undefined
Skip to content
Moz logo Menu open Menu close
  • Products
    • Moz Pro
    • Moz Pro Home
    • Moz Local
    • Moz Local Home
    • STAT
    • Moz API
    • Moz API Home
    • Compare SEO Products
    • Moz Data
  • Free SEO Tools
    • Domain Analysis
    • Keyword Explorer
    • Link Explorer
    • Competitive Research
    • MozBar
    • More Free SEO Tools
  • Learn SEO
    • Beginner's Guide to SEO
    • SEO Learning Center
    • Moz Academy
    • SEO Q&A
    • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
  • Blog
  • Why Moz
    • Agency Solutions
    • Enterprise Solutions
    • Small Business Solutions
    • Case Studies
    • The Moz Story
    • New Releases
  • Log in
  • Log out
  • Products
    • Moz Pro

      Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

    • Moz Local

      Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

    • STAT

      SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

    • Moz API

      Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

    • Compare SEO Products

      See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

    • Moz Data

      Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
    Moz Pro

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

    Learn more
  • Free SEO Tools
    • Domain Analysis

      Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

    • Keyword Explorer

      Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

    • Link Explorer

      Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

    • Competitive Research

      Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

    • MozBar

      See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

    • More Free SEO Tools

      Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
    Moz Pro

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

    Learn more
  • Learn SEO
    • Beginner's Guide to SEO

      The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

    • SEO Learning Center

      Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

    • On-Demand Webinars

      Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

    • How-To Guides

      Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

    • Moz Academy

      Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

    • MozCon

      Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

    Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
    Moz API

    Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

    Find your plan
  • Blog
  • Why Moz
    • Small Business Solutions

      Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

    • Agency Solutions

      Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

    • Enterprise Solutions

      Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

    • The Moz Story

      Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

    • Case Studies

      Explore how Moz drives ROI with a proven track record of success.

    • New Releases

      Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

    Surface actionable competitive intel
    New Feature

    Surface actionable competitive intel

    Learn More
  • Log in
    • Moz Pro
    • Moz Local
    • Moz Local Dashboard
    • Moz API
    • Moz API Dashboard
    • Moz Academy
  • Avatar
    • Moz Home
    • Notifications
    • Account & Billing
    • Manage Users
    • Community Profile
    • My Q&A
    • My Videos
    • Log Out

The Moz Q&A Forum

  • Forum
  • Questions
  • Users
  • Ask the Community

Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

  1. Home
  2. SEO Tactics
  3. Link Building
  4. Different number of backlinks (Search console - Majestic)

Moz Q&A is closed.

After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

Different number of backlinks (Search console - Majestic)

Link Building
4
4
2.4k
Loading More Posts
  • Oldest to Newest
  • Newest to Oldest
  • Most Votes
Reply
  • Reply as question
Log in to reply
This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
  • skrauss
    skrauss Subscriber last edited by May 25, 2016, 1:37 PM

    Hi there,

    I saw a notable difference between the number of backlinks from ref domains to my website in search console and majestic.

    I basically have two questions: why such a difference? And which tool gives me the most accurate number between these two?

    Thank you!

    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
    • Marketing-Omoda
      Marketing-Omoda last edited by Mar 2, 2017, 6:37 AM Mar 2, 2017, 6:37 AM

      Google's primary objective is to give users the best experience, off course they do so by crawling the entire web for the most relevant results based on their search queries.

      Google's Search Console is a free service that provides you with links Google the came across / found in the before mentioned proces.

      With this in mind, be aware that Google does not crawl the web to give you as a webmaster the most recent en relevant backlink reports.

      many links in Google's Search Console can therefore be old, non-existing links (even in most recent link reports)
      Another shortcoming of Search Console in my opinion, is that is show where links are/were FROM, but not where they link TO.

      I personally think paid services such as MOZ, Majestic en Ahrefs do better jobs at this, because their primary objective is to give webmasters / SEM's the best experience, not searchers.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • topic:timeago_earlier,9 months
      • Travis_Bailey
        Travis_Bailey last edited by May 25, 2016, 1:56 PM May 25, 2016, 1:56 PM

        There will likely always be a significant variance between backlink tools. They have to first discover the links, and later determine if the links are still there. It's a pretty big job to do, for the entire internet.

