serves for link suggestion, redirection, support, social previews, etc.

The Yoast plugin works on both WordPress.org and WordPress.com platforms (except free WordPress.com). Also, you can check our article if you don’t know the differences between WordPress.org vs WordPress.com.

Rank Math Overview: Emerging SEO Plugin with Great Features

Rank Math is another great SEO plugin that you can use on your WordPress site. It has a wide range of features that helps you optimize your site for search engines.

In fact, this plugin was developed by a popular WordPress development team MyThemeShop. Its development was going on for years before its release in 2018. Not to mention, this plugin has been popular in such a short period.

Now, it has over 600 thousand active installations in the WordPress.org plugin directory. It lags behind the Yoast plugins by a large margin but has the potential to catch up very soon.

What people love about Rank Math is the number of SEO features that it provides, even in the free version. While you’ll have to pay to use some features that Rank Math provides for free.

With Rank Math, you can edit the title, URLs, meta descriptions, make your content optimized and readable. Moreover, one of its strongest features is it allows you to optimize your page/post for 5 keywords.

Besides, other features include internal linking suggestions, XML sitemaps, search engine verification, redirection, etc.

Having known about both the plugins, now let’s compare these plugins based on various features and specifications.

Yoast SEO vs Rank Math: Comparison

You’ve known that Yoast and Rank Math both are great plugins from the quick overview. Now, let’s see a detailed comparison between them.

1. Setup Procedure of Yoast SEO vs Rank Math

Both Yoast and Rank Math are WordPress plugins that you need to install to use. If you’re a WordPress user, you might be familiar with installing a plugin. If you don’t know, you can check our article on ‘How to Install a WordPress Plugin?’

Besides installing, you need to set up the SEO settings in your plugin. To make it easy, both Yoast and Rank Math comes with an installation wizard for basic configuration.

i) Yoast SEO Setup

After installing and activating your Yoast plugin, the first thing you should do is run the configuration wizard. Then, from your admin area, you can go to SEO > General and find the configuration wizard there.

The wizard takes you through important SEO settings step by step. Essentially, it starts with asking if your site is live and ready for indexing or just under construction. Other steps include:

• Selecting website type
• Entering site name, logos, and other social URLs.
• Search engine visibility settings for pages and posts
• Configuring title settings
• Allowing/disallowing Yoast to track your data, etc.

Once you’re done with the configuration wizard, you can go to more settings from the Yoast menu in Dashboard. Then, you’ll find options available like feature toggle, integration, webmaster verification, content types, title and meta description settings, etc.

ii) Rank Math Setup

Like Yoast, Rank Math also lets you run the plugin configuration wizard. But, just after installing and activating it, you’re asked to create a Rank Math Account. Then only you can proceed further.

The configuration process starts with selecting an easy, advanced, or custom mode for managing settings.

Then, you can configure the following things.

• Importing settings from other plugins
• Entering basic site info
• Connecting Google services

After completing the setup wizard, you can go to your Rank Math from the admin dashboard to work on other settings. Moreover, you can work on analytics, general settings, titles and meta descriptions, sitemaps, and so on. Inside each category, there are multiple options.

2. Which One has the Best User Interface on Yoast vs Rank Math?

Having a neat and easy user interface is a desired feature of any WordPress plugin. So, let’s see how the user interfaces of both the plugins are.

i) Yoast SEO User Interface

Yoast SEO has a distinguished user interface and also provides a good navigating experience.

You’ll see a separate menu for the Yoast SEO after you install it. In addition, it has a clean and distinguished sub-menu for general, appearance, and social settings. Following that, you can find related settings that you can configure.

Further going inside each of them, you can find more categories for related settings.

While creating or editing pages/posts, you can see the SEO information on the editor. If you use a classical editor, then it’ll appear at the bottom of the web page.

While in the Gutenberg block editor, it’ll also show up in the sidebar.

