A free Semrush account lets you track the Google rankings of 10 keywords for one website. We set up a Position Tracking campaign on a real site, wrote down every screen, and then checked each limit against Semrush’s own documentation. Here’s what the setup looks like, what the free account can and can’t track, and what AI engine tracking really costs.
What This Semrush Position Tracking Guide Covers
Semrush Position Tracking checks where your pages rank for a fixed list of keywords, and Semrush says it “monitors your website’s search rankings daily for specific keywords” (Semrush Position Tracking). This guide covers the free setup, the options Semrush documents, the update schedule, the reports and the limits of each plan.
We’re an independent site that tests creator tools on free plans and no-card trials. For this guide we set up Position Tracking for a small marketing website our own team runs, on a free account, on October 21, 2026.
One thing up front: our campaign had not returned a ranking when we wrote our test log. So this guide covers setup, settings and limits, not ranking accuracy. Where we rely on Semrush’s documentation instead of our own screens, we say so.
Why a separate guide for one tool? Because Position Tracking is where most people first meet Semrush’s AI search options, and the engine menu makes it easy to assume more than a free account includes. For the wider picture of the free account, see our review of what a free Semrush account gets you.
Key Takeaways
Without the SEO Toolkit, Semrush Position Tracking covers 10 keywords across 1 website (Semrush Position Tracking). Our free setup confirmed that cap on screen, and the engine menu listed ChatGPT and Gemini next to Google. Tracking prompts in those AI engines is a separate paid product, so a free account is a Google rank tracker for a short keyword list.
Quick Verdict: Is Free Semrush Position Tracking Worth Setting Up?
Yes, if you want daily Google positions for a handful of money keywords on one site: the free account allows 10 keywords and 1 website, and setup took us two wizard steps. No, if you need many keywords, several sites or AI answer tracking, because those need a paid toolkit (Semrush Position Tracking).
| What we found | |
|---|---|
| Best for | One small site and its 10 most important keywords |
| What we set up | Google, Desktop, United States, English, one keyword |
| Free cap seen on screen | “Keyword limit 1/10” |
| AI engines in the menu | ChatGPT and Gemini, next to Google |
| Not tested by us | Ranking results, accuracy, AI engine tracking, competitors |
Is 10 keywords enough to learn anything? For a new site, it is. Pick the keywords tied to sign-ups or sales, not the broad terms you hope to rank for someday.
How We Set Up Position Tracking on a Free Account
We opened Position Tracking on October 21, 2026, chose Set up tracking, and finished a two-step wizard: Targeting, then Keywords. In Targeting we picked Google, Desktop, United States and English. The engine list offered Google, ChatGPT and Gemini, with more options below.
The Keywords step had two tabs, “Only Keywords” and “Tagged Keywords,” plus an “Import from…” button and an “Add common tag” link. We typed one English keyword and added it to the campaign. The counter read “Keyword limit 1/10,” and the keyword row said “Waiting for start.”
One box was already ticked: “Send me weekly ranking updates via email.” Leave it on if you want a weekly summary in your inbox; untick it if you already check the dashboard.
After we pressed Start Tracking, the campaign header showed “United States (Google) • English,” “Updated: 0 hours ago” and “Keywords: 1.” The main panel said “Gathering keywords data: 0/1.” What surprised us was the tip under the progress bar: “Viewing rankings for www.Domain.com won’t show ranking for blog.Domain.com.” If your blog lives on a subdomain, set the scope with that in mind.
Why only one keyword? One was enough to see every setup screen and the cap counter, without spending the free allowance. Here’s what we did not do: add competitors, connect Google Search Console, import keywords, or come back to read a ranking. Every number in this section comes from our setup screens and masked screenshots.
Every Setup Option Semrush Documents
Semrush’s setup guide lists five search engines, three devices and locations down to ZIP code, with root domain as the default scope (Configuring Position Tracking). We only used the first row of each choice, so the table below comes from that guide.
| Setting | Options Semrush lists | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Scope | Root domain (default), subdomain, URL, subfolder | Root domain is the recommended choice |
| Search engine | Google, Bing, Baidu, ChatGPT, Google AI Mode | Baidu is national and desktop only |
| Device | Desktop, mobile phone, tablet | We picked Desktop |
| Location | Country, state or region, city, ZIP code | Local or national search volume, switchable later |
| Local pack | Your business name, written exactly as it appears publicly | Optional |
| Keyword sources | Typed list, .txt or .csv file, another campaign, Organic Positions, Keyword Magic Tool, Keyword Strategy Builder, Google Analytics, Google Search Console | A CSV only reads the first column |
| Tags | One common tag for all, or one tag per keyword | Tags group keywords in reports |
The one setting you can’t undo is the starting point. Semrush says that after setup “it’s impossible to change the original location or device type” (Semrush). You can swap the campaign for a new one, but that erases its ranking history. Adding a separate target keeps the history.
