Is Google Search Console free to use?

Yes, Google Search Console is free. Google's help centre calls it a free service that helps you monitor, maintain and troubleshoot your site's presence in Google Search results. You need a Google account to use it, and Google says you do not need to understand HTML or coding. Google also encourages every site owner to use Search Console, because its data comes directly from Google Search.

Do I need Bing Webmaster Tools if I already use Google Search Console?

Yes, Bing Webmaster Tools is worth adding, and setup is short because Bing can import your sites from Google Search Console with no separate verification code. Microsoft describes its tools as free. Bing Webmaster Tools also keeps 16 months of search performance history, and its AI Performance report shows how often Microsoft Copilot and Bing's AI summaries cite your pages.

Which paid SEO tool does Google Search Console replace?

Google Search Console covers part of what businesses buy an SEO suite for: search data about their own website. On 27 September 2026, Semrush listed its SEO plan at $139 a month billed monthly, and Ahrefs listed Lite at $129 a month. Search Console gives Google's own figures at no cost, though only for sites you have verified, so a competitor's data needs another source.

How do I verify my website in Google Search Console?

To verify a website in Google Search Console, add a property and choose one of the methods Google offers: an HTML file upload, an HTML tag on the homepage, your Google Analytics tracking code, Google Tag Manager, or a DNS record at your domain name provider. A Domain property accepts the DNS record method. Platforms such as WordPress or Wix may offer a setting or plugin that verifies the site for you.

How long does Google Business Profile verification take?

Google Business Profile verification time depends on the method Google offers you. For postcards, Google says most codes arrive within 14 days and that codes expire after 30 days. After you complete any method, Google's review can take up to 5 business days. In some cases Google verifies a profile at once, for example when you have already verified your website in Google Search Console.

Is Google Business Profile free for a small business?

Yes, Google Business Profile is free. Google states that creating a Business Profile and listing your business on Google is free, and its help pages say you can add or claim your business at no charge. The profile controls how your hours, address, phone number, photos and reviews appear on Google Search and Maps, and Google lists keeping it up to date among the basics for its AI features.

How do I add Google Analytics to my website?

To add Google Analytics to a website, create an account and a property at analytics.google.com, then add a Web data stream with your site's address. Copy the Google tag ID, which starts with G-, into the Google Analytics field of your website builder, or paste the full Google tag into every page. Google says data collection may take up to 30 minutes to begin, and the Realtime report confirms it.

Is there a free tool that shows if AI answers cite my website?

Yes, Bing Webmaster Tools has a free report for this, called AI Performance, which Bing introduced on 10 February 2026 as a public preview. It shows how often your content is cited in Microsoft Copilot, AI-generated summaries in Bing and selected partner services, and which of your URLs are cited. For Google, traffic from AI Overviews and AI Mode appears in the Search Console Performance report.

Do I still need a paid SEO tool if I use the free ones?

A small business can start with the four free tools and add a paid SEO tool when a specific question needs it, such as data about a competitor's website, which Search Console does not show. Google says third-party tools have no access to its internal ranking data and cannot guarantee performance. For your own website, the free tools give the figures that come straight from Google and Microsoft.

The four free tools every small business website should have

Google and Microsoft give site owners, at no cost, the same type of search data that big companies buy software subscriptions for. Here is what each tool shows, which paid tool it partly covers, and how to set it up.

See if customers can find you

Four free tools cover the base of small business SEO. Google Search Console shows how your site appears in Google Search, Bing Webmaster Tools does the same for Bing and its AI answers, Google Business Profile controls your listing on Search and Maps, and Google Analytics shows what visitors do on your site. On 27 September 2026, Semrush's SEO plan listed at $139 a month.

Why a small business should start with the free tools

Let us begin with a fact that surprises many owners. Google says that it never accepts money to include or rank a site in its results, and that it costs nothing to appear in its organic results (the unpaid results). The data that shows how your site is doing in Google is also free, and it comes from Google itself, through a tool called Search Console. Google's guidance on third-party SEO tools says it strongly encourages every site owner to use Search Console, because its data comes directly from Google Search.

Big companies pay for software subscriptions on top of this, and Google, for its part, says that third-party tools have no access to its internal ranking data and cannot guarantee performance. For a small business with one website, the free tools give the figures that come straight from the search engines, and this is the right place to begin.

There are four such tools, and each one answers its own question, as the sections below explain. None of the four costs money, and Google's getting-started guide for Search Console says you do not need to understand HTML or coding to use it.