You can expand and view the SEO and readability analysis for more information. Also, you can see the search engine snippet for mobile and desktop. If you have premium Yoast, then you can also preview how your post looks like on social media.

ii) Rank Math User Interface

Similar to Yoast, Rank Math also has a good user interface with clear sub-menus, categories, and settings.

Clicking or hovering over the ‘Rank Math’ menu from the dashboard will display you the sub-menus. Also, each sub-menu has categories and buttons that make it easier for you to find settings.

Rank Math also fully integrates with your editor for your post’s or page’s SEO analysis. In the block editor, you can get the Rank Math SEO analytics section in the sidebar and at the bottom. Furthermore, it shows the search engine snippet in mobile and desktop versions.

Else, if you use classic editors, then you can find all that at the bottom of the page.

3. Keywords Analysis in Yoast SEO vs Rank Math

When you’re creating content, you’re aiming to appear for certain keywords. So, optimizing your content for your target keyword is absolutely necessary.

For that, both Yoast and Rank Math let you enter the focus keyword and analyze your content based on it. i.e. Further, the plugins check the use of keywords in various parts of the content and see if it’s used adequately.

Now, let’s see the approaches of keyword analysis in Yoast SEO and Rank Math.

i) Yoast SEO Keywords

With the free version of Yoast SEO, you get to enter one focus keyword in your content for analysis. While with the premium version, you can enter multiple keywords.

To enter the keyword, you can go to the Yoast SEO section in your editor. Following that, you can find it in the right sidebar or bottom, depending upon the editor you use. Afterward, it’ll generate lots of results related to the focus keyphrase.

For example, if your focus keyphrase is very long, it’ll print it out and suggest making it shorter. Similarly, it can suggest you enter focus key phrases in titles, content, meta descriptions, image alt tags, and other important areas.

ii) Rank Math Keywords

The most appreciated feature of Rank Math is that it can let you add up to 5 key phrases in the free version.

In your Rank Math SEO section, you can enter the 5 focus keyphrases, by pressing enter after each keyphrase. Then, it shows how your content is optimized for each keyphrase.

You can check how your content is SEO optimized for each keyphrase. You just have to click on the keyphrase, and below it’ll display the suggestion and results for that particular keyphrase.

Similar to Yoast, it shows things like keyphrase density, length, use of keyphrase in the meta description, title, image alt tags, headings, and so on.

4. Sitemaps on Yoast SEO and Rank Math

A sitemap is a file that contains the structure and links of your website. It helps search engine bots to crawl and index your website in a search engine database easily. Consequently, search engines recognize your website and make it available for ranking.

But what sitemap features do the Yoast and Rank Math plugins offer? Let’s find out.

i) Yoast SEO Sitemap

Creating a sitemap with Yoast is easy. You can go to General > Features in your Yoast menu and toggle on the ‘XML sitemaps’ option. You can also instantly see the XML site of your site from there.

ii) Rank Math Sitemap

With Rank Math, you can create sitemaps automatically. Including or excluding certain posts, pages, categories, or tags in the sitemap is possible.

Also, you can create sitemaps for images to help search engines index important images of your site. In addition, you can choose to include featured images too.

5. Webmaster Tools Verification with Yoast SEO and Rank Math

Webmaster Tools helps you verify the ownership of your site to search engines. Additionally, it provides your site analytics, alerts, and analyzes the performance of your website.

Firstly, you should enter your website URL in the webmaster tools of the respective search engine. Then, you’ll get a code, which you’ll have to enter into your site to verify with the search engines.

i) Yoast SEO Webmaster Tools Verification

Now, Yoast lets you verify your search engine in 4 search engines: Google, Bing, Yandex, and Baidu.

Yoast provides text areas for where you can enter those codes you get after verifying in search engines.

ii) Rank Math Webmaster Tools Verification

Similarly, Rank Math lets you enter verification code search engines like Google, Bing, and Baidu.

The approach is also similar to Yoast. Also, it has text boxes for respective search engines, where you enter the verification codes.

