What is Domain Rating (DR)?
Domain Rating (DR) a metric created by Ahrefs and it developed to represent a websites strength of its backlink profile on a logarithmic scale from 0 to 100, with 100 being to strongest.
This is similar to SEMrush’s AS (Authority Score) & Moz’s DA (Domain Authority) metrics developed to represent similar metrics.
Ahrefs DR is often used by SEO professionals for competitor analysis, link opportunities, and website authority within SERPs.
There have been several studies on these metrics and DR being a key focus – displaying a strong correlation to the higher a website’s DR, the more likely the website will rank for a higher quantity of keywords – therefore increasing organic traffic through to the website.
How does Domain Rating scale?
The key part for how DR scales is in the term “logarithmic” – this means that the increase required to move from DR10 to DR11 is far less that trying to increase from DR70 to DR71.
Simply put… The higher your DR, the harder it is to increase.
How do you increase your Domain Rating (DR)?
Ahrefs doesn’t disclose the domain rating formula, yet they have outlined some key factors that influence the number;
- Number of domains linking to your website
- The DR of these linking domains – The higher a linking domain’s DR, the more “DR” it passes onto your website.
- The number of domains the linking domains are linking too – If you are receiving a link from a DR 50 website that out links to 1m sites… this will provide little “pass-through” in authority… whereas receiving a link from a DR 40 with that links to only 100 sites may have more impact on your DR.