        Google Search Console will show you a sampling of links. You'll seldom ever get anywhere near the whole story from them. Unless, the site is new. I've still seen months long delays in reporting totally legit backlinks.

        Majestic is pretty good. I've always found their metrics to be something of a gobble-dee-guk, which is only useful for comparisons between sites - within Majestic.

        aHrefs is another backlink tool. And they do a fine job. But still, they have to update their database after crawls. The same as anyone else.

        Open Site Explorer has always kind of lagged, but it's another source you should consider for backlink data.

        So, no one tool has all of the information. I don't think that will happen for at least 10 years, if not more.

        The reasons various tools lack certain information varies. Some tools, like ahrefs, are actually on the 'bad bots list'. And some webmasters use that to block their official bot from crawling their site. Thus no links would be discovered through their official bot, where sites block their bot.

        Backlink research is as post-modern as it gets. (read: literature) You're seldom privileged with all the information. The sources you think should be authoritative aren't.

        The answer has been, and will be for a while, seek out an array of backlink data information. No one thing is going to do it for you.

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
        • ThomasHarvey
          ThomasHarvey last edited by May 25, 2016, 1:52 PM May 25, 2016, 1:52 PM

          It'll vary because of the crawlers, each company will have a different amount of sites in their database, and they will also have a different process to get their data live in their console. Honestly I would take each with a grain of salt and just try and use them as a rough guide.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
          • 1 / 1
          1 out of 4
          • First post
            1/4
            Last post

          Got a burning SEO question?

          Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


          Start my free trial


          Browse Questions

          Explore more categories

          • Moz Tools

            Chat with the community about the Moz tools.

          • SEO Tactics

            Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers

          • Community

            Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!

          • Digital Marketing

            Chat about tactics outside of SEO

          • Research & Trends

            Dive into research and trends in the search industry.

          • Support

            Connect on product support and feature requests.

          • See all categories

          Related Questions

          • FriedmanSimon1000

            Backlinks and SPAM

            I was doing some back link review of competitors and I have noticed that many of our competition have 300+ do follow back links from Justia.com  and an additional 300+ do follow links from law.cornell.edu (they share the same database). The links on Justia are from different pages and they are all going to the root of our competitors site. So the questions are as follows; 1: For the purpose of SEO is this considered SPAM 2: If not SPAM, then does it have a positive effect on the competitions website and should I attempt to emulate for my client. Thanks in advance. -Jeff

            Link Building | Apr 7, 2019, 2:20 PM | FriedmanSimon1000
            0
          • poke1

            Rankings Dropped After New Backlinks.

            I have a low-traffic website (under 100 unique visitors per day) and I've encountered a strange issue started yesterday morning. I acquired three back-links, one of these back-links is contextual and the other two are site-wide. The site-wide back-links are from PA 40+ blogs. It looks like the back-links are already indexed by Google. Despite these new back-links, my rankings across multiple keywords have dropped several positions. I'm new to SEO, but I would assume new back-links would improve my rankings. None of these back-links are low quality links, they are from real established blogs with high domain and page authority values. Could anyone give me insights into why my rankings may have dropped with new back-links?

            Link Building | Aug 15, 2016, 8:49 PM | poke1
            1
          • Turkey

            Backlinks from the Same Domain (But Different Pages)

            Wayyy back when (in the days of yore) Mr Cutts spelled out in a video that page rank is distributed equally between the external links on the page. If there are two links on a page, each gets passed 50% of the available page rank etc. (Perhaps an oversimplification but bear with me). As a result of this, the company I worked for at the time (this was the dark ages when sidebar homepage links were in vogue) decreed that we would only ever approach a site about a link for a client once, as additional links had little extra SEO Value. Now you could argue that if there are 5 external links, each acquiring 20% of the power, and your site has 2 of those, you are getting 40% of the power, but lets forget the basic math for a minute. I have scoured the web and Mr Cutts' videos and I cannot find the answer to my question: If my site (Site A) has a backlink from SiteB Page 1, and a backlink from SiteB page 2 - does this count as two separate links in the eyes of Google? If the SAME site links out to my site, linking to different pages in different posts, does this give me more SEO benefit? Thanks for your time!

