How Many Backlinks Do You Need to Rank? Real Numbers
- No universal number exists. Yours is whatever the pages already ranking for your keyword have, and on easy searches that is small: the eight regular results for “how many backlinks do i need to rank” have between 0 and 24 linking sites each.
- Count sites, not links. Submitator.com has 118,886 backlinks, and they come from 886 sites. The 886 is the number to compare.
- Only followed links count toward Domain Rating. One of our sites has 692 linking sites and sits at DR 18. Another has 335 and sits at DR 47.
- Roughly, on our own sites: about 400 to 500 linking sites came with DR 33 and 34, and about 850 with DR 38 and 40. That is our experience, not a rule.
- On a badge directory, the badge decides whether you keep the link: take it off your site and the followed link can go with it. Submitator installs those badges and keeps them live.
Nobody can give you one number of backlinks that ranks a page, and the reason is useful: the number is set by the pages you have to beat and by which of your links actually count. Both can be measured. We run six sites of our own (Submitator, ShareSpeak, IndexMachine, Solvitor, AffyList and AlterBase) and read 175 directories from our catalog in Ahrefs alongside them, so the numbers below are ours, including the ones that break the usual rules of thumb.
Your number is on page one
Google ranks pages, and links point at pages, so the count that matters is the one on the pages ranking for your keyword. SEO tools call it referring domains: the number of different sites linking to a page, however many links each of them sends. We pulled page one of Google US for six searches with the referring domains of every ranking page, starting with the question you probably typed to get here.
Referring domains on page one, six searches
| Search | Pages counted | Fewest | Median | Most | Lowest-DR result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| “how many backlinks do i need to rank” | 8 | 0 | 4.5 | 24 | #10: DR 34, 0 domains |
| “directory submission service” | 8 | 0 | 4 | 19 | #2: DR 11, 5 domains |
| “product hunt alternatives” | 8 | 0 | 1.5 | 14 | #4: DR 22, 0 domains |
| “saas directories” | 5 | 0 | 1 | 4 | #3: DR 4, 1 domain |
| “dr checker” | 8 | 2 | 59.5 | 440 | #3: DR 37, 2 domains |
| “startup directories” | 8 | 6 | 57.5 | 2,185 | #6: DR 6, 655 domains |
Ahrefs SERP overview, Google US, read 23 October 2026. Regular results only: the AI Overview, People also ask, discussions and sitelinks are left out. Referring domains are Ahrefs' count for the ranking URL itself, and DR is the ranking site's. Results Ahrefs had no count for are left out of the counts: a Quora page on directory submission service; a Reddit thread, a LinkedIn post, an AppSumo page and one blog post on saas directories. The median of an even number of pages is the average of the middle two.
On four of the six searches the median result has fewer than five referring domains. For the question this post answers, the result at #10 has none at all, on a DR 34 site. Page one is often cheap.
The table also shows the two ways a page gets there. A strong domain carries a weak page: the Reddit thread at #2 for that same question has one referring domain on a DR 95 site, and the YouTube video at #5 has one too. A strong page carries a weak domain: for “startup directories”, a DR 6 site ranks #6 with 655 referring domains to its home page, one place below a page with six on a DR 73 site.
Ahrefs says as much about its own two ratings, one per page and one per domain: “Note that while DR correlates with Google rankings pretty well, it doesn't do this as well as our URL Rating (UR).” So compare pages first. The domain still matters, because it carries every page you have not built links to yet, and Ahrefs' glossary ties it to reach: “Our study found a correlation between the DR of the website and the number of keywords it ranks for.” Every followed link to any page of your site counts toward the domain.
How to find the number for your keyword
- 1
Search your keyword
Use a private window, set to the country you sell in, and write down the ten regular results. Leave out the ads, the AI Overview and the People also ask box.
- 2
Count each page's referring domains
Put each ranking URL, not just its domain, into a backlink checker and write down referring domains, not backlinks. Ahrefs' free backlink checker shows the count for any URL.
- 3
Note the DR of each site
Use our free tool to check your Domain Rating and each competitor's. A DR 90 site can hold a place with a page that has one referring domain; a weak site gets there on the page's own links.
- 4
Find the weakest page you can replace
The page with the fewest referring domains on a site no stronger than yours is your floor. The median of page one is the target to plan around.
- 5
Count only the links that pass something
A nofollow link passes no Domain Rating by Ahrefs' own rule, so the sites that matter are the ones sending a followed link. The next sections are about exactly that.
