If you’re running a WordPress site, choosing the right SEO plugin can make or break your search rankings. Two tools dominate this space: Yoast SEO and Rank Math.
Yoast has been the go-to SEO plugin for over a decade, with 10 million+ active users.
But the newcomer Rank Math—boasting a feature-rich free plan, AI-powered tools, and a user-friendly setup—has skyrocketed to 3 million users in just a few years.
Having tested both plugins extensively, I’ll break down their strengths and weaknesses in this head-to-head comparison. We’ll dig into key factors like ease of use, advanced SEO features (think schema markup and content analysis), pricing, and support.
Let’s settle the Rank Math vs Yoast debate once and for all so you can pick the perfect plugin for your goals.
Rank Math vs Yoast SEO: An Overview
As the most visible difference between the two, Rank Math offers a wider range of SEO features for free and allows more affordable scaling compared to Yoast SEO.
Also, the modern interface of Rank Math feels much more intuitive. Let’s look at some other differences below:
| Parameters | Yoast | Rank Math |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing starts at | $99/year | $6.99/month |
| Free trial | 14-day | 15 days |
| What it does | Helps optimize content for SEO with readability and keyword checks | Provides advanced SEO tools, automation, and multi-keyword tracking |
| Features | Basic keyword analysis, readability check, single keyword optimization (free), advanced internal linking (premium) | Multi-keyword analysis (free), schema generator, redirection manager, detailed SEO scoring |
| Best for | Beginners and those who prefer a simpler interface | Users needing advanced features and automation |
| G2 Ratings | 4.6/5 | 4.8/5 |
How Did I Test Yoast SEO And Rank Math?
To compare Yoast SEO and Rank Math, I tested both on live WordPress sites. Here’s how I did it:
- Installed and set up both plugins: I did it on different websites to see how easy or complex the onboarding process was.
- I ran an SEO analysis on the same blog post: I used both plugins to compare their optimization suggestions.
- Checked content readability scores: I wanted to see how each tool evaluates writing quality.
- Tested keyword optimization features. I did this by adding primary and secondary keywords and reviewing their recommendations.
- Monitored site performance: I wanted to check if either plugin slowed down the website.
- Explored additional features: Features like schema markup, redirections, and internal linking suggestions.
- Compared pricing and value: This is to determine which offers better features for free and paid versions.
This hands-on approach helped me understand the real-world usability of both plugins.
Yoast SEO Overview
Yoast SEO has been the go-to WordPress SEO plugin since 2010.
Created by SEO expert Joost de Valk, it helps millions of websites optimize content, improve readability, and rank better on search engines.
Yoast SEO has over 288 million downloads and 10 million+ active installations. It’s a trusted choice throughout the WordPress and SEO industry.
Yoast Pros
- User-friendly interface with clear SEO guidance
- Readability analysis for better content structure
- Regular updates to align with Google’s algorithm changes
- Strong integration with Schema markup
- Works well with most WordPress themes and plugins
Yoast Cons
- Free version has limited features compared to competitors
- It can slow down websites if not configured properly
- A premium version is expensive for small businesses
Rank Math Overview
Rank Math is a newer but fast-growing SEO plugin. Launched in 2018 by MyThemeShop, it quickly became a favorite due to its feature-packed free version.
With a modern interface and AI-driven suggestions, it offers an advanced approach to SEO.