6. Which does the Content Analysis, Yoast SEO or Rank Math?

Content analysis is important for deciding if your content is optimized and ready to be published. Both Yoast and Rank Math analyze your content and try to make it better by providing suggestions.

So, let’s see how Yoast and Rank Math analyze your content for making it better.

i) Yoast SEO Content Analysis

Yoast SEO has a very good approach to content analysis. Basically, it reads your content and checks its SEO and readability.

What you’ll like about Yoast is its attention to detail. Moreover, it looks for every possible way that you can make your content SEO-friendly and readable.

In SEO section, it shows things like:

• Internal and external linking suggestions
• Keywords usage in parts of various article
• Recommends nofollow and dofollow links
• Meta description, title, and permalink length
• Text length, etc.

In readability section, it’ll show suggestions and results about:

• Readability score
• Sub-heading distribution
• Use of transition words
• Use of active and passive voice
• Sentence and paragraph length, and more.

Each of these factors is indicated by 3 colors (green, orange, and red), red being problematic, orange okay, and green meaning good.

ii) Rank Math Content Analysis

Rank Math also analyzes your content in real-time to make it more optimized and qualitative. Since this plugin lets you enter up to 5 keyphrases, it also allows content analysis for individual phrases.

It displays the results in many categories like Basic SEO, Additional, Title Readability, and Content Readability.

In Basic SEO, you’ll see:

• Focus keyword in descriptions and URLs
• Keyword Density in the content
• Article length (number of words)

In Additional, it suggests things like:

• Focus keywords use in sub-headings
• Using focus keywords in image alt texts
• URL length
• Internal and external linking

In Title Readability, you can see suggestions like:

• Using focus keywords in titles
• A negative or positive statement in titles
• Suggestion to use a power word
• Including numbers

In Content Readability, it recommends:

• Table of content
• Maintaining paragraph length
• Use of images or videos

The individual improvement factors are indicated by 2 colors red and green. As obvious, red means it needs improvement, and green means good. Plus, the overall SEO score is given in numbers out of 100.

7. Artificial Intelligence Feature

Rank Math comes with artificial intelligence feature called Content AI. There is no such feature found in Yoast SEO. So, here we are going to discuss about Rank Math Content AI feature.

Now, Rank Math has a Content AI feature that is lacking in the Yoast SEO plugin. To put it simply, Content AI is an artificial intelligence-based content wizard to help you rank your content higher in search engines. 

Essentially, it provides advanced resources such as keywords, links, and various other details. With its AI-generated suggestions, you can know exactly what and how to write better content. Consequently, this helps to optimize your content fully and generate a good amount of traffic to your website.

Moreover, it gives you control over who can use Content AI and on which posts as an administrator. This way, you can use Content AI in your cornerstone and other significant articles. 

Features of Content AI 

• It’s straightforward to use as it tells you how many words to write, what headings to use, how many links to include, and what media to embed.
• Get intelligent recommendations based on the language of your focus keyword and the country you want to reach. Also, the suggestions vary depending on the audience you’re aiming for.
• Provides you with a list of similar keywords that you can use in your content.
• Assist you in determining which phrases or words to use in your content, headings, and SEO metadata.
• You can use the smart link suggestions to add trustworthy links to your text and improve your exposure in the Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs).
• Easily find out about your keyword’s ad competition, volume, Cost Per Click (CPC), etc. That also, on the basis of evidence and proven data.

Pricing of Content AI

Rank Math does provide promotional complimentary credits that you can use. You can understand credits as certain points required to optimize your content using Content AI. So, every time you research a new term or update previously studied data with new data, the Content AI will deduct one credit from your account. 

Basically, you get 5, 15, 125, and 600 credits in Rank Math’s free, pro, business, and agency plans respectively.

However, you can purchase extra credits at a reasonable cost. Its credit pricing scheme goes:

• 50 Credits: It costs you $19 per year exclusive of VAT.
• 150 Credits: It costs you $49 per year exclusive of VAT.
• 450 Credits: It costs you $99 per year exclusive of VAT.