Count sites, not backlinks
A backlink is one link. A referring domain is one site, whether it links to you once or thirty thousand times, and the two numbers can sit miles apart. Submitator.com has 118,886 live backlinks from 886 referring domains, and one site alone sends it 29,843 followed links while counting once. AlterBase, the alternatives directory we own, has 165,845 backlinks from 335 domains. Sitewide links in a footer or a sidebar inflate the first number and leave the second alone, which is why every comparison in this post is in referring domains.
What our six sites show
| Our site | DR | Referring domains | Ever recorded | Followed, of the strongest 100 | DR 50+ and followed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Submitator | 40 | 886 | 1,010 | 40 | 29 |
| AffyList | 38 | 836 | 1,018 | 7 | 7 |
| Solvitor | 18 | 692 | 880 | 4 | 3 |
| ShareSpeak | 34 | 504 | 612 | 59 | 43 |
| IndexMachine | 33 | 391 | 467 | 43 | 30 |
| AlterBase | 47 | 335 | 449 | 47 | 5 |
Ahrefs, 22 October 2026: Domain Rating, live referring domains and all-time referring domains (ever recorded), subdomains included. The last two columns read each site's 100 strongest live referring domains by DR as Ahrefs listed them on 23 October 2026; a domain counts as followed when Ahrefs records at least one dofollow link from it. All six sites are ours.
Sort our sites by referring domains and DR does not follow. Four of them do line up with a rough ladder: IndexMachine at 391 and ShareSpeak at 504 sit at DR 33 and 34, AffyList at 836 and Submitator at 886 at DR 38 and 40. On those four, about 400 to 500 referring domains went with the low 30s and about 850 with roughly DR 40. None of our sites has 1,000 live referring domains, so that is where our own ladder stops.
The other two break it in opposite directions. Solvitor has 692 referring domains and DR 18. Of its 100 strongest, four send a followed link, and 88 of the rest are machine-named .store and .shop sites (seo-high-ranking.shop and thebacklinks.shop are two of them) that Ahrefs rates DR 47 to 54 and that send no followed link at all. AlterBase has fewer than half that count, 335, and sits at DR 47, with 47 of its 100 strongest linking to it with a followed link.
The same glossary states the rule in five words: “Nofollow links don’t pass DR.” A referring domain that links to you nofollow adds one to your count and nothing to your rating, however high its own DR.
AffyList keeps this honest. Its strongest 100 look like Solvitor's, with 83 of the same kind of .store and .shop sites and seven followed links, and it still sits at DR 38, 20 points higher. Two sites with a similar count and a similar mess at the top land 20 points apart, so a target count cannot tell you which of the two you will be. Only the followed links, and who sends them, can.
What 175 directories show
Directories are the other set we can read side by side: the directories in our catalog, each with its DR and referring domains for the same day as our own sites.
Referring domains by DR, 175 directories
| Domain Rating | Directories | Median referring domains | Middle half |
|---|---|---|---|
| DR 0 to 9 | 14 | 687 | 554 to 909 |
| DR 10 to 19 | 27 | 755 | 543 to 1,008 |
| DR 20 to 29 | 20 | 1,082 | 850 to 1,270 |
| DR 30 to 39 | 25 | 964 | 679 to 1,319 |
| DR 40 to 49 | 24 | 1,039 | 907 to 1,197 |
| DR 50 to 59 | 17 | 1,010 | 935 to 1,610 |
| DR 60 to 69 | 16 | 1,625 | 1,261 to 4,051 |
| DR 70 to 79 | 22 | 2,489 | 2,109 to 4,939 |
| DR 80 and up | 10 | 10,062 | 5,691 to 21,536 |
Ahrefs, 22 October 2026, for the 183 directories we do not own in our catalog export of 18 October 2026; the five added in the export of 23 October are not in it. Two returned no data, and six that sit on a subdomain are left out because their DR belongs to the parent domain while the count is the subdomain's, which leaves 175. Medians are rounded to the nearest domain; the middle half runs from the 25th to the 75th percentile.
From DR 20 to DR 59 the median barely moves: 1,082, 964, 1,039 and 1,010. About a thousand referring domains can be almost any DR: the 36 directories with between 900 and 1,100 run from DR 2 to DR 73. And 10 of the 41 under DR 20 have more referring domains than the median directory at DR 50 to 59. The count only starts to separate sites from DR 60, where the medians climb to 1,625, 2,489 and then 10,062 for the 10 at DR 80 and up.