Google Search Console: how Google sees your website

Google's help centre describes Search Console as a free service that helps you monitor, maintain and troubleshoot your site's presence in Google Search results. In practice it does five jobs. It confirms that Google can find and read your pages. It shows which pages Google could not add to its index (the index is Google's stored copy of the pages it can show in results), and lets you ask Google to look at a page again after you fix it. It shows your search traffic. It sends you alerts when Google finds indexing, spam or other problems. And it shows which other websites link to yours.

The part owners use most is the Performance report. It shows clicks, impressions, click-through rate and average position, by default for the past three months. Google says that when your site appears in AI Overviews or AI Mode, that traffic is counted in the same report, under the Web search type. Our guide to checking results yourself explains how to read each number.

Which paid tool does it partly replace? SEO suites such as Semrush, whose SEO plan listed at $139 a month billed monthly on 27 September 2026, are one of the paid ways to follow a site's visibility in search. Search Console gives you Google's own figures for your own site, at no cost. Its limit is clear: it shows data only for websites you have verified as yours, so any question about a competitor's website needs another source.

Its indexing reports also cover part of the work of a crawler, a program that visits every page of a site and lists problems. Screaming Frog's SEO Spider is one: free up to 500 URLs, then £199 per user per year.

Bing Webmaster Tools: Microsoft's search engine and its AI answers

Bing Webmaster Tools deserves its place on this list, and setup is short, because Bing can copy your sites from Search Console in a few steps. Microsoft says the tool is free to start and describes its SEO and GEO tools as free. (GEO is the work that helps a website appear as a source in answers written by AI assistants.) Like Search Console, it shows how your site performs in search, and since October 2024 its Search Performance feature keeps 16 months of history, so you can compare a season with the same season one year before.

The newer part is called AI Performance. Bing announced it on 10 February 2026 as a public preview. It shows how your content appears across Microsoft Copilot, the AI-generated summaries in Bing and selected partner services, how often your pages are cited as sources in those answers, and which of your URLs are cited. For a small business this is a free first look at whether AI answers name its pages. Traffic from Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode, as we saw above, is counted in Search Console.

Paid tools sell visibility data of this kind too. On 27 September 2026, Semrush listed its Starter plan, sold as SEO + AI Search, at $199 a month billed monthly. Moz listed Moz Pro Medium, which it describes as including AI Search and GEO tools, at $179 a month paid monthly. Profound published no price for its brand plans, beyond a free trial and a custom-priced Enterprise plan.

In Licheo's retired audit tool, 50 of the 66 websites checked between 30 December 2025 and 27 August 2026 showed no Bing Webmaster Tools verification. Those were the sites that visitors (and our own team, when testing) chose to type into the tool, so the figure describes that group of 66 sites alone.

Google Business Profile: your business on Search and Maps

For a business that serves customers in a place, the Business Profile is the listing that shows your hours, phone number, address, photos and reviews on Google Search and Google Maps. Google states that creating a Business Profile and listing your business on Google is free. Google also names keeping your Business Profile information up to date among the SEO basics that still matter for its AI features.

To edit your profile, you must verify it, which means proving to Google that you run the business. Google chooses which verification methods you are offered, based on your business type, public information, region and business hours. The options include a phone call or text message, email, a live video call and a postcard by mail. Google says most postcard codes arrive within 14 days and that the codes expire after 30 days, and that its review of a verification can take up to 5 business days. In some cases Google verifies a profile at once, for example when you have already verified your website in Search Console, which is one more reason to set up Search Console first.

We found no verified list price for a paid tool that does the same job, so we name none here.

Google Analytics: what visitors do after they arrive

Search Console follows a person up to the moment they click your link in Google. Google Analytics takes over from there. Google describes it as a way to see how people find you and what they do on your pages, so that you can make improvements, and it says Google Analytics is free of charge.

At big companies, visitor data often sits inside larger paid platforms. Similarweb, a paid web data service, published no prices on 27 September 2026 and asked businesses to contact its sales team for a custom package. For measuring your own website, Google Analytics costs nothing.

The two Google tools answer two separate questions, and you need both. Search Console answers: how do people find me on Google, and for which searches? Analytics answers: once they arrive, which pages do they open?

The free tools side by side, with the paid tools they partly cover

The table below puts each free tool next to a paid tool that sells a similar type of data.

