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2026-10-27 01:48 Tool comparisons

Semrush vs Long Tail Pro (2027): Long Tail Pro Is Gone, So Is Semrush the Best Long-Tail Keyword Tool for Startups?

Semrush vs Long Tail Pro: Is Semrush the Best Long-Tail Keyword Tool for Startups Now?

Founders used to compare these two tools as "big suite vs cheap specialist": Semrush for keyword research, competitor data, audits and rank tracking in one place, and Long Tail Pro for finding long-tail keywords a small site can actually rank for. Long-tail phrases are still the best starting point for a young website, because they are specific, less competitive and close to what buyers type. But when we checked both tools in October 2026, only one of them still existed: Semrush had new plans, and longtailpro.com showed an unrelated company.
Quick answer: Long Tail Pro is gone, so the real choice in 2027 is between Semrush and a focused replacement. Choose Semrush if you want long-tail research plus rank tracking, site audits and competitor data; its paid plans start at €112.52 a month on annual billing (€134 monthly), with a 7-day free trial and a free plan of 10 reports a day. Choose KWFinder by Mangools if you only need what Long Tail Pro did, from €37.70 a month billed annually. On a zero budget, start with Semrush's free plan and Google Keyword Planner.
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Semrush vs Long Tail Pro at a Glance

SemrushLong Tail ProKWFinder (closest replacement)
StatusActive; an Adobe company since April 2026Website offline since March 2024; domain now shows an unrelated firmActive, part of the Mangools SEO package
PriceSEO €134, Starter €190, Pro+ €286 a month; up to 17% less on annual billing; Advanced on requestLast advertised at $59/month (archived homepage, February 2024)Basic €37.70, Premium €52.70, Agency €97.70 a month, billed annually
Free optionFree plan: 1 demo project, 10 reports a day; 7-day free trial of paid plansNoneFree account to try the tools; 48-hour money-back guarantee
Long-tail researchKeyword Magic Tool: 28B+ keywords, 142 regional databasesIts core feature, while it workedKeyword ideas by keyword or by competitor domain
Difficulty metricKeyword Difficulty (KD%, 0 to 100) and Personal Keyword Difficulty on paid plansKeyword Competitiveness (KC) scoreKeyword difficulty score
Rank trackingPosition Tracking: 500 keywords daily on SEO and StarterNo longer availableSERPWatcher: 200 keywords weekly on Basic, daily on Agency
AI search trackingFrom Starter: 50 prompts tracked dailyNo longer availableAI Search Watcher PRO included in the bundle
Sources: semrush.com/prices, the Semrush Knowledge Base, mangools.com/plans-and-pricing and the Internet Archive copy of longtailpro.com, checked 27 October 2026. Prices were shown in euros from Europe.

The Tools Compared

Semrush: All-in-One SEO With a Long-Tail Workflow Built In

Semrush is a full search marketing platform: keyword research, competitor analysis, Position Tracking, Site Audit, backlink analysis and, since its newest plans, tracking of how your brand shows up in AI answers. Adobe completed its acquisition of Semrush on 28 April 2026, and Semrush's customer FAQ says there are no immediate changes to existing accounts, features or billing. For long-tail research, the parts that matter are the Keyword Magic Tool and Keyword Difficulty.
  • SEO plan, €134 a month (€112.52 billed annually): 5 websites, 500 keywords tracked daily, basic keyword research and competitor analysis, Position Tracking and Site Audit.
  • Starter, €190 a month (€158.40 annually): the full keyword research and optimisation tools, competitor insights and MCP access, plus AI Visibility: 50 prompts tracked daily and 300 AI visibility reports a day.
  • Pro+, €286 a month (€238 annually): 15 websites, 1,500 tracked keywords, historical data, content optimisation, keyword cannibalisation analysis and multi-location tracking.
  • Advanced and Enterprise: custom prices. Advanced covers 40+ websites and 5,000+ tracked keywords, with API data integration and team users. Extra users are an add-on from €43 a month.
  • Free: a free plan with no credit card (1 demo project, 10 reports a day across the main tools) and a 7-day free trial of the paid plans. Details on the Semrush pricing page.
Best for: founders who want keyword research, rank tracking, audits and competitor data in one account, and who will use it every week. Our Semrush pricing guide and free Semrush tools guide cover the plans and free options in more depth.
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How Semrush Handles Long-Tail Keywords

