---
title: "Domain Rating"
url: https://marketingsignals.com/glossary/domain-rating
type: Page
---

# Domain Rating

Domain Rating and Domain Authority explained: how Ahrefs and Moz calculate them, why neither is a Google metric and how to use them to judge prospects.

Link building glossary

## Domain Rating (DR)

Domain Rating (DR) is Ahrefs' score from 0 to 100 for the strength of a website's backlink profile compared with other sites in its index. Moz's Domain Authority (DA) is a similar score from 1 to 100. Both are third-party estimates built from link data, not metrics Google uses.

## How is Domain Rating calculated?

Ahrefs says DR looks at the quantity and quality of domains linking to a whole website. Each linking domain splits its own rating equally among the domains it links to, so a DR 10 site that links to three domains can raise your DR more than a DR 80 site that links to a million. The result is scaled into a 0 to 100 range.

Because the score is relative, DR can fall without a site losing any links, if other sites gain links faster. Ahrefs says DR correlates with Google rankings, but less well than its page-level URL Rating.

## How is Domain Authority different?

Moz describes Domain Authority as a score that predicts how likely a site is to rank compared with competitors, calculated from its Link Explorer index using dozens of factors. Moz states it is not a direct ranking factor and recommends using it for benchmarking against sites in the same niche.

## How should DR and DA be used?

Google says it does not evaluate or endorse third-party SEO tools, and that these tools have no access to its internal ranking data. DR and DA are useful for comparing sites and shortlisting link prospects, not as targets in themselves.

Since both scores are calculated from links, they can be pushed up by links built only to raise the score. We treat a high DR with little or no organic traffic as a warning sign. Ahrefs makes the same point: never judge a site on site-wide authority alone, and check its traffic, topical relevance and how many sites it links out to.

## Example

A restaurant booking platform has two prospects: a DR 72 general news site that publishes hundreds of sponsored posts a month and links out to thousands of domains, and a DR 41 trade magazine for UK hospitality operators with steady organic traffic. The trade magazine is usually the better link, despite the lower score.

## Related terms

- [Referring domains](https://marketingsignals.com/glossary/referring-domains)
- [Backlinks](https://marketingsignals.com/glossary/backlinks)
- [Link spam](https://marketingsignals.com/glossary/link-spam)
- [Link building](https://marketingsignals.com/glossary/link-building)

## Further reading

- [Link Building for SaaS: 20 Strategies That Work](https://marketingsignals.com/insights/saas-link-building-guide)

Our [SaaS Link-Building Agency](https://marketingsignals.com/service/saas-link-building) service puts this into practice for brands in the UK and US.

## Sources

- [What is Domain Rating (DR)?, Ahrefs Help Center](https://help.ahrefs.com/en/articles/1409408-what-is-domain-rating-dr)
- [What is Domain Authority?, Moz](https://moz.com/learn/seo/domain-authority)
- [Do you need an SEO?, Google Search Central](https://developers.google.com/search/docs/fundamentals/do-i-need-seo)

## Ready To Build Links That Actually Rank?