The four free tools and paid tools that sell similar data. Paid list prices as shown on each vendor's pricing page on 27 September 2026, billed monthly unless stated.
Free tool	What it shows you	Paid tool that sells similar data	Paid list price
Google Search Console	Clicks, impressions and position in Google Search, including AI Overviews and AI Mode; sites that link to you	Semrush SEO plan; Ahrefs Lite	$139 a month; $129 a month
Search Console indexing reports	Pages Google could not add to its index	Screaming Frog SEO Spider, a crawler	£199 per user per year; free up to 500 URLs
Bing Webmaster Tools	Bing search performance with 16 months of history; AI Performance citations in Copilot and Bing AI summaries	Semrush Starter (SEO + AI Search); Moz Pro Medium; Profound	$199 a month; $179 a month; no published price
Google Business Profile	Your listing, hours, photos and reviews on Search and Maps	No verified paid equivalent	No verified price
Google Analytics	How people find your site and what they do on it	Similarweb	No published price

How to set up the four tools, step by step

The order matters, because each tool makes the next one easier. Use a Google account that belongs to the business, and keep its password with the business. Every step below comes from Google's and Microsoft's own help pages, listed in the sources at the end.

A Google account. Search Console's getting-started guide says a Google account is the only requirement to use the tool.
Search Console, adding your site. Open Search Console, open the property selector, choose Add property, and pick a property type. A Domain property covers every version of your address (with and without www, with http and https), and it must be verified with a DNS record, a line of text you add in your account at the company where you registered your domain. A URL-prefix property covers one exact address and offers more ways to verify.
Search Console, verifying. Google lists an HTML file upload, an HTML tag on the homepage, your Google Analytics tracking code, Google Tag Manager, and your domain name provider. If your site runs on a platform such as WordPress, Wix, Squarespace or Shopify, Google suggests searching the platform's help for Search Console verification first, and it names Site Kit for WordPress as a plugin that can verify the site for you. Google says it takes a few days for data to start to appear.
Bing Webmaster Tools. Sign in and choose to import your sites from Google Search Console. Bing's help says an imported site needs no separate verification code, that Bing asks for view-only permission on your Search Console account, and that it imports your verified sites and the sitemaps you submitted to Google (a sitemap is a file that lists your pages), with no analytics data. Bing's other verification methods are an XML file uploaded to your site, a meta tag on your homepage, and a CNAME record added at your domain company.
Google Business Profile. If your business is not on Google yet, go to business.google.com/add, choose Add your business to Google and follow the steps. If an unverified profile already exists, find your business on Google Maps and choose Claim this business, then Manage now. Then complete the verification method Google offers you.
Google Analytics. Go to analytics.google.com and choose Start Measuring. Create an account, then a property, which is the container for one website's data, with your reporting time zone and currency. Add a Web data stream with your website address. Copy the Google tag ID, which starts with G-, into the Google Analytics field your website builder provides, or paste the full Google tag into every page as Google's instructions show. Google says data collection may take up to 30 minutes to begin, and the Realtime report shows whether data is arriving.

Keep the accounts in the business's name

Each of these tools lets the owner invite other people with a limited role: full and restricted users in Search Console, managers in Business Profile, roles from Viewer upward in Analytics, and Read Only or Read/Write users in Bing Webmaster Tools.

Keep ownership yourself, and give each helper the role their work needs. Our guide to SEO without a long contract explains what to check in any agreement about these accounts.

What the free tools leave for a person to do

These tools report problems and numbers, and the work of acting on them stays with a person. Google says a small local business can probably do much of its SEO work itself, starting with its SEO Starter Guide.

For the owner who would prefer to spend those hours on the business, this is the work Licheo's agents do each month: the website, search and AI work that big companies pay whole teams for, done for your small business. Nothing goes live until the owner approves it, and the owner learns no tools. Contact us for pricing.

Part of a larger guide

This page is one part of Small business SEO. The other parts:

