Domain rating (DR)

Domain Rating (DR) is a search engine optimization (SEO) metric developed by Ahrefs that measures the overall strength and authority of a website’s backlink profile on a scale from 0 to 100. A higher DR indicates a stronger backlink profile, suggesting the site is more authoritative and more likely to rank well in search engines.

Although DR is not a Google ranking factor, it is widely used by marketers and SEO professionals as a benchmark for evaluating link-building opportunities, competitor strength, and overall domain authority in the marketplace.

Advanced

Domain Rating is calculated based on the quality and quantity of backlinks pointing to a website. Ahrefs assesses referring domains, their own DR scores, and the distribution of link equity to determine a site’s DR. Unlike simple link counts, DR places emphasis on unique, high-quality domains while discounting spammy or low-value links.

Advanced SEO strategies leverage DR to identify valuable partnerships, outreach targets, and competitor gaps. However, DR is proprietary to Ahrefs and differs from similar metrics like Moz’s Domain Authority (DA) or Majestic’s Trust Flow. Understanding these differences is important when analyzing data across multiple SEO platforms.

Relevance

• Provides an industry-recognized metric to evaluate backlink strength.
• Helps SEO professionals assess link-building opportunities.
• Assists in competitive analysis by comparing domain authority.
• Guides digital PR and outreach campaigns for higher impact.
• Useful for tracking improvements in a website’s backlink profile.
• Influences how marketers prioritize partnerships and collaborations.

Applications

• Analyzing competitor DR scores to evaluate SEO strength.
• Prioritizing outreach to websites with high DR for backlinks.
• Monitoring DR growth after a link-building campaign.
• Using DR as a benchmark to report SEO progress to stakeholders.
• Assessing risk by identifying low-DR or spammy referring domains.

Metrics

• Current DR score of the domain.
• Growth or decline of DR over time.
• Number of referring domains and their DR quality.
• Ratio of high-DR vs low-DR backlinks.
• Correlation between DR improvements and organic traffic growth.

Issues

• DR is a third-party metric, not used by search engines directly.
• Overemphasis on DR may distract from content quality and relevance.
• Scores may fluctuate due to changes in Ahrefs’ algorithms.
• Comparing DR with other platforms’ metrics may cause confusion.
• Sole reliance on DR can result in misguided SEO decisions.

Example

A digital marketing agency launched a link-building campaign targeting high-DR industry blogs. Over six months, the client’s DR increased from 30 to 50, which correlated with a noticeable rise in organic traffic and keyword rankings.