Can I count on ahrefs data to create new website ?

Hi, I just start using ahrefs couple days ago, honest I found most of it KW's analysis tools useful,
But I'm curious about Keyword difficulties and domain rating metrics they have are they accurate and hoe much,
In pas I used Ahrefs to analyse competitors links and it was not that accurate but give me good results

Ahrefs is a great tool (possibly the best of its kind), but when it comes to KD scores it's unreliable...

Just an hour ago I re-checked the main keywords for a website that I've built 1,5 years ago that doesn't rank anywhere and saw a 4-words keyword with 10 monthly searches (according to Ahrefs) and ZERO KD score doesn't rank anywhere after almost 2 years despite of having 12 backlinks (4 of them d0follow) pointing to its URL.

And yet, Ahrefs "thinks" that this keyword has ZERO difficulty score. Yeah, zero my ass! When I check the sites ranking on google's 1st page for this keyword half of them are direct competition like real businesses and affiliate sites, and 8 of the websites ranking there have at least 2 backlinks pointing to those specific URLs.

If this is what a 0 KD keyword looks like.... I don't think I ever want to know what a 100 KD one looks like.

The point is that the KD score is pretty bogus and you should manually check each one of the websites ranking on google's 1st page for your keyword to assess the real difficulty. Do not solely rely on Ahrefs for keyword research.

For other things, though (backlink checking for example) the tool is unmatched

tazarbm said:

The point is that the KD score is pretty bogus and you should manually check each one of the websites ranking on google's 1st page for your keyword to assess the real difficulty. Do not solely rely on Ahrefs for keyword research.

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I mainly use the trial period for KW's research and KW's competitions mensuration, and mostly KW research to get new KW's for the websites I'm building, I used G KW planner(I don't know what's it name now) and after they update it, it becomes useless to me, all it results were piece of crap, like they make it useful for advertisers only .

Ahrefs is relatively relible.
You need to understand that the less searches a keyword has, the less updated their data about it will be.

It's a matter of cost/return.
It makes sense for them to put more effort on a 5k searches kwd than on a 10 searches one.
And that's true for all tools.

RoyDanino said:

It makes sense for them to put more effort on a 5k searches kwd than on a 10 searches one.

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In fact I filtered result for 1k KW's and up and showed me many 0 KD results which is weird

Ahref is good to get keyword ideas but I suggest that you better verify it with semrush. They are better when it comes to KD compared to rest including ahref.

They are currently giving free account with limited features (10 searches / day) untill 2022.

So my suggestion would be > explore keywords from ahref and select 10 ideas > get it verified in semrush.

https://lp.semrush.com/free-backlinks-tools_en.html
Here is the link to get free semrush trial account!

AHREFs KD is not reliable, however, it is indeed a great tool for everything else.

I also agree with others, semrush keyword difficulty is more reliable then ahrefs.

It is hard to say - for some reason i trust Ahrefs more.
Best is to analyze top 10 competitors backlink profiles, on-page SEO etc.
Of course competitors can have hidden PBNs.

Google Keyword Planner is very shitty tool - on all keywords i am searching i am getting this:

yes

Smeklinis said:

Google Keyword Planner is very shitty tool - on all keywords i am searching i am getting this:

Click to expand...

My first website I created in late 2013 was because of G keyword planner, without it I was lost in the dark,
But they changed drastically year after year becomes worst than ever, I don't remember it correctly but I think both Ahref's KW and Semrush were not support languages other than Eng and couple other, my language were not supported back than, but now both add it .

Well, as I can see there is 2 best option for what you need, ahrefs and semrush, you can try both and compare them and maybe they fill each other for the purpose that you need.

It depends

Currently, SEMrush has an edge over Ahrefs because they updated how the KD is calculated. Yet, it barely makes sense when you take a look at the SERP.

it's not something to fully rely on while trying to rank for specific keywords,
their data is purely based on off-page wise and has nothing to do with OBL, content, indexing, etc...
in other words, it's too limited and basic compared to google,
so you'll have to double-check most of the stuff manually to make sure you know what you're dealing with,
overall, it can be very useful only to filter initial data or to get some basic idea while making research, not to fully rely on

I would also check your competitor's domains with a hidden backlink checker to especially check for PBN links.