            Link Building | Mar 19, 2015, 2:20 PM | Turkey
            0
          • RetBit

            Best Name for Business and Backlinks / SEO

            Sorry if this is a basic question I should know the answer for. We have just acquired the .org for a moderately well searched keyword set. Our objective is to fight for rank specifically on this one set of two keywords. We want make sure our site is setup and business named optimally for this. Here is my question. What is the best business name for SEO and keyword rich backlinks, or anything else I'm not thinking of? KEYWORDS: Blue Widget     DOMAIN: BlueWidget.org BUSINESS NAME OPTIONS: A) simply BlueWidget.org. We like this but do we lose some benefit of "Blue Widget" with a space on backlinks? **B) Blue Widget Foundation. Is this better because people will reference us by the keywords with a space "The Blue Widget Foundation", instead of "from the people at BLUEWIDGET.org"? ** Am I missing anything important here in the name? We just want to start everything off on the right foot. Thank you Moz. Just joined and my first post.

            Link Building | Feb 2, 2015, 7:03 PM | RetBit
            0
          • AndersDK

            Best Backlink checker - OSE or Hrefs?

            Hi Guys I am looking for a new back link tool but i'm not sure which one to go for. Should I continue using Open Site Explorer or should I go for something else like Ahrefs.com or something else?

            Link Building | Oct 7, 2013, 5:08 AM | AndersDK
            0
          • ruddyhapiq

            Using Schema markup for backlinks

            Hi, Is there any benefits for using schema markup for backlinks. Using for Article directory submission,Drupal Submission etc.. mUz1umK.png?1

            Link Building | Sep 10, 2013, 7:35 AM | ruddyhapiq
            0
          • locoto0007

            Why do we need proxy to so Backlinks?

            Does Google knows the IP addresses that the backlinks are created from? if i create 200 backlinks for my site without proxies will google ban my site because it will look like i a the one who create all the backlinks? May i ask how many proxies do you guys need to create around 200 backlinks per day? If i already use the proxies today Can i use the same set of proxies to create backlinks tomorrow? THanks

            Link Building | Nov 14, 2012, 8:58 PM | locoto0007
            1
          • hfranz

            Are backlinks to a domain that redirects useless?

            I am working on trying to get backlinks. We are currently redirecting a few Domains to our current domain name. One of the Domains that is redirecting is the main Domain, we will be advertising in the near future. Can I send backlinks to the redirected URL or does it only carry link juice if it is to the main Domain?

            Link Building | Jun 3, 2011, 6:02 PM | hfranz
            0

          Get started with Moz Pro!

          Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

          Start my free trial
          Products
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Local
          • Moz API
          • Moz Data
          • STAT
          • Product Updates
          Moz Solutions
          • SMB Solutions
          • Agency Solutions
          • Enterprise Solutions
          Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Authority Checker
          • Link Explorer
          • Keyword Explorer
          • Competitive Research
          • Brand Authority Checker
          • Local Citation Checker
          • MozBar Extension
          • MozCast
          Resources
          • Blog
          • SEO Learning Center
          • Help Hub
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO
          • How-to Guides
          • Moz Academy
          • API Docs
          About Moz
          • About
          • Team
          • Careers
          • Contact
          Why Moz
          • Case Studies
          • Testimonials
          Get Involved
          • Become an Affiliate
          • MozCon
          • Webinars
          • Practical Marketer Series
          • MozPod
          Connect with us

          Contact the Help team

          Join our newsletter
          Moz logo
          © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
          • Accessibility
          • Terms of Use
          • Privacy

          Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.