Questions people ask

Is Google Search Console free to use?: Yes, Google Search Console is free. Google's help centre calls it a free service that helps you monitor, maintain and troubleshoot your site's presence in Google Search results. You need a Google account to use it, and Google says you do not need to understand HTML or coding. Google also encourages every site owner to use Search Console, because its data comes directly from Google Search.
What is the difference between Google Search Console and Google Analytics?: Google Search Console and Google Analytics measure two moments in a visitor's path. Search Console shows how your site appears in Google Search before anyone arrives: clicks, impressions, click-through rate and average position. Google Analytics shows how people find your site and what they do on its pages after they arrive. Both are free, and a small business should set up both, starting with Search Console.
Do I need Bing Webmaster Tools if I already use Google Search Console?: Yes, Bing Webmaster Tools is worth adding, and setup is short because Bing can import your sites from Google Search Console with no separate verification code. Microsoft describes its tools as free. Bing Webmaster Tools also keeps 16 months of search performance history, and its AI Performance report shows how often Microsoft Copilot and Bing's AI summaries cite your pages.
Which paid SEO tool does Google Search Console replace?: Google Search Console covers part of what businesses buy an SEO suite for: search data about their own website. On 27 September 2026, Semrush listed its SEO plan at $139 a month billed monthly, and Ahrefs listed Lite at $129 a month. Search Console gives Google's own figures at no cost, though only for sites you have verified, so a competitor's data needs another source.
How do I verify my website in Google Search Console?: To verify a website in Google Search Console, add a property and choose one of the methods Google offers: an HTML file upload, an HTML tag on the homepage, your Google Analytics tracking code, Google Tag Manager, or a DNS record at your domain name provider. A Domain property accepts the DNS record method. Platforms such as WordPress or Wix may offer a setting or plugin that verifies the site for you.
How long does Google Business Profile verification take?: Google Business Profile verification time depends on the method Google offers you. For postcards, Google says most codes arrive within 14 days and that codes expire after 30 days. After you complete any method, Google's review can take up to 5 business days. In some cases Google verifies a profile at once, for example when you have already verified your website in Google Search Console.
Is Google Business Profile free for a small business?: Yes, Google Business Profile is free. Google states that creating a Business Profile and listing your business on Google is free, and its help pages say you can add or claim your business at no charge. The profile controls how your hours, address, phone number, photos and reviews appear on Google Search and Maps, and Google lists keeping it up to date among the basics for its AI features.
How do I add Google Analytics to my website?: To add Google Analytics to a website, create an account and a property at analytics.google.com, then add a Web data stream with your site's address. Copy the Google tag ID, which starts with G-, into the Google Analytics field of your website builder, or paste the full Google tag into every page. Google says data collection may take up to 30 minutes to begin, and the Realtime report confirms it.
Is there a free tool that shows if AI answers cite my website?: Yes, Bing Webmaster Tools has a free report for this, called AI Performance, which Bing introduced on 10 February 2026 as a public preview. It shows how often your content is cited in Microsoft Copilot, AI-generated summaries in Bing and selected partner services, and which of your URLs are cited. For Google, traffic from AI Overviews and AI Mode appears in the Search Console Performance report.
Do I still need a paid SEO tool if I use the free ones?: A small business can start with the four free tools and add a paid SEO tool when a specific question needs it, such as data about a competitor's website, which Search Console does not show. Google says third-party tools have no access to its internal ranking data and cannot guarantee performance. For your own website, the free tools give the figures that come straight from Google and Microsoft.

Sources

About Search Console, Google Search Console Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Getting started with Search Console, Google Search Console Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Add a website or platform property to Search Console, Google Search Console Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Verify your site ownership, Google Search Console Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Managing owners, users, and permissions, Google Search Console Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Performance report (Search results): Overview and basic setup, Google Search Console Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Google Search's guidance on using third-party SEO tools, services, and advice, Google Search Central. Last updated 2026-06-05, accessed 27 September 2026.
Do you need an SEO?, Google Search Central. Last updated 2026-06-05, accessed 27 September 2026.
AI features and your website, Google Search Central. Last updated 2025-12-10, accessed 27 September 2026.
Bing Webmaster Tools (about page), Microsoft Bing. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Bing Webmaster Tools Extends Search Performance Data to 16 Months, Microsoft Bing Webmaster Blog. Published 2024-10-16, accessed 27 September 2026.
Introducing AI Performance in Bing Webmaster Tools (Public Preview), Microsoft Bing Webmaster Blog. Published 2026-02-10, accessed 27 September 2026.
Add and Verify site, Bing Webmaster Tools help documentation, Microsoft Bing. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Google Business Profile, Google. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Add or claim your Business Profile, Google Business Profile Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Verify your business on Google, Google Business Profile Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Manage your Business Profile owners & managers, Google Business Profile Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Google Analytics (Google Marketing Platform), Google. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Set up Analytics for a website and/or app, Google Analytics Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Access and data-restriction management, Google Analytics Help. Accessed 27 September 2026.
Semrush Plans and Pricing, Semrush. List prices as shown on 2026-09-27, accessed 27 September 2026.
Ahrefs Plans & pricing, Ahrefs. List prices as shown on 2026-09-27, accessed 27 September 2026.
Moz Pro pricing, Moz. List prices as shown on 2026-09-27, accessed 27 September 2026.
SEO Spider Pricing, Screaming Frog. List price as shown on 2026-09-27, accessed 27 September 2026.
Profound Pricing, Profound. As shown on 2026-09-27, accessed 27 September 2026.
Similarweb pricing, Similarweb. As shown on 2026-09-27, accessed 27 September 2026.
What 102 website audits and 215 website checks showed us about small business SEO (Licheo's own records), Licheo. Queried 27 September 2026.

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