Rank Math vs Yoast SEO: Which plugin is best

In travel blogging, where every moment is a potential story, time is often scarce. Content creators are all too familiar with the grind of juggling writing, photography, social media, and sharing their adventures. This relentless pace can lead to major stress just trying to stay on top of it all. And don’t get us started with understanding the ins and outs of search engine optimization (SEO). It’s important, but sometimes it can be hard to implement. This is where WordPress plugins, especially SEO plugins, are absolute lifesavers.

What is an SEO plugin?

An SEO plugin is essential for optimizing WordPress websites and blog articles. It addresses the technical and content-related aspects required to improve search engine rankings. At its core, an SEO plugin helps in:

• Keyword optimization: It guides content creators on where and how to use relevant keywords within their posts and pages, enhancing their visibility for those terms in search engine results.
• Metadata management: The plugin simplifies editing meta titles and descriptions, which are critical for click-through rates from search results. It ensures these elements are optimized for both search engines and potential readers.
• Content analysis: By evaluating readability and content structure, it helps make the text more user-friendly, potentially reducing bounce rates and improving the time spent on the site.
• Sitemap creation: Automatically generates and updates XML sitemaps, making it easier for search engines to crawl and index the website’s content efficiently.
• Social media integration: Facilitates the integration of social metadata to improve how content is shared and presented on social platforms.
• Technical SEO improvements: Some plugins offer solutions for more technical aspects of SEO, such as creating proper canonical tags to avoid duplicate content issues, managing 301 redirects, and optimizing site speed.

By streamlining these processes, an SEO plugin removes the complexity of site optimization, eliminating the guesswork needed to get your article on the first page of Google.

Overview of the best WordPress plugins for SEO

Now that we’ve covered the importance of SEO plugins, you’re probably wondering which plugin is best. There are two that stand out when it comes to optimizing WordPress sites for search engines: Rank Math and Yoast SEO. 

Both plugins are beloved in the digital marketing community for their features that streamline SEO tasks, making it easier for website owners to optimize their content and improve their search engine rankings.

So, without further ado, Yoast vs Rank Math – which takes the cake? Let’s take a look.

Rank Math

Rank Math comes from the team behind MyThemeShop, a renowned WordPress theme and plugin provider. According to WordPress.org, the plugin boasts over a million active installations, a testament to its growing popularity and effectiveness. 

Rank Math is admired for its comprehensive suite of features, which includes: 

• Advanced analytics with Google Search Console integration
• Over 840 supported schema types
• Sitemap and image SEO automation
• A user-friendly interface to suit both beginners and experts
• Local SEO 
• Robust support for WooCommerce sites.

Rank Math’s user-friendly interface and deep customization options make it a powerful tool for optimizing WordPress content​​​​.

Yoast SEO

Yoast SEO, developed by Joost de Valk and his team, is trusted in the WordPress community and recognized for its solid SEO tools and user-centric design. Like Rank Math, Yoast SEO is widely used, with millions of downloads, indicating its reliability and effectiveness in the SEO space.

Yoast is known for its comprehensive set of features, which includes:

• Detailed readability analysis for content optimization
• Intuitive traffic light system for on-page SEO status
• Comprehensive SEO and content analysis tools
• Robust XML sitemap functionality.
• Long-standing reputation and wide user base

Yoast is known for its focus on sustainable SEO practices, ensuring that websites remain optimized according to the latest standards.

Rank Math vs Yoast: A comparison

Below, you will find a detailed comparison of the most important features that Rank Math and Yoast SEO offer to their audiences. We’llgo through keyword and content optimization, structured data, statistics, and more.

Keyword optimization

Yoast SEO’s free version helps optimize your content for a single focus keyword or keyphrase per page or post, emphasizing the importance of using that keyword naturally within the content, title, meta description, and URL. 

Yoast provides real-time feedback on keyword distribution, suggesting improvements to ensure the keyword is adequately represented throughout the content. You’ll need to upgrade to the premium version for more comprehensive keyword optimization, such as targeting multiple keywords.