Rank Math Pros
- Feature-rich free version with many premium-like tools
- Built-in keyword tracking and schema support
- Lightweight and optimized for fast performance
- AI-based content suggestions for better optimization
- Easy migration from other SEO plugins
Rank Math Cons
- It can be overwhelming for beginners due to the many features
- AI features require a paid subscription
- Some users report conflicts with other plugins
Rank Math vs Yoast: Features
Rank Math offers more features than Yoast does. Here is a side-by-side comparison of Rank Math vs Yoast when it comes to the features:
| Features | Yoast | Rank Math |
|---|---|---|
| Keyword Tracking | Up to 5 | Up to 500 |
| Plugin Zip Size | 7.18 MB | 2.85 MB |
| Lines of code | 87.2k | 51.3k |
| Speed Optimization | Moderate | High |
| Content Optimization Monitoring | Limited | ✅ |
| Performance in Search Results | Limited | ✅ |
| Advanced Analytics | ❌ | ✅ |
| Google News SEO Sitemap | ✅ | ✅ |
| Breadcrumbs | ✅ | ✅ |
| Full Divi Integration | ❌ | ✅ |
| XML sitemaps | ✅ | ✅ |
| Social media graph control | ✅ | ✅ |
Rank Math vs Yoast SEO: Ease Of Use
Both Yoast SEO and Rank Math are beginner-friendly, but Rank Math has a more modern and intuitive interface, making it easier to navigate and optimize content.
Using Yoast SEO
Yoast SEO offers two interface options:
- A sidebar panel within the editor or
- A meta box below it provides flexibility in accessing SEO settings.
This is how the Yoast meta box looks like:
It uses a traffic light system (red, yellow, green) to indicate SEO performance, keeping the analysis simple. However, readability suggestions are separate from SEO analysis.
Schema customization in Yoast SEO is more limited compared to Rank Math, making it less versatile for advanced users. If you prefer a structured, detailed approach, Rank Math is the better choice, while Yoast SEO is great for simplicity.
Using Rank Math
Rank Math also uses a sidebar panel in the editor’s top-right corner, allowing quick access to key SEO settings. The sidebar is divided into four tabs—General, Advanced, Schema, and Social—making navigation quick and accessible.
This is how the four tabs in the sidebar look:
It provides a detailed SEO score out of 100, helping users easily understand their optimization level. It also offers better readability insights and more customizable schema options for structured data.
Rank Math includes an analytics dashboard that tracks SEO performance, available in both free and paid versions, giving users valuable insights.
Verdict: Yoast SEO is more straightforward and, hence, much easier to use if you are a beginner.
Rank Math Vs. Yoast SEO: Setup Process
An ideal plugin should have an easy setup process. Let’s see which one wins here in the Rank Math Vs. Yoast SEO setup process showdown.
Setting Up Yoast SEO
Yoast SEO has a setup wizard, but you need to launch it manually from the WordPress toolbar. It helps configure schema, indexing settings, and title templates.
The dashboard provides SEO tips and highlights potential issues. Like Rank Math, Yoast SEO lets you enable or disable features through a dedicated tab.
It also highlights the problems and notifications that you can see at a glance.
Both plugins make setup simple, so it’s all about personal preference.
Setting Up Rank Math
Rank Math guides you through setup with a step-by-step wizard. It helps you configure schema, XML sitemaps, and Google integrations.
You can choose between Basic and Advanced setup modes right from the beginning. The Advanced mode unlocks redirections, 404 monitoring, and role management features.
After setup, the module manager lets you enable or disable features based on your needs. The easy mode keeps things simple, while the advanced mode gives full control.
I found the setup process pretty straightforward but lengthy.
Verdict: Yoast offers an easier setup option, which is best for beginners.
Yoast Vs Rank Math Speed: Which Plugin Is Faster?
A faster plugin is always desirable since a sluggish experience can take away the enjoyment of writing and publishing new content on the website. Let’s take a look at the speed of both plugins:
Yoast SEO Speed
Yoast has become heavier over time, which affects site performance. Running tools like New Relic, which is an application performance monitoring tool, showed Yoast as one of the slowest plugins!
One WordPress forum user, @jacksmithy, also commented on the Yoast SEO’s speed and how it was the slower option:
Another issue with Yoast is its intrusive ads. You need a separate plugin just to remove them, which feels unnecessary. Plus, Yoast itself is not a lightweight plugin.
