How the score works
It’s a heuristic: a fixed formula, shown in full, applied to numbers you enter. It isn’t measured data and it isn’t a Google or Ahrefs metric.
- Authority. The linking site’s Domain Rating divided by 100. DR is Ahrefs’ score of a whole domain’s backlink profile; look it up with the Domain Rating checker or type it in.
- Traffic. Monthly visits to the page carrying the link, on a log scale that tops out at 100,000 visits. Going from 100 to 1,000 visits counts as much as going from 10,000 to 100,000.
- Blend. 60% authority plus 40% traffic. Authority gets more weight because it’s the reason most people chase links; traffic keeps a busy page on a young site from scoring zero.
- Link attribute. A followed link keeps the full blend (× 1). nofollow and ugc keep × 0.25, sponsored × 0.15. Google treats these as hints, not blocks.
- Relevance. Same topic × 1, related × 0.6, unrelated × 0.25. A link from a page your buyers read matters more than a stronger one they never see.
The result runs from 0 to 100: under 15 is low, 15–34 modest, 35–59 good, 60 and up strong. Separately, the referral estimate multiplies page visits by the click share you enter.
Using it well
Score several options side by side: a directory listing, a guest post, a podcast show-notes link. The relative order is the useful part. Check the attribute on a real listing before you trust the dofollow setting; our directory database records it for each directory we’ve inspected.
Don’t buy links to move this number. Paid links that pass ranking value break Google’s spam policies, and the links that last are the ones people give because your product is worth mentioning. A free way to start is to launch on LaunchRanked: a permanent product page and a followed link after human review, no badge required.