Yoast’s plugin also has SEMrush integration, which suggests ideas for additional keywords from the SEMrush database. 

Rank Math, on the other hand, takes a more than generous approach in its free version, allowing users to optimize their content for up to five focus keywords. This capability enables a more nuanced and comprehensive optimization strategy, targeting a broader range of keywords and phrases without any additional cost. On top of that,Rank Math will provide detailed suggestions on improving keyword usage across various content elements, enhancing the potential for higher search engine rankings.

🏆 Winner: Both 

Both Rank Math and Yoast support keyword optimization. Rank Math allows optimizing content for more keywords without needing a premium upgrade. It stands out as the clear winner in keyword optimization. Although Yoast isn’t bad at all and offers several keyword optimization tools. 

Content optimization 

Yoast SEO excels in content optimization through its advanced readability analysis. It uses the Flesch-Kincaid Reading Ease test, among other metrics, to evaluate the readability of the content, offering a separate readability score from the overall SEO score. 

This differentiation allows users to focus on improving content readability, which is crucial for user engagement and SEO. Yoast provides actionable advice on sentence length, passive voice usage, transition words, and more, making it a robust tool for enhancing content quality. 

Furthermore, Yoast’s inclusive language feature analyzes content for inclusivity across various dimensions to add another layer of content optimization. Plus, Yoast SEO is functional in 17 different languages. 

Rank Math integrates content optimization into its overall SEO analysis, providing a score encompassing both SEO and readability factors. While it offers suggestions for improving content’s SEO aspects, its readability analysis is not as detailed as Yoast’s. 

Rank Math focuses more on keyword usage, meta information, and technical SEO settings, providing a holistic view of content optimization but with less emphasis on the readability and stylistic aspects of the content.

🏆 Winner: Yoast SEO

Yoast SEO is the top contender when it comes down to content optimization for its detailed readability analysis, separate readability scoring, and actionable insights to improve content quality and user experience.

Structured data

Structured data is a piece of code in a specific format that helps Google and other search engines understand your page. It provides insights into both the content and context of the page and increases your chances of getting rich results. Both Rank Math and Yoast do the technical side of the job for you – they scan your articles and automatically add structured data for headlines, images, and more.

Rank Math offers quite a few options for free. You can create SEO titles,meta descriptions, and templates, customize your XML sitemap, set up schema markup for the whole website, connect Google Search Console to submit sitemaps automatically, and more. The difference with Yoast is that the latter creates structured data as a single graph rather than blocks of data and offers many features only as a part of the premium plan. 

🏆 Winner: Rank Math

Although both plugins automatically generate structured data for your website, Rank Math offers more tools for free and supports a wide range of scheme types. In its Pro version, you can even create your own scheme templates, which is a helpful feature for advanced users.

Images SEO

Rank Math has a wide range of both free and paid image SEO tools. With a free plan, you can add missing alt and title attributes to help search engines understand your content. With Rank Math Pro, you will be able to add missing image caption and description, as well as change casing for alt and title attributes, captions, and descriptions.

The freeYoast SEO plugin will require you to manually write out and optimize your titles and descriptions, while its premium plan uses Yoast AI to generate meta content automatically.

🏆 Winner: Rank Math

Although both plugins have basic features when it comes to image optimization, Rank Math is slightly more advanced and provides more features for free. However, you may still want to install an additional plugin to automate image optimization.

Analyses and statistics

Both Rank Math and Yoast SEO plugins allow you to track keywords and their performance and carry out SEO checks with Google Search Console integration. The difference lies in how the plugins evaluate the content. While Rank Math calculates the overall SEO score for your page, Yoast highlights the readability score for your page separately from the overall score and shares tips to improve the content. Thus, Yoast analyzes the length of your sentences, the use of transition words, passive voice, and more. Its additional “Inclusive language” feature helps analyze for seven factors, such as age, gender, disability, etc. to make sure your text is inclusive. Rank Math is more vague in this regard and sends the user to a general article in its knowledgebase. 