Rank Math Speed
Rank Math is built to be lightweight. It has fewer lines of code (51.3k) and a smaller installation file compared to Yoast (87.2k). This makes a noticeable difference in load times.
Rank Math, despite having more features, runs more efficiently. It consumes fewer resources, making it a better choice for performance-focused websites.
Verdict: Rank Math is faster than Yoast due to better optimization and fewer lines of code.
Rank Math vs. Yoast: AI Features
Not having AI features in today’s age is not adding cheese to a pizza. It’s simply not right in 2025! Let’s look at how these plugins incorporate the AI features:
Yoast SEO AI Features
Yoast’s AI tools focus on meta descriptions, titles, and content optimization. ‘Yoast AI Generate’ creates multiple title and meta description options, while ‘Yoast AI Optimize’ suggests SEO-friendly edits to improve rankings.
These AI features are available in Yoast SEO Premium, but they don’t offer full content generation like Rank Math. It is only limited to the meta descriptions.
Yoast also introduced a new AI feature, ‘Yoast AI Optimize,’ in August 2024, which highlights suggested changes for certain assessments in the Yoast SEO Analysis.
Yoast SEO focuses on simplicity. Allowing the user to have total control over their content without interference. If you don’t want the AI options, Yoast can be your plugin.
Rank Math AI Features
Rank Math takes AI-driven SEO to another level with its Content AI. This feature can research topics, outline posts, and even write complete blog sections with a single click.
It also helps rewrite paragraphs, summarize content, and generate social media posts, emails, and sales copies.
For on-page SEO, Content AI compares your keywords with top-ranking content and suggests improvements. Plus, RankBot, an AI assistant, helps with content creation, SEO research, and business queries.
Verdict: For more and better AI features at an affordable price, Rank Math is a better choice than Yoast SEO.
Rank Math vs Yoast: Schema
Schema Markup helps search engines better understand your content, and Yoast and Rank Math offer built-in support. But they handle it differently.
Yoast SEO Schema
Yoast uses an interconnected structured data graph to help search engines see relationships between content.
It automatically adds schema based on content type (e.g., articles, FAQs, and breadcrumbs).
Yoast has limited schema types compared to Rank Math, but it integrates well with WordPress themes.
Rank Math Schema
Rank Math offers 18+ schema types, including FAQ, review, recipe, and video. It also auto-detects and applies schema (e.g., video schema when embedding a video).
You can manually add and customize schema in a dedicated section without needing to install extra plugins.
You also get a ‘Code validation’ feature, which lets you access the Advanced Schema markup viewer and do the live testing with Google.
No other plugin offers this feature as of yet, as per Rank Math’s claims.
Verdict: If you need advanced schema customization, Rank Math gives you more control. If you prefer automation with minimal setup, Yoast gets the job done.
Rank Math vs Yoast: Analytics
Rank Math and Yoast both offer analytics, but they take different approaches. Rank Math has the edge if you’re looking for built-in SEO insights.
Yoast Analytics
Yoast’s SEO analysis is based on its well-known red, orange, and green light systems.
It assesses internal and external links, image alt text, and content length to prevent thin content.
It requires a third-party service integration like Semrush and Wincher for keyword and rank tracking, with a limit of 5 keywords unless you pay extra.
Its premium version also provides advanced key phrase analysis, including synonyms and related terms.
Rank Math Analytics
It pulls analytics directly from Google Search Console, showing ranking changes with red and green arrows.
I also found the Rank Math analytics dashboard to be very useful. It showed everything from the overall optimization of search traffic, impressions, keyword positions, and more, as you can see in the image below.
Verdict: Rank Math offers a more detailed SEO analysis than Yoast, justifying its price.
Rank Math vs. Yoast SEO: Keyword Analysis
Both Rank Math and Yoast SEO help you optimize your content by analyzing keywords.
Yoast SEO Keyword Analysis
Yoast’s free version limits you to one keyword per post. You can upgrade and get up to 5 related keyword suggestions.
