DR 79, and the Link Is Nofollow. Submit Anyway, for the Other Reason.
Written by Submitator. Index is one of the directories we file customers to, so we have a reason to like it, and we are telling you the unflattering half anyway because you would find it in ten seconds. Every number below is measured from their live listings, and the method is in the footnote.
Index is a startup and SaaS directory built by the developers at Dodo Payments and hosted on their subdomain, which is where the 79 Ahrefs Domain Rating comes from. It holds 1,041 tool pages, 230 alternatives pages and a facet system deeper than anything else in this catalog. Listing is free, there is no badge and no account.
And the link it gives you is nofollowed. We sampled 80 of those tool pages and read every outbound anchor: 878 links, 876 of them carrying rel="noopener nofollow". On 79 of the 80 listings, the anchor pointing at the listed product is one of them.
A Domain Rating of 79 next to a nofollowed link tells you how strong their domain is. It tells you nothing about what your link is worth, because a nofollowed anchor passes no equity at all. So do not put this one in the column where you count backlinks. Put it in the column where you count places your product is listed and found.
Index by Dodo Payments at a glance
| What you get | Index |
|---|---|
| Price | $0, no paid tier offered |
| The link | Nofollow, on 79 of 80 listings measured |
| Domain Rating | 79 (Ahrefs), inherited from dodopayments.com |
| Badge or account | Neither |
| Directory size | 1,041 tools, 230 alternatives pages |
| What it is good for | Referral traffic and alternatives pages |
| What it is not good for | Link equity |
| Filed for you by Submitator | Free listing, plus 29 more directories from $29 |
Per index.dodopayments.com, its submit page and its sitemaps, all read on 4 September 2026. Domain Rating is Ahrefs' figure via submitator.com/domain-rating-checker, which returned 79 for both dodopayments.com and the index subdomain; Domain Rating is a domain-level metric and is not a property of any individual link. Sitemap counts on the day: 1,041 tool pages, 230 alternatives, 91 categories, 331 tags, 55 industries and 12 payment stacks. The link finding is a sample, not a census: we drew a seeded random sample of 80 tool URLs, fetched every one successfully at 135-216 KB, parsed the HTML rather than pattern-matching it, and classified every outbound anchor by hostname without excluding any category of link. That produced 878 outbound anchors, of which 876 carried "noopener nofollow" and 2 carried "noopener", both on a single listing. On 79 of the 80 pages the anchor pointing at the listed product was nofollowed; outbound anchors also append a utm_source parameter identifying the index. Every page carried a canonical tag and none carried a robots noindex. We then re-fetched one listing with a Googlebot user agent and the markup was byte-for-byte comparable, with the same 11 of 14 external anchors nofollowed, so the rel is not being varied by user agent. We did not check the other 961 pages, and markup can change at any time. Form fields and the "Add a free listing" heading are read from the live submit page, whose only stated condition is "We only list high-quality tools that are useful for directory owners."; only name, email, tool name and website URL are marked required. Nothing behind the form was observed: no submission was made, so approval rates and turnaround are outside what we can report. Index is unrelated to DodoDirectory, a separate directory covered in its own guide. Submitator files customers to Index. Our plans are $29 for 30 directories, $49 for 60 and $79 for 100, one-time, chosen by you in the dashboard with each Domain Rating shown and nofollow marked where it applies, rejections credited back as +1 directory and a 30-day refund policy on the conditions in our terms.
How to submit to Index, step by step
- 1
Fill the four required fields, then keep going anyway
Only your name, your email, the tool name and the website URL are required. Everything else is optional, which is exactly the trap: the optional fields are the ones that put you on browsable pages. A listing with four fields filled in sits in one place. A listing with fifteen sits in a dozen.
- 2
Spend your effort on 'Alternative to'
This is the highest-value field on the form. They generate pages titled like "3 Best 1Password Alternatives in 2026", and the competitors you name here are how you appear on them. Name the products a buyer would actually be comparing you against, not aspirational ones, because a page listing you as an alternative to something you are not is worth nothing to either side.
- 3
Answer Payment Stack honestly
It is a facet no other directory has, and it exists because a payments company built this. If you take money through Stripe, Paddle, Lemon Squeezy or anything else on their list, say so. There are only twelve payment-stack pages, so each is small and easy to be visible on.
- 4
Tick open source if you are, and give the licence
There is a dedicated open-source flag, a GitHub URL field and a licence dropdown, plus a whole Open Source section in their navigation. If that is your product, this is a shortcut to a smaller pool with a more motivated audience.
- 5
Fill Company Stage, Monetization and Deployment
Each of these is its own browsable index. They take a second each and they are the difference between one entry point and several. Status is worth a moment too, since a directory that tracks whether products are still alive is unusually useful to the people browsing it.
- 6
Expect referral traffic, and measure it
Every outbound link they publish carries a utm_source parameter naming the index, so visits from here will show up cleanly in your analytics. That is the return on this listing. If it sends you nothing in three months, you have learned something a nofollowed link could never have told you.