Long Tail Pro's whole job was to find specific phrases with low competition. In Semrush, that job is split between two features.
  • Keyword Magic Tool: you enter one seed phrase and get a table of related keywords, grouped into topic subgroups, with a questions-only filter for question keywords. Semrush says the Keyword Magic Tool draws on more than 28 billion keywords across 142 regional databases, and the Keyword Strategy Builder turns a list into topic clusters for a content plan.
  • Keyword Difficulty (KD%): a score from 0 to 100 for how hard it is to reach Google's top 10. Semrush's Knowledge Base groups it as 0 to 14 very easy, 15 to 29 easy, 30 to 49 possible, 50 to 69 difficult, 70 to 84 hard and 85 to 100 very hard. It is based on the referring domains, follow-link ratio and authority of the ranking pages, plus the keyword's search results features.
  • Personal Keyword Difficulty (PKD): an AI-powered score for how hard a keyword is for your own domain. Like Potential Traffic and exports, it is not available on the free plan.
  • Free plan limits: according to the Keyword Magic Tool help page, accounts without the SEO toolkit get 10 reports a day, 10 results per report and no export. Paid tiers get thousands of reports a day and tens of thousands of results per report (the help page still uses the older Pro, Guru and Business plan names).
  • No account at all: Semrush's free keyword tool shows a limited number of broad-match ideas with volume, keyword difficulty, intent and CPC without signing up.
Our guide to Semrush keyword research walks through the reports step by step, and the free keyword difficulty checkers list shows how KD compares across tools.

Long Tail Pro: What Happened to It?

Long Tail Pro was a keyword tool built around one idea: find long-tail keywords a small site can rank for, scored with its own Keyword Competitiveness (KC) metric. In its last archived version it also listed SERP analysis, a rank tracker, backlink analysis and a site audit, with the "full toolkit" advertised at $59 a month (Internet Archive copy, February 2024).
  • March 2024: the Internet Archive starts recording server errors (Cloudflare error 522) instead of the Long Tail Pro homepage.
  • From May 2025: longtailpro.com shows the website of an unrelated insurance claims investigation firm.
  • 27 October 2026: we checked again. longtailpro.com still shows that firm, the www address redirects to the firm's own domain, and app.longtailpro.com does not respond.
We found no official shutdown notice and could not confirm who owns the product today. There is no working way to sign up, pay or log in, so Long Tail Pro is not an option in 2027. Old tips for it, such as our Long Tail Pro tips, now work best as a checklist for any long-tail tool. If an old Long Tail Pro subscription is still being charged to your card, ask your card provider to stop the payment.

KWFinder: The Closest Replacement for Long Tail Pro

KWFinder by Mangools is the tool most like Long Tail Pro. Its homepage promises to find long-tail keywords with low SEO difficulty, and you can search by keyword or by a competitor's domain. It is sold as a bundle with SERPChecker, SERPWatcher (rank tracking), LinkMiner (backlinks), SiteProfiler and AI Search Watcher.
  • Basic, €37.70 a month billed annually (€452.40 a year): 100 keyword lookups per 24 hours, 200 keyword suggestions per search, 200 tracked keywords updated weekly.
  • Premium, €52.70 a month: 500 lookups per 24 hours, unlimited suggestions, 700 tracked keywords, 3 extra seats.
  • Agency, €97.70 a month: 1,200 lookups per 24 hours, 1,500 tracked keywords updated daily, 5 extra seats.
  • Also: API and MCP access and AI Search Watcher PRO (500 monitored prompts) on every plan, a free account to try the tools, and a full refund within 48 hours of payment. See the Mangools pricing page.
Best for: founders and solo marketers who only need long-tail keyword research and a light rank tracker. We compare the two directly in Semrush vs KWFinder.
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Discontinued and Changed Since the Old Version of This Guide

  • Long Tail Pro: no longer available (website offline since March 2024, domain now used by an unrelated company). We removed it as a recommendation and added KWFinder as the replacement.
  • Semrush plans: the plans are now called SEO, Starter, Pro+ and Advanced, with AI search tracking from Starter up, and Semrush is now part of Adobe.
  • Removed claims: the old "Semrush ranked highest among small businesses" claim and the third-party "learn more" links had no official source, so we took them out.
The same change from other sides: Ahrefs vs Long Tail Pro and Moz vs Long Tail Pro.

Semrush or a Long Tail Pro Replacement: Which Should You Choose?