It also uses a traffic light system (green, yellow, red) instead of a numerical score. Meanwhile, the readability analysis gets its own section.
The premium version supports multiple keywords and recognizes word variations, which, for absolute beginners, comes at an unaffordable cost.
Rank Math Keyword Analysis
With Rank Math, you can analyze up to five focus keywords for free. It assigns a score from 0-100 with color coding (green = good).
You enter a keyword, and the plugin tells you how well you’ve optimized your content. As you can see, it gave me a score of 70, and the color is set to orange, which means the content needs more optimization.
The difference lies in how they handle multiple keywords and the depth of their analysis.
You can track up to 500 keywords with the PRO version. However, the extra analytics features may add more code to your site.
You can get detailed suggestions on keyword usage, title, and readability. Plus, you can toggle between different keywords easily.
Its most basic plan allows you to track over 500 keywords, which is much more than what Yoast has to offer.
Verdict: Rank Math offers 5 keyword analysis features for free, and with Yoast, you have to subscribe to its premium plan.
Yoast Vs. Rank Math: Pricing & Plans
Both Rank Math & Yoast SEO offer free versions of their tools. However, if you are serious about SEO, you might want to move on to the paid version, and here is how the plans look:
Yoast SEO Pricing & Plans
Yoast SEO premium costs $99/year with package deals for multiple website owners. That’s all; there is no fancy pricing structure or plans.
With the premium plan, you get year-long access to SEO features, AI tools, 24/7 support, and all the Yoast SEO Academy courses!
Learn more about how much Yoast SEO pricing on its official page.
Rank Math Pricing & Plans
Unlike Yoast, Rank Math offers three separate plans, which are perfect for users at different stages of their SEO journey.
- Pro: $6.99/month (Renews at $7.99 per month + taxes)
- Business: $20.99/month (Renews at $24.99 per month + taxes)
- Agency: $49.99/month (Renews at $59.99 per month + taxes)
You can check out the full list of features that you get with the Rank Math plan on Rank Math’s pricing page.
Verdict: Rank Math is cheaper and more flexible in terms of pricing than Yoast SEO and offers more features.
Yoast Vs Rank Math: User Reviews
One Reddit user, digi_devon, says that relying on Yoast SEO too much can lead to “over-optimization” of the content and stresses keeping the content naturally keyword-rich:
A G2 reviewer, Debbie, liked the webinars Yoast hosted; however, she didn’t like how she was charged for every upgrade:
Another Reddit user, bigeba88, sided with RankMath as it offers the ‘Redirects’ features with its free version:
Another G2 user, Kimberly, appreciates the free version of Rank Math. However, she encountered some glitches with Rank Math:
Verdict: I found both platforms equally viable when it comes to user reviews, as both of them have similar user reviews and satisfaction ratios.
Suggested Read:
Conclusion: Rank Math Is Cheaper Than Yoast, Best For Users With Some SEO Knowledge
Rank Math offers more SEO features than Yoast SEO, and that too for a lower price. Even the free version of Rank Math provides more features like Redirection and Sitemaps, than Yoast does.
If you are a beginner looking for an affordable option, Rank Math would be the perfect tool. However, if you have the budget and want a cleaner interface without a lot of moving parts, you can opt for Yoast.
In terms of value, Rank Math provides more value than Yoast SEO when it comes to the free tools, and after paying for a subscription, it all depends on how granular you want to go with your SEO.
FAQs
Rank Math offers a free version with features like SEO titles, meta descriptions, social media descriptions, keyword analysis, sitemaps, schema, image SEO, internal link suggestions, 404 monitoring, and more.
High-quality, relevant content is the most crucial SEO ranking factor, as it directly influences user engagement and satisfaction.
Using Yoast and Rank Math simultaneously is not recommended due to potential conflicts and redundancy between the two plugins.
WordPress offers more advanced SEO capabilities and flexibility compared to Wix, making it a preferred choice for many seeking robust SEO performance.
