One of the most efficient approaches to link building is not starting from scratch — it is studying what is already working for your competitors and replicating their best opportunities. If a website has linked to your competitor, there is a reasonable chance they would link to you too, assuming your content is at least as good. Competitor backlink research converts this logic into a systematic acquisition strategy.
The even better news: you do not need an expensive subscription to do this research effectively. Several free tools provide enough backlink data to build a substantial link building pipeline.
Why Competitor Backlinks Are Valuable
When you research competitor backlinks, you are not just finding link opportunities — you are finding pre-qualified link opportunities. Each site that links to a competitor has already demonstrated willingness to link to content in your niche, relevant topical interest, and editorial standards compatible with your target domain. This dramatically reduces the time spent prospecting compared to cold outreach to unknown sites.
Additionally, understanding which backlinks are driving your competitors' rankings helps you prioritise your own acquisition efforts. If one competitor ranks significantly better than you and has links from ten high-authority domains you do not have, those ten domains become your primary targets.
Free Tools for Competitor Backlink Research
Ahrefs Free Webmaster Tools — Ahrefs offers free access to backlink data for sites you verify ownership of. While this does not let you see competitor data directly, it gives you complete data for your own site, which you can compare against competitor rankings to identify the gap.
Moz Link Explorer — provides limited free backlink lookups. The free tier allows ten queries per month, which is enough for targeted competitor research on your top two or three competitors.
Ubersuggest — Neil Patel's tool offers three free daily searches with backlink data including top linking domains, anchor text distribution, and new and lost links. Sufficient for regular competitor monitoring.
Google Search operators — search link:competitor.com in Google (though this is deprecated and returns limited results). More useful is site:linkingsitedomain.com competitor.com to find specific pages on a known site that link to your competitor.
Wayback Machine — use our Wayback URL extractor to see the historical link profile of competitor content. This reveals links that may no longer be visible in current backlink tools but can still be reached for outreach.
How to Turn Competitor Backlinks Into Your Own
The skyscraper approach. Find a piece of competitor content that has earned many backlinks. Create a demonstrably better version — more thorough, more up to date, better designed. Then reach out to the sites linking to the competitor version and show them your superior resource.
Broken link replacement. Use our broken link checker to scan competitor domains and identify their broken outbound links. When you find a broken link pointing to content similar to what you have published, contact the linking site, inform them of the broken link, and suggest your content as a replacement. This is the most efficient link building method available — you are solving a real problem for the site owner.
Direct outreach to shared link sources. Export competitor backlink data and identify sites that link to multiple competitors but not to you. These sites have demonstrated interest in your niche and linking behaviour — a personalised pitch showing them your relevant, high-quality content has a strong success rate.
What to Look for in Competitor Backlinks
Not all competitor backlinks are worth replicating. Focus on links from sites with genuine authority and topical relevance. As we covered in our guide to dofollow vs nofollow links, prioritise acquiring dofollow editorial links from relevant, authoritative sources. Ignore directory submissions, forum profiles, and low-quality link farms — these are not worth the effort to replicate.
Also check the anchor text your competitors receive using insights from our anchor text analyser. Understanding how authoritative sites reference your competitors gives you guidance on how to position your own content for link acquisition.
Summary
Competitor backlink research gives you a pre-qualified list of link opportunities from sites already active in your niche. Use free tools like Moz Link Explorer and Ubersuggest for direct competitor data, combine with broken link building using our site scanner, and prioritise dofollow editorial links from topically relevant domains. Systematic competitor backlink research is one of the most efficient link building strategies available regardless of your budget.
Missed the previous article? Read: What Are Long-Tail Keywords and How Do You Use Them?