All of these schemes can be used on an unlimited number of websites with any of the Rank Math licenses. The plans feature Content AI’s powerful ideas, 24/7 assistance, and the ability to cancel at any moment.

8. The Cost of Yoast SEO vs Rank Math

The cost of the plugin is a concern for every user. Additionally, the features available in free and premium versions also determine what plugin you’ll use.

Both Rank Math and Yoast are freemium plugins i.e. they offer both free and premium options. So, let’s see the cost of these plugins.

i) Yoast SEO Cost

The cost of Yoast SEO Premium is $89 for a year. Moreover, if you don’t like it, you can ask for a refund for up to 30 days. Also, you get free updates for up to a year with this product.

With Yoast SEO Premium, you get access to many more features like internal linking suggestions, integration with other tools, social previews, redirection, local SEO, video SEO, etc. You’ll also get access to all the Yoast Academy courses, and dedicated support.

ii) Rank Math Cost

Rank Math, on the other hand, provides 2 different paid plans. They are Pro Plan and Business Plan, costing $59/year and $199/year respectively.

The paid plans have so many features that are excluded from the free plan. Some of the important ones are keywords rank tracker, schema generation, Google services integration, and so on.

9. Customer Support Comparison of Yoast vs Rank Math?

You might get into technical problems every now and then. That’s why you need to have customer support so that your problems are taken care of.

Both Yoast and Rank Math provide value to their users so they have a strong support system.

i) Yoast SEO Support

Yoast offers lots of ways to provide support to its users. Firstly, you have free access to its documentation, support forums, and knowledge base. As a result, this will likely solve any problems you have.

You’d rarely encounter any bugs in Yoast, so you might not need any premium support. In case you need it, you can contact the Yoast customer care team.

Moreover, you can get premium support through emails where you send Yoast the email with your problem. Then, they can reply to you back with your solution.

You can also use the help beacon of Yoast for asking any question.

ii) Rank Math Support

Rank Math also offers various ways of support for solving your problems, questions, and queries. If you’re a free user, then you can go to their knowledge base and find hundreds of articles. Also, you can search for the ones that you need there.

However, you’re most likely in need of premium priority support in Rank Math. Since it’s a new plugin, people have found bugs and errors many times.

For premium support, you can email the Rank Math support team. Additionally, you can use the support tickets for submitting your query to them.

Feature Comparison Table

Next, let’s see the comparison table to gain a quick summary of our detailed comparison.

Pros and Cons of Yoast SEO

So, let’s see some of the pros and cons of the Yoast SEO plugin.

Pros:

• Easy to use
• Reliable and trustable
• Compatible with most WordPress themes and plugins
• Regular updates
• Easy explanation of all the SEO and readability issues

Cons:

• You might need add-ons for certain features
• Lets you enter only one focus keyword

Pros and Cons of Rank Math

Similarly, here’re some of the pros and cons of Rank Math.

Pros:

• Provides good support
• Lots of features even in the premium plugin
• Lets you optimize your content for up to 5 keywords
• Offers local SEO and video SEO

Cons:

• Being a new plugin, its users prone to many bugs and errors
• It’s not quite sure if all of its features work or not
• These many features can be overwhelming and unused.

Conclusion

That’s all for the comparison of Yoast vs Rank Math.

By now, you might’ve understood that both of them are good plugins. But, which one are you more likely to use? It’s up to you. In our case, we use the Yoast SEO plugin for our site SiteNerdy.

We hope that you liked our article on the differences between two powerful SEO plugins Yoast and Rank Math. Also, make sure that you’ll select the one that fits your needs.

If you have any questions or suggestions about this article, then you can comment below.

Next, you can also read our detailed beginner’s guide on Search Engine Optimization (SEO). It’ll help you get proper knowledge of SEO, things affecting SEO on your site, and how to properly optimize your site for better SEO.

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