Directories are an unusual crowd, since many of the products they list link back to them, often through a badge, so read this as a picture of directories rather than of every website. It says the same thing as our six sites, though: a target like “1,000 referring domains for DR 50” means little when 1,000 is the typical count in the DR 20s and in the DR 50s alike.
Why a badge decides whether you keep the link
Now look at where the followed links on our sites come from. On four of the six, half or more of the followed links among the 100 strongest referring domains are directories in our catalog that we do not own: 35 of 59 for ShareSpeak, 28 of 43 for IndexMachine, 5 of 7 for AffyList and 2 of 4 for Solvitor. Submitator is close behind at 18 of 40, and AlterBase, a directory itself, gets 5 of its 47 that way. Startup Fame, Twelve Tools, Findly, Turbo0 and DailyPings send a followed link to Submitator, ShareSpeak and IndexMachine alike, and each of them asks for its badge or a link back in return for a free listing.
Those links come with a condition. Of the followed links above, 9 of Submitator's, 15 of ShareSpeak's and 14 of IndexMachine's come from directories whose listing requires a badge or a link back, and on a badge directory the link stays followed for as long as the badge stays on your site. Startup Fame switches off a free listing once the badge is gone, and DailyPings looks for its badge every day. A redesign or a new footer that drops the badge takes the link with it. What each kind of free listing asks of you is in our post on free directories.
Links also disappear for ordinary reasons: pages get deleted and sites lapse. Ahrefs has recorded 1,010 sites linking to submitator.com at some point, and 886 still do. Across our six sites, between 12 and 25 percent of the referring domains Ahrefs ever recorded are gone. The number you need is a number you keep, not one you reach once.
Keeping badges live is the part Submitator takes off your hands. We install one badge component on your site that loads whichever badge each directory requires, and we keep every one of those badges live, so a redesign does not quietly cost you the listing. No commit per directory and no thirty snippets to babysit.
So how many backlinks do you need?
As many referring domains as the pages you want to beat have, counted per page and from sites that send a followed link. Then keep them. On four of our six sites, half or more of the followed links among the strongest come from directories in our catalog, and every one of them counts toward the domain that carries your other pages.
Our where-to-submit page lists every directory in our catalog, 160+ of them, with its Domain Rating, link type and badge. Submitator submits to the ones you pick: we write a description for each directory, install the badges and keep them live. Most directories are delivered in 24 to 48 hours, every directory within 21 days at most.
30 directories for $29
Picked by you from 160+, badges placed and kept live. 60 for $49, 100 for $79, one-time.
FAQ
How many backlinks do I need to rank on the first page?
As many referring domains as the pages already there, counted for the ranking page itself and from sites that send a followed link. On easy searches that is small: for “how many backlinks do i need to rank”, five of the eight regular results on page one have fewer than 10 referring domains, and the one at #10 has none.
Are backlinks and referring domains the same thing?
No. A backlink is one link and a referring domain is one site, however many links it sends. Submitator.com has 118,886 live backlinks from 886 referring domains, and one site alone sends 29,843 of them. Compare referring domains.
How many backlinks should I build per month?
There is no monthly quota to hit, so plan in links you keep. Between 12 and 25 percent of the referring domains Ahrefs ever recorded for each of our six sites are gone, so part of every new month only replaces what was lost. A badge directory's link lasts as long as its badge does.
How many backlinks is good for a new website?
Enough to match the weakest page ranking for the first keywords you want, which can be a handful. For scale, our own six sites have 335 to 886 referring domains at DR 18 to 47, and the directories in our catalog between DR 20 and DR 59 have a median of about 1,000.
Why can a site with fewer referring domains have a higher DR?
Because DR counts only followed links and weighs the sites that send them. AlterBase has 335 referring domains and DR 47, with 47 of its 100 strongest sending a followed link. Solvitor has 692 and DR 18, with four. Ahrefs puts it in one line: “Nofollow links don’t pass DR.”
Do spammy backlinks count toward the number?
In the count, yes. In the rating, only if they send a followed link. Of Solvitor's 100 strongest referring domains, 88 are machine-named .store and .shop sites, and none of them sends a followed link. They make 692 look healthy and pass nothing, which is why a raw count says so little.
Keep reading
One listing for $49, or 30 directories for $29
There's An AI For That charges $49 for one listing. Submitator is $29 for 30 directories you pick and $79 for 100, one-time, with every badge kept live.