So which choice deserves the most thought? Location. Search results change by city and even by ZIP code, so set it to where your customers search, not where you sit. Our local rank tracker guide goes further on city-level tracking.
ChatGPT and Gemini in the Engine Menu: What a Free Account Can Track
A free account can show ChatGPT and Gemini in the engine menu, but tracking prompts in ChatGPT Search, Google AI Mode or Gemini requires a subscription to the AI Visibility Toolkit (Prompt Tracking on Semrush). Semrush lists that toolkit at $99 per month with 25 prompts, and says it “does not offer a free trial” (AI Visibility Toolkit).
In our own setup, we tracked Google only. We saw the AI options in the menu, but we never selected them, so we can’t tell you what a free account shows if you pick one. Treat the menu as a signpost to a paid feature, not as free AI rank tracking.
How do prompts differ from keywords? A keyword is a short search phrase, like the one we tracked. A prompt is the longer question someone types into an AI assistant. Semrush counts the two separately: Semrush One Starter lists 500 keywords with daily tracking and 50 prompts, Pro+ lists 100 prompts and Advanced lists 200 (Semrush).
Why does any of this matter for plain Google tracking? Because AI answers now sit on top of many results. Pew Research Center found that Google users who saw an AI summary clicked a traditional result in 8% of visits, against 15% when no summary appeared (Pew Research Center, 2025). Position Tracking flags SERP features for your keywords, AI Overviews included (Semrush Position Tracking), which helps explain a traffic drop when your position didn’t move.
If tracking AI answers is your main goal, compare dedicated tools first. Our comparison of Otterly.AI and Writesonic ran the same prompts through both, and our AI search visibility tools guide covers the wider field.
How Often Rankings Update and How Long History Lasts
Semrush says Position Tracking data is “generally updated daily within 24-48 hours,” and that updates “cannot be scheduled manually” (Semrush). There’s no fixed hour, so one day’s update can land at a different time than the next.
History follows a two-speed rule. Semrush keeps daily results for 60 days, then shows weekly data points, captured on Wednesdays by default, for 140 weeks (Semrush Position Tracking). History starts on the day you create the campaign, so the best time to start tracking a keyword is before you need the trend.
How long until the first numbers show up? Semrush says a new campaign needs “up to an hour to gather data” (Semrush). Our screen still read “Gathering keywords data: 0/1” when we wrote our log, and we didn’t go back to check, so we can’t confirm the timing. If you still see nothing later, Semrush suggests checking the scope first: a subdomain or URL scope can miss rankings that the root domain holds.
Why doesn’t the tracker match what you see in Google? Semrush’s answer: “Position Tracking shows unbiased SERP results, while Google shows personalized SERP results,” and your own location and browser settings shift what you see (Semrush). Search Console differs again, because it averages real searches. To cross-check, here is how to check keyword rankings in Google Search Console.
Visibility, Estimated Traffic and Average Position: Reading the Reports
The Overview report charts three numbers over time: Visibility, Estimated Traffic and Average Position (Position Tracking Overview). We had no data to read yet, so this section explains how Semrush defines each one.
Visibility is the headline metric. Semrush says Visibility % “is based on the click-through rate (CTR) that shows a website’s progress in Google’s top 100” for your tracked keywords, and it reaches 100% when you rank first for every keyword (What is Visibility %?). Semrush’s own example shows why it beats average position: a site ranking 1st and 100th and a site ranking 50th twice share an average of 50, but the first site has far higher visibility. So which number should you watch first? Visibility, because it rewards top positions the way clicks do.
Average Position has a catch of its own. For any keyword where you don’t rank, Semrush counts the position as 100. A new site with a few unranked keywords will see a high average that says more about missing pages than about weak ones.
Estimated Traffic is a daily estimate of visits “based on the domain or URL’s current positions.” The Rankings Overview table adds a column per competitor, an Intent column and the SERP features found for each keyword. You can attach up to 20 competitors to one campaign and chart 5 domains at a time, your own included.
