The best free AI visibility checkers in 2026, compared
Compare the free AI visibility checkers from Ahrefs, Semrush, HubSpot, Mangools, Backlinko, SE Ranking, Search Atlas and ONEGO: engines, limits and results.
Short answer: The main free AI visibility checkers in 2026 are from Ahrefs, Semrush, HubSpot, Mangools, Backlinko, SE Ranking, Search Atlas and ONEGO. They differ in which AI engines they check, whether you need an account, how many free checks you get, and whether they read live AI answers or estimate from a model’s training data. For the widest engine coverage without signing up, start with Ahrefs; for a score with a fix list across ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and both Google AI features, run the ONEGO audit. Treat every free result as a snapshot, not a verdict.
Disclosure: this guide is published by ONEGO, which is one of the checkers listed. Every other tool is described only from what its vendor states on its own website as of November 2026. Free tools change often, so check each page before relying on a detail. We have left out the prices of paid upgrades because they change frequently.
Free AI visibility checkers answer one question: when people ask AI about your category, does your brand come up? A year ago almost none existed. Now most large SEO vendors offer one, and they do not all measure the same thing. This guide compares what each free checker covers and shows you how to get a result you can trust.
What is a free AI visibility checker?
A free AI visibility checker is a tool that tests whether AI engines such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Google’s AI features mention your brand, and returns a snapshot such as a score, a mention count or a list of competitors named instead. It is a one off check. Ongoing tracking of the same questions over time is what paid AI visibility platforms do.
If the term is new to you, our guide to what AI visibility is explains the metrics behind these scores, and the glossary defines the rest.
Free AI visibility checkers at a glance
The table below compares each free checker on the points that matter most. Everything is as stated on the vendor’s own page in November 2026.
| Checker | AI engines it checks | Account needed | Free limit | What the free result shows |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ahrefs AI Visibility Checker | ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Copilot, Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode | No | A limited preview (top 5 per section) | Total mentions, mentions by platform, top topics, top cited domains and pages |
| Semrush AI Visibility Checker | ChatGPT, Gemini, Google AI Mode, Google AI Overviews | No | 3 checks a day without registering | Score out of 100, mentions, citations, platform breakdown, top cited pages, topics and prompts |
| HubSpot AI Search Grader | ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini | No | One time check | Score out of 100 weighted towards sentiment, plus share of voice against competitors |
| Mangools AI Search Grader | 6 AI models: 3 without an account, 3 more with a free account | Optional (free) | A free search allowance | How each model knows and describes your brand |
| Backlinko AI Brand Visibility Checker | ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity | No | Not stated | 150 live queries about your category, scored on presence, position, citation, sentiment and confidence |
| SE Ranking AEO Checker | Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT | Not stated | 5 checks a day | Visibility score, brand mentions and brand links, with up to 5 competitors |
| Search Atlas AI Visibility Checker | ChatGPT, Gemini | No card | A 10 prompt snapshot | Mention rate, citation rate and competitor gap |
| ONEGO free AI audit | ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Mode, Google AI Overviews | Free account, no card | Your first audit | ONE Score out of 100, where you appear, who is named instead, and what to fix first |
Each free checker in brief
Here is what each checker is best for, in one or two lines, so you can pick the right one for your question.
Ahrefs AI Visibility Checker
Ahrefs checks the most engines of any free tool here, six in total, with no signup. The free report is a limited preview that shows your top mentions, the topics you appear for and the domains AI cites. Ahrefs describes it as a one time snapshot and points to its paid Brand Radar product for monitoring.
Semrush AI Visibility Checker
Semrush gives you a visibility score out of 100 plus separate counts for mentions and citations, which is useful because being named and being linked are different things. You can run three free checks a day without registering. Deeper prompt tracking and competitor insight sit in its paid AI Visibility Toolkit.
HubSpot AI Search Grader
HubSpot’s grader asks how ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini characterise your brand and turns it into a score out of 100. Sentiment carries the most weight, up to 40 of the 100 points, so it is a good read on how AI describes you rather than how often it recommends you. It works on any brand, including competitors, and needs no account. Some HubSpot pages now call it the AEO Grader.
Mangools AI Search Grader
Mangools tests brand knowledge across six AI models: ChatGPT, Mistral and Llama without an account, and DeepSeek, Claude and Gemini once you sign up for a free account. It is the only free tool here that includes Claude. It does not list Perplexity or Google’s AI search features.
