181,132,097 domains in the index
Domain rating checker with a reference for every term
Type a domain, get its 0-100 DR and referring-domain count. Every number then links to a short entry saying what it means, how it is computed and where it stops being reliable.
- Free lookup, no key and no card
- DR formula published in full
- One short entry per term and API field
$ curl "https://rankupedia.com/api.php?q=nytimes.com&action=overview&key=sk_live_..."
Who it is for
What a domain rating checker returns, entry by entry
A domain rating checker returns one integer between 0 and 100. That integer is derived from a single input: the number of distinct domains that link to the target.
The formula is public. DR equals round(100 times the natural log of referring domains plus one, divided by the natural log of twenty million). A site with 1,000 referring domains lands on 41, and one with 1,000,000 lands on 82. The scale is logarithmic, so early links move the number far more than late ones.
Rankupedia is organised like a small encyclopaedia. Each page defines one cluster of terms. That is deliberate. Claims stay inside what our own crawler and our own link index can show, and the formula entry is the best starting point.
Entries carry a date. When Google changes how it treats links, as it did with the September 2019 introduction of rel=sponsored and rel=ugc, the entry says so.
Who it is for
Reading the result the lookup returns
A lookup gives two numbers that belong together. Read them in the order they were built, because the score depends on the count.
Every result belongs to a snapshot date, even when the page does not print one. Keep that in mind when you compare two results.
The referring-domain count comes first
The count is the input, and the score is computed from it. A DR figure without its count is hard to check, so read the count before the score.
Say a hypothetical lookup returns 340 referring domains. The score is 35, and a reader can reproduce that with the arithmetic in the formula entry.
The score comes next
DR is a 0 to 100 integer on a log scale. Early links move it more than late ones, so a young site can climb quickly while a large one seems stuck.
Compare scores only inside one tool and one date. Other vendors publish their own figures, and those are not interchangeable with ours.
The date sits behind both
The index refreshes roughly once a month, so each result is a snapshot. A link added last week may not be in it yet.
Keep the date with any figure you copy. That way a later check will not look like a contradiction.
How it works
Looking up a term or a domain
Run the free lookup
Enter a domain in the box above. The call uses the free domain action, so no key is needed.
Find the field in the reference
The API field entry names each parameter and the two fields present in every authenticated response.
- domains in our link graph
- 181,132,097
- domain-to-domain links
- 2,774,625,913
- backlinks indexed
- ~798.5 billion
- free credit on sign-up, no card
- $100
Compare
Four metrics that sound alike
| Name | Published by | Scale | What it is not |
|---|---|---|---|
| DR (this site) | Rankupedia | 0-100, log of referring domains | Not Ahrefs DR and not Moz DA |
| Domain Rating | Ahrefs | 0-100 | Not a Google signal |
| Domain Authority | Moz | 1-100 | Not a Google signal |
| Authority Score | Semrush | 0-100 | Not comparable to DR |
What it is for
Where the reference is used
Readers arrive with one narrow question. Four entries cover most of them.
Reading a vendor report
A client sends a PDF full of abbreviations. The glossary defines each one in a line or two.
Writing an integration
Parameters, sort order and pagination limits are tabulated in the field entry.
Settling an argument
Whether DA matters to Google has a myth-and-reality entry.
Budgeting a run
One credit costs $0.0001. A table of actions shows what a 10,000-domain screen costs.
Who it is for
What a lookup can and cannot tell you
A domain rating checker answers one kind of question well. It cannot answer the others, and the reference says so on each entry.
The questions it answers
Whether a site has linking domains in our index, and roughly how many. That breadth question is what the score is built to measure.
How a score moved between two lookups, provided both results carry dates and counts.
The questions it leaves open
Whether a link will help a ranking, or whether a page deserves a place in results. Those depend on content and relevance, which a link count cannot see.
Whether a paid placement is worth its price. Read the donor page as a reader would, since no score replaces that reading.
Keyword volume and daily rank changes. For those, the fuller tools are the better fit.
Scope of this reference
Exact about links, silent about the rest
Everything here concerns link data. Keyword research, position monitoring and a crawl refreshed every day are outside it; for those, pay Ahrefs or Semrush.
- Index refreshed roughly once a month
- DR is our own metric
- No entry predicts a ranking
FAQ
Questions the reference is asked most
What is a domain rating checker and what does it measure?
It is a lookup that converts the count of referring domains into a 0-100 score. Ours uses a published log formula, so you can reproduce any result by hand. It measures link breadth, not content quality, traffic or the chance of ranking.
Is there a free DR checker without sign-up?
Yes. The box at the top calls the free domain action and needs no key. The overview, stats and suggest actions are also free. Calls that list rows, such as backlinks or anchors, cost credits.
Why does my score differ from Ahrefs or Moz?
Each vendor crawls its own web and uses its own formula. Ours is derived only from referring-domain count, while Ahrefs and Moz keep their methods private. Expect the same rough order of magnitude and different exact numbers.
How often does the data change?
About monthly. A link won last week may be missing, and a dead one may linger. Looking daily mostly shows the same snapshot, so a monthly rhythm is the honest one.
What does the API cost per call?
One credit is $0.0001. Free actions cost nothing, bulk_dr costs 1 credit for up to 2,000 domains, listing actions cost 2, and search or keyword cost 3. See the cost table for all of them.
Does Google use domain rating?
No. Google has said publicly that it does not use third-party scores such as Domain Authority, and DR is the same kind of thing. It is a convenient proxy for link breadth and nothing more.