However, Rank Math has a number of other good features. For example, its “Index Status” allows you to check the pages that are indexed in Google and whether they are marked as mobile-friendly. It also allows you to integrate Search Console for free in contrast to Yoast.

🏆 Winner: Yoast SEO

If you want to increase your text readability directly in a WordPress editor, Yoast will highlight areas to work on and share tips on how to improve your content. It also helps you improve on your use of inclusive language.

Other SEO tools

Both plugins allow you to create 301 and 302 redirects, get internal link suggestions, and support WooCommerce SEO. However, unlike Yoast, Rank Math offers all these for free.

When it comes to global SEO settings, Rank Math supports more content types and site builders (including global SEO for widgets and templates). Yoast offers global SEO for home page, posts and pages. It also supports a limited number of rich snippets. 

Rank Math provides an impressive suite of options for users seeking deeper SEO analysis and a broader range of tools without upgrading to a higher plan. For example, you can monitor 404 pages and set one free location to boost your local SEO. Its paid subscription allows you to integrate Google Trends, Google Video, and News SEO sitemap, set multiple locations for local SEO, access your Google AdSense earning history, and more. In Yoast SEO, these extensions are only available as add-ons.

For its extensive list of free features and greater customization options, Rank Math is the one to choose for users looking for comprehensive SEO tools at no additional cost. 

AI features 

Yoast SEO has introduced AI features to some extent, like the beta version of its AI content analysis tool for generating optimized titles and meta descriptions. This addition aims to streamline the optimization process, although its AI capabilities are still in the early stages and are more limited in scope.

Conversely, Rank Math extensively embraces AI technology with its Content AI feature. This feature assists users in optimizing content for SEO by providing suggestions on focus keywords, content length, and other essential elements. This tool is part of Rank Math’s premium offering, emphasizing its commitment to integrating advanced technology for content optimization. 

Although this is a premium feature, if you sign up with Rank Math, you are offered a couple of credits for free to try it out.

🏆 Winner: Rank Math

Rank Math takes the lead in AI features with its more developed and integrated Content AI tool, offering users advanced assistance in content optimization.

Pricing 

Yoast SEO’s free version covers the basics of SEO. Its premium version, priced at $99/year per site, offers advanced features like multiple keyword optimization and internal link suggestions. You can access all the features with the All Yoast plugins plan for $299/year.

Rank Math sets itself apart with a highly competitive pricing model. Its free version includes many features that Yoast reserves for its premium users. The Pro version of Rank Math costs as low as $4.92/month when billed annually and covers unlimited personal sites. It offers a broader set of features than Yoast’s premium version, making it a more budget-friendly option for users managing multiple sites or seeking extensive SEO tools. To track more keywords and manage customers’ websites, you can upgrade to the Business or Agency plans.

🏆 Winner: Rank Math

Rank Math offers a more affordable solution with its lower pricing for the premium version and a broader range of features available for free, presenting better value for users at different levels of SEO expertise.

Comparative table

Yoast vs. Rank Math: Which should you use?

So, we’ve now broken down each plugin, but you may still be left unsure about what to do with all this information. Not to worry; let’s break it down even further. If either of the two descriptions below better describes your strategy, then that plugin is probably the one for you: : 

✅ Who is Yoast tailored to?

Choose Yoast SEO if content quality and readability are important to your SEO strategy. It’s ideal for those valuing a plugin with a long-standing reputation and focusing on user-friendly insights for optimizing content. Yoast’s detailed readability analysis and its structured approach to SEO make it suitable for beginners and those willing to invest in premium features for comprehensive management across various SEO needs. 

Additional benefits are access to courses from the Yoast SEO Academy and the plugin’s localization covering 17 languages. On top of that, it offers great integration options, since many themes and plugins are already adapted to Yoast due to its long-standing presence. However, most of these features are only available in the premium plan, while the free basic plugin is rather limited and may be better suited for beginners.

✅ Who would benefit more from Rank Math?

