Desktop SEO Spider for deep site-wide crawls · Pricing: $259 / yr (single seat)
Screaming Frog and SEO Score API both touch SEO, but they are different shapes of product. Screaming Frog is a Desktop application (Windows / Mac / Linux); SEO Score API is a hosted REST API that returns a scored audit as JSON in about two seconds. This page is an honest side-by-side — including when you should pick Screaming Frog over us.
| Feature | Screaming Frog | SEO Score API |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | $259 / yr per seat | $0 free, $5+ / mo |
| Shape | Desktop crawler | Hosted REST API |
| Best at | Deep site-wide crawl | Single URL or batch on-demand audits |
| Run in CI/CD | Limited (CLI mode, manual setup) | GitHub Action ships ready to use |
| Run from a script | CLI flag, single OS at a time | Any language with HTTP |
| AI readability score | No | Yes |
| Schema validation | Yes | Yes |
| Lighthouse / Core Web Vitals | Limited | Performance checks included |
| Multi-site monitoring | Manual re-runs | Scheduled monitors with alerts |
| Cloud-hosted | No | Yes |
Not in one call. SEO Score API audits a single URL per call (or many in a batch). For full-site crawls of 10k+ pages, Screaming Frog is the better tool. Many teams use both: Frog for periodic deep crawls, SEO Score API for automated per-URL checks in CI.
Yes — we publish a GitHub Action and Python/Node SDKs. Screaming Frog has a CLI mode but it requires installing the desktop app on your runner.
We run a focused product (on-demand audits via API) and don't pay for desktop UI, support staff for non-developers, or bundled features. Different scope, different price.
Frog exports CSV/Excel and has scheduled exports, but it isn't an API. You can't `curl` it. SEO Score API is JSON-first.
Run an audit in your terminal in 30 seconds.