How to Check a Competitor's Backlinks for Free
Check any competitor's backlinks for free with no paid tools. A step-by-step method to find who links to them, spot easy wins, and copy their best sources.
To check a competitor's backlinks for free, run their domain through a free backlink tool, sort the results by linking domain, and look for sites that link to them but not to you. Those are your fastest wins. You do not need a paid tool to do this. You need one that shows referring domains, anchor text, and roughly how strong each linking site is. That is enough to see where a competitor gets their authority and to copy the sources you can realistically earn.
Why competitor backlinks are worth your time
Backlinks are still one of the strongest signals for both classic search rankings and AI answers. When ChatGPT or Perplexity decide who to name, they lean on sites that other trusted sites already point to. So if a competitor keeps showing up instead of you, part of the reason is who links to them. Reverse-engineering those links tells you exactly which blogs, directories, and roundups treat your niche as credible.
You are not trying to copy every link. You are looking for patterns. If five competitors all have a link from the same industry newsletter, that newsletter is a target. If one competitor got a link from a guest post on a mid-size blog, you can pitch that same blog.
How do you check competitor backlinks for free?
Here is the plain workflow. It takes about twenty minutes per competitor.
- Pick two or three competitors who rank for the keywords you want. Use the ones who beat you in real searches, not the biggest brand in the space.
- Drop each domain into a free backlink checker and pull the list of referring domains. Referring domains matter more than raw link count, since ten links from one site count far less than ten links from ten sites.
- Sort by domain strength so the most valuable sources sit at the top. Ignore spammy or auto-generated links. You want editorial links a human chose to place.
- Export or copy the anchor text. Repeated anchors show you which pages and topics earn them links.
- Compare their referring domains against yours and mark every site that links to them but not to you.
What should you actually look for in the results?
A long list of links is noise until you filter it. Focus on a few things that turn into action.
- Link gaps. Sites that link to a competitor but not to you. This is the shortest path to a new backlink because the site already links to someone doing what you do.
- Repeatable sources. Directories, resource pages, and roundups that link to several competitors. These are open doors, not one-offs.
- Content that earned links. Note which of their pages attract the most links. Usually it is a free tool, a data study, or a genuinely useful guide. Build your own version.
- Anchor text patterns. If they get links using a specific phrase, that phrase is a topic people cite them for. Cover it better.
Turn the list into links you can actually get
Finding the links is the easy half. Earning them is the work. Start with the link gaps you can approach directly. Resource pages and directories often just need a short, polite request. Roundups need you to have a page worth including. Guest post sources need a pitch that fits their audience.
Prioritize by effort. A directory submission takes five minutes. A guest post takes a week. Do the cheap wins first so you build momentum while the harder outreach plays out. Track everything in a simple sheet so you do not pitch the same site twice.
Tie it back to AI visibility
The end goal is not just higher blue-link rankings. It is getting named when someone asks an AI tool for a recommendation in your space. Strong, relevant backlinks help AI models trust your site as a source. Once you have earned a few of your competitor's links, check whether your mentions actually improved. See how to check AI visibility for that, and if you want more link-worthy topics, find long-tail keywords for free to fuel the content that earns them.
Do this for three competitors and you will have a backlog of real, reachable sources instead of a vague plan to build more links. Start with one domain today and let the gaps show you where to go.