Opt for Rank Math if you’re looking for extensive SEO tools and features without the premium price tag. It’s perfect for users who need to integrate advanced options like keyword rank tracking and schema markup right out of the box. With its modular design and competitive pricing for premium versions, Rank Math caters to novice and experienced users looking for a customizable and budget-friendly SEO solution. It is also known for its extensive global SEO options and additional free features, such as WooCommerce, available as a premium option in Yoast.

The verdict from travel bloggers: insights and experiences

But what do the travel bloggers and content creators themselves have to say? What tool are they using, and which one do they love the best? Well, RankMath is a clear winner, although some people still prefer Yoast. 

Louise Joy, Formidable Joy:

“I’ve just started using RankMath for my new niche travel website. I’ve been using Yoast for so long on my main blog, so I thought it would be interesting to try a different tool with this one. I’m still getting used to using it, but I’m struggling to get a good score via RankMath. Posts that were previously optimised perfectly according to Yoast (I started off with Yoast on this site before swapping to RankMath) are now low score.

The main issues I’ve found is the tool not recognising when I use my keyword(s)/keyphrtases in headers, even when I am. It also gives me a low score for keyword dentisity, but in my eyes, if I add the keyword anymore, I’ll definitely be keyword stuffing.

I’m also getting a low score for not including my exact keyphrase in the URL, but I’ve always been taught to omit filler words like ‘and’, ‘at’ etc in the URL.

And, finally, it penalises me for not using the exact keyphrase or keywords in my image alt text either. But also, with my own knowledge of SEO, I know that alt text is there to describe the image for visually impaired users, not as a way to include keywords (unless you can do it naturally, of course).

So in this case, I’ve struggled to understand the best practice. I do know that SEO tools are only supposed to be used as a general guide and that for factors like keyword dentisty, they will literally count keyword use based on text length and not take into account things like keyword stuffing or how natural the text sounds. But I’m also really keen to get a high/green score for consistency, if even so I can scroll through my posts at a glance and recognise which ones need further work.”

Lena Mrowka, Not Another Backpacker:

“I have used both tools for different clients and I like Rank Math more. Particularly, because you can enter up to five keywords in the free version vs you can only enter one keyword to focus on in Yoast’s free version. If you want to try it out, you can install Rank Math (before deleting Yoast). There is a way to transfer all data from Yoast automatically to Rank Math, so that your keywords, slugs, meta descriptions, etc. from Yoast are saved. Another reason I can think of why I prefer Rank Math over Yoast is keyword stuffing. I feel like Yoast overoptimizes for keywords and I feel more inclined to keyword stuff when I use Yoast than when using Rank Math.”

Marya Sutimi, BeauTraveler:

“I switched to RankMath at some point, I’ve lost a lot of posts that ranked well when I used Yoast. And I find Yoast performs better for search engines other than Google. Back then I occasionally got traffic from Bing etc. Never had it since I started using RankMath. I don’t switch back just because I have no time to set up everything again. I think compared to Yoast, RankMath has a better user-friendly interface and experience, which makes it look pretty seamless. I think in terms of user experience, I like RankMath better.”

Final thoughts: Rank Math vs. Yoast

In the debate surrounding Rank Math vs Yoast SEO, the ultimate choice heavily depends on your specific SEO requirements and preferences, which highlights the importance of research, knowledge, and the details of each plugin’s modules.

Yoast SEO is known for its user-friendly interface, content analysis, and readability scoring. It’s ideal for those who place a high value on content quality and user experience, emphasizing the importance of security and the promotion of registered content. Thanks to its long-standing history, Yoast SEO is compatible with many themes and plugins.

On the other hand, Rank Math has a comprehensive set of advanced SEO features at no extra cost, making it appealing to users who would prefer not to to invest heavily in SEO and instead rely on free platforms. 

Deciding between Yoast SEO and Rank Math doesn’t have to be an either/or proposition; it’s about aligning the plugin’s capabilities with your SEO strategy’s goals. Whether you value detailed content analysis and readability insights or require a broad spectrum of SEO tools on a budget, both plugins offer great advantages to enhance your site’s search engine visibility.

So, what’s your preferred plugin? Are you #TeamRankMath or #TeamYoast?