  • You have no budget yet: Semrush's free plan (10 reports a day) or its no-account keyword tool for ideas, plus Google Keyword Planner for volume ranges. See Keyword Tool vs Keyword Planner for the free options.
  • You only need long-tail keyword research: KWFinder Basic, the closest thing to what Long Tail Pro used to be, at about a third of Semrush's entry price.
  • You want one tool for keywords, rank tracking and audits: Semrush's SEO plan; run the 7-day free trial on a real project first.
  • You also want to see whether ChatGPT and other AI tools mention you: Semrush Starter or higher, or the AI Search Watcher in the Mangools bundle.
  • You prefer Ahrefs' data: Ahrefs Starter costs $29 a month; our Ahrefs alternatives and free Ahrefs alternatives lists compare the rest of the market.
  • You are weighing other suites: see Moz vs SE Ranking and Ahrefs vs Semrush.

How to Find Long-Tail Keywords in Semrush

  1. Start on the free plan. Ten reports a day is enough to test a handful of seed phrases before you pay.
  2. Run the Keyword Magic Tool. Use the words customers use in interviews and support emails as seeds, then open the questions filter and the topic groups. Our 10 steps to find long-tail keywords go deeper.
  3. Filter by KD%. Keep phrases in the very easy and easy bands (0 to 29%) that still have search volume. Google Keyword Planner is a free cross-check for volume.
  4. Check who ranks. If page one shows forums, thin pages or small sites, a new site can compete.
  5. Publish and track. Write one page per topic, add the keywords to Position Tracking, and watch which queries bring impressions in Search Console. Our long-tail SEO guide explains how to group topics.

How Founders Use Long-Tail Keywords

Long-tail research doubles as a cheap market test: if nobody searches for the problem you solve, that is worth knowing before you build. If people do search, each long-tail phrase can become an article, and the F/MS AI SEO Tool turns a keyword into a full article written to rank on Google and to be cited by ChatGPT and Perplexity, with human editors checking it. For competitor research and keyword clustering beyond Semrush, see SpyFu vs Keyword Insights, and for daily rank tracking, Ahrefs vs Wincher.
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FAQ: Semrush vs Long Tail Pro

Is Long Tail Pro still available?

No. Its website stopped working in March 2024 according to the Internet Archive, and in October 2026 longtailpro.com showed an unrelated company. There is no way to sign up or log in.

Is Semrush a good replacement for Long Tail Pro?

Yes, if you also want rank tracking, audits and competitor data. The Keyword Magic Tool plus the KD% filter does what Long Tail Pro did, inside a bigger and more expensive suite.

How much does Semrush cost?

When we checked from Europe, the SEO plan cost €134 a month, Starter €190 and Pro+ €286, or up to 17% less on annual billing (€112.52, €158.40 and €238 a month). Advanced and Enterprise are priced on request.

Can I use Semrush for free?

Yes. The free plan needs no credit card and gives 1 demo project and 10 reports a day; in the Keyword Magic Tool that means 10 results per report and no export. Paid plans also have a 7-day free trial.

What is a good Keyword Difficulty score in Semrush?

For a new site, aim for 0 to 29%, which Semrush calls very easy or easy. Scores of 50% and above usually need strong backlinks.

Where can I submit a guest post about my startup?

You can publish a guest post in one of the Fe/male Switch startup blogs, which rank in Google and in AI tools like ChatGPT and Perplexity. Get a quality backlink.

What is the closest tool to Long Tail Pro?

KWFinder by Mangools: a focused long-tail keyword finder with a difficulty score, from €37.70 a month billed annually, with a free account and a 48-hour refund window.

Did Adobe buy Semrush?

Yes. Adobe completed the acquisition on 28 April 2026. Semrush told customers there would be no immediate changes to their accounts, features or billing.

Which tool is better for a brand-new website?

Start free with Semrush's free plan, Google Keyword Planner and Search Console. Pay for KWFinder or a Semrush plan once you publish every week.

Can I use AI to write SEO articles from long-tail keywords?

Yes. The F/MS AI SEO Tool writes articles from your keywords that are built to rank on Google and in AI assistants, with human editors reviewing them.

About the Author

Violetta Bonenkamp, also known as MeanCEO, is an experienced startup founder with an impressive educational background including an MBA and four other higher education degrees. She has over 20 years of work experience across multiple countries, including 5 years as a solopreneur and serial entrepreneur. Throughout her startup experience she has applied for multiple startup grants at the EU level, in the Netherlands and Malta, and her startups received quite a few of those. She’s been living, studying and working in many countries around the globe and her extensive multicultural experience has influenced her immensely.