Why we are telling you this
We file customers to Index and we could have written a page about a free DR 79 listing and stopped there. Plenty of directory round-ups do exactly that, because a big number next to a directory name is persuasive and almost nobody checks the rel attribute.
But the whole point of this catalog is that the numbers on it mean something. If we let a nofollowed link sit in the same column as a followed one because they share a Domain Rating, then every other number we print gets a little less trustworthy. So this one is marked nofollow on its card, and the guide leads with it.
What it is actually good for
Two things, and they are not small. The first is the alternatives pages. Two hundred and thirty of them, each targeting the phrase people search when they are already shopping and comparing. Being named on one of those is worth more attention than most founders give it, and the Alternative to field on the form is how you get there.
The second is that this is a genuinely well-built directory. Facets for payment stack, monetization, deployment, company stage, licence and product type, 91 categories and 331 tags, all browsable and all indexed. A tool listed properly here is reachable from a dozen directions, and the pages are crawled because the domain underneath them is strong.
It is free, it asks nothing of your site, and it takes one form. Judge it as distribution rather than as a backlink and it is an easy yes.
Not to be confused with DodoDirectory
Two different companies, similar names, opposite deals. DodoDirectory is a business directory whose free tier requires a badge on your site permanently and which delists you without warning if it comes down. Index is a side project by a payments company, asks for nothing, and nofollows its links.
One gives you equity for a badge. The other gives you traffic for a form. We have a separate guide for DodoDirectory if that is the one you meant.
Free here, and nofollow. $29 for thirty, with the rel checked on every one.
One payment, every directory named in your dashboard with its Domain Rating on the card, nofollow marked where it applies, and you tick the ones you want before anything is filed.
Index review: the short answer
Submit, and file it under distribution. Free, no badge, no account, a strong domain and the best-organised facet system of any directory we have written up. Fill the optional fields, especially Alternative to, because they are what the site is for.
Do not count it as a backlink. The link is nofollowed, the DR belongs to a payments company, and anyone selling you this listing on the strength of that 79 either has not checked or is hoping you will not.
Strong domain, nofollow link, free listing.
Index by Dodo Payments is DR 79 because it lives on a payments company's subdomain. We read 878 outbound links across 80 of its 1,041 tool pages and 876 were nofollowed, the product link among them. It is still free, badge-free, deeply faceted and home to 230 alternatives pages. Take it for the traffic, not the equity. The whole catalog.
FAQ
Is the Dodo Payments Index dofollow?
No. We sampled 80 of the 1,041 tool pages in their sitemap and read every outbound anchor: 878 links, of which 876 carry rel="noopener nofollow". The product link itself is nofollowed on 79 of the 80 listings. We re-fetched a listing with a Googlebot user agent and the markup was identical, so this is not something served only to ordinary visitors.
So what is the DR 79 worth?
It describes the domain, not your link. Index sits on a subdomain of dodopayments.com, a payments company, so it inherits a genuinely strong rating. None of that reaches your site through a nofollowed anchor. Treat the number as a signal that the pages get crawled and can rank, not as link equity you are receiving.
Is it still worth submitting to?
For most people, yes, on different grounds. It is free, takes one form, asks for no badge and no account, and puts you on a well-structured page that ranks. The outbound links carry a utm_source parameter, so referral traffic is the thing being measured and the thing to expect.
What is the Index alternatives feature?
Their strongest surface. They generate pages like “3 Best 1Password Alternatives in 2026”, 230 of them at the time of writing, each naming a lead alternative and listing others. The submission form has an “Alternative to” field, so the competitors you name are how you get onto those pages. Fill it in carefully, because the automatic matching is loose.
Is this the same as DodoDirectory?
No, and the names cause real confusion. DodoDirectory is a separate business directory that requires a badge on your site for its free tier. Index is run by Dodo Payments, a payments company, on the index.dodopayments.com subdomain, and asks for nothing in return. We have a separate guide for each.
What does the Index submission form ask for?
Your name and email, the tool name and website URL, and then a long list of optional facets: open source with a GitHub URL and licence, categories, industries, built with, payment stack, use case, product type, deployment, monetization, pricing model, company stage, status, alternatives, and Twitter, LinkedIn, Discord and YouTube links. Only the name, email, tool name and website URL are required.
Does the Dodo Payments Index cost anything?
No. The page is headed “Add a free listing” and there is no paid tier, no badge requirement and no account to create. Their one stated condition is editorial: “We only list high-quality tools that are useful for directory owners.”
How big is the Index directory?
1,041 tool pages, 230 alternatives pages, 91 categories, 331 tags, 55 industries and 12 payment stacks, counted from their own sitemaps. For a directory run as a side project by a payments company, that is a substantial, well-organised catalog.
More submit-to guides.
Thirty directories for $29, with the rel attribute checked on each.
One payment, each directory named with its Domain Rating on the card before you choose it, nofollow marked where it applies, badges installed and kept live where one is wanted, and a rejection swapped for another directory.