Backlinko AI Brand Visibility Checker
Backlinko runs 150 live queries about your category across ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity and scores the answers on presence, position, citation, sentiment and confidence. The high query count makes the result less dependent on one lucky or unlucky answer.
SE Ranking AEO Checker
SE Ranking’s free checker covers Google AI Overviews and ChatGPT, lets you add up to five competitors, and allows five checks a day. SE Ranking notes that brands AI rarely mentions, such as new or niche ones, may get an empty result.
Search Atlas AI Visibility Checker
Search Atlas runs a 10 prompt snapshot across ChatGPT and Gemini and reports your mention rate, citation rate and the gap to competitors. It reports what it finds rather than why, so pair it with a tool that gives fixes.
ONEGO free AI audit
ONEGO is the platform we build, so weigh this accordingly. The free audit asks ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Mode and Google AI Overviews the questions your buyers ask, then shows your ONE Score out of 100, where you appear, which competitors are named instead and a prioritised list of fixes. You create a free account but need no card. Paid plans add weekly tracking. If you want one engine at a time, use the ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity or Google AI Overviews checker pages, which also explain how to check each engine by hand.
Answer checkers vs readiness checkers
Free checkers come in two kinds, and it helps to know which one you are running. Answer checkers read what AI engines actually say and tell you whether your brand is in it. Readiness checkers test your website, for example whether AI crawlers are allowed in and whether your content is easy for machines to read.
| Answer checker | Readiness checker | |
|---|---|---|
| Question it answers | Does AI mention or recommend my brand? | Can AI engines reach and read my site? |
| What it looks at | AI answers to category questions | robots.txt, llms.txt, structured data, page content |
| Examples | Every tool in the table above | ONEGO AI crawler checker, Backlinko AI Agent Readiness Checker |
| When to use it | To see whether you are visible today | To find technical blockers before or after an answer check |
You want both. A readiness problem, such as blocking OAI-SearchBot or PerplexityBot in robots.txt, can keep you out of AI answers however good your content is. Our free AI crawler checker tests that in seconds.
Why free checkers give different results
Free checkers often disagree about the same brand. That is expected, because they measure different things in different ways. The five main reasons are below.
- Different engines. One tool checks two engines, another checks six. A brand strong in Google AI Overviews but weak in ChatGPT will score very differently depending on the mix.
- Live answers vs model knowledge. Some tools run live queries the way a user would; others ask models what they know about your brand. A model can know your brand well and still not recommend it when a buyer asks for the best option.
- Different questions. One tool asks 10 prompts, another 150. More questions give a steadier picture, but only if they are questions your buyers really ask.
- Different score formulas. Each vendor builds its score differently. HubSpot weights sentiment heavily, for example. A 60 in one tool is not a 60 in another, so never compare scores across tools.
- AI answers fluctuate. The same question can get a different answer minutes later. Any single run is one sample from a moving target.
How to choose a free AI visibility checker
Choose the free checker that matches the question you are asking and the engines your buyers use. Use this short checklist.
- Does it cover your buyers’ engines? If your buyers use Perplexity or Google AI Overviews, make sure the tool checks them.
- Does it read live answers? For “does AI recommend us”, live answers beat model knowledge.
- Does it ask category questions? The useful test is whether you appear when buyers ask about your category without naming you, not whether AI recognises your name.
- Does it show competitors? Knowing who AI names instead of you tells you who to beat.
- Does it tell you what to fix? A score without a next step is only half the job.
How to get a reliable result from any free checker
You can get a trustworthy picture for free by combining two or three checkers with a quick manual check. This takes about half an hour.
- Run two answer checkers that cover different engines, for example Ahrefs plus ONEGO or Semrush.
- Run a readiness check with the AI crawler checker to rule out blocked crawlers.
- Check by hand with the method on our engine checker pages: ask five buying questions in a fresh chat, without naming your brand, and note who is named.
- Write down the competitors that appear across tools. The names that keep coming up are your real AI competitors.
- Repeat in a week. If the same picture shows up twice, you can trust it. Our guide to tracking brand mentions in ChatGPT shows how to keep a simple log.
When a free check is not enough
A free check is enough to learn whether you have a problem. It is not enough to fix one, because you cannot see whether your changes work without tracking the same questions over time. Move to tracking when you have found a gap worth closing, you are making changes and want proof they work, or you need to report progress to a team or client.
At that point, compare paid platforms on engine coverage, prompt quality, cadence and whether they tell you what to fix. Our guide to the best AI visibility platforms compares the main options, and how to measure AI visibility explains what a good score is built from.