Semrush Rank is a different number
People who search “what is Semrush Rank” often expect a Position Tracking metric. It isn’t one. Semrush Rank is “Semrush’s proprietary ranking of domains” with the highest organic visibility, based on estimated monthly organic traffic, and “a lower rank number indicates a larger online presence” (Semrush Rank). It ranks whole domains against each other, while Position Tracking follows your own keyword list.
Free vs Paid Position Tracking Limits
A free account tracks 10 keywords on 1 website, while the paid SEO Toolkit tiers go up to 5,000 keywords across 40 websites (Semrush Position Tracking). Here are the limits Semrush lists for each tier:
| Tier | Keywords | Websites | Multitargeting | Competitors in total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Without SEO Toolkit (free) | 10 | 1 | No | 20 |
| Pro SEO Toolkit | 500 | 5 | No | 100 |
| Guru SEO Toolkit | 1,500 | 15 | 10 targets per campaign | 3,000 |
| Business SEO Toolkit | 5,000 | 40 | 5,000 targets per campaign | 4 million |
Multitargeting means tracking the same keywords for more than one device, location, engine or language inside one campaign. Each keyword on each target counts toward your keyword limit. Semrush also lists the Tags, Cannibalization and Devices & Locations reports for the Guru and Business tiers, and scheduled CSV and Excel exports for Business.
What do the paid plans cost? Our in-app subscription page listed Starter at $199/month and Pro+ at $299/month, and the signup flow pushed a 7-day Pro+ trial first, with a smaller “Skip trial” button for the free path. For how those plan names map to the toolkit tiers above, see our Semrush pricing guide.
What We Could Not Test on a Free Account
Five parts of Position Tracking stayed out of reach in our single free setup: a ranking result, accuracy, AI engine tracking, competitors and multitargeting. Multitargeting needs the Guru or Business tier (Semrush), and AI prompts need the paid AI Visibility Toolkit.
- A ranking result. Our campaign was still gathering data when we wrote the log, so we report no position, Visibility or traffic figure.
- Accuracy. Without a result, we have nothing to compare with Search Console.
- AI engines. We saw ChatGPT and Gemini in the menu but tracked Google only.
- Competitors, imports and the Search Console connection. We kept this round to one typed keyword.
- Multitargeting and the Guru-level reports. Both need a paid tier, and our rule is no card, no paid plan.
Why list the gaps? Because a guide that guesses reads the same as one that checked. When we go back for the first ranking, we’ll add it here.
Who Should Use Semrush Position Tracking
Use the free Position Tracking if you run one site and want daily Google positions for up to 10 keywords at no cost. Look elsewhere if you need hundreds of keywords, several client sites or AI answer tracking on a budget. This section is our judgment, based on the setup and limits in this guide.
Here’s how we’d sort readers:
- Bloggers and solo creators: track the 10 keywords tied to your best pages and check the weekly email.
- Small businesses: set the location to your customers’ city before you add a single keyword.
- Freelancers with clients: the 1-website cap rules out tracking more than one client site on a free account.
- Teams focused on AI answers: budget for the AI Visibility Toolkit or a dedicated AI visibility tool.
Position Tracking works best next to Site Audit on the same project. Our Semrush Site Audit review shows what a free audit found on the same site, and fixing those issues is what you’d hope to see in your rankings. If you’re still choosing a tracker, our best rank tracker software comparison sets up Semrush next to SE Ranking, Mangools and Ubersuggest, and the free rank tracker tools guide compares free caps. Need a one-off check instead? Try our website rank checker guide.
Further Reading
- Semrush Site Audit review: what a free audit found
- Semrush SEO tools review: what a free account gets you
- Best keyword rank tracker software: 4 trackers set up
References
- Semrush Knowledge Base: What is Position Tracking?
- Semrush Knowledge Base: Configuring Position Tracking
- Semrush Knowledge Base: How do I change the device and location in Position Tracking?
- Semrush Knowledge Base: How often does Semrush update its Position Tracking data?
- Semrush Knowledge Base: Why is Position Tracking not showing any rankings?
- Semrush Knowledge Base: Why are my Position Tracking results different in Google?
- Semrush Knowledge Base: Position Tracking Overview
- Semrush Knowledge Base: What is Visibility %?
- Semrush Knowledge Base: Prompt Tracking on Semrush
- Semrush Knowledge Base: AI Visibility Toolkit
- Semrush Knowledge Base: Semrush Rank
- Pew Research Center: Google users are less likely to click on links when an AI summary appears in the results