Updated February 2026 • 5 min read
Ahrefs charges $99/month for Lite, $199/month for Standard, $399/month for Advanced, or $999/month for Enterprise. Most users use it for one thing — checking backlinks — which you can do for free. Here's how to cancel and what to use instead.
⚠️ No refunds: Ahrefs does not prorate. If you cancel mid-cycle, you keep access until the end of your billing period but get no money back for unused days.
The #1 reason people keep Ahrefs is sunk cost fallacy. "I've been paying $200/month, might as well keep it." But most users only need SEO data during specific campaigns:
Smart approach: Subscribe for one month, export everything (keyword lists, backlink profiles, content gaps), cancel. Resubscribe when you need fresh data. Cost: $200-400/year instead of $2,400-4,800/year.
If you genuinely need a paid SEO tool, here's the honest comparison:
Even paid plans have monthly credit limits. Lite users get 500 credits/month for Site Explorer, Keywords Explorer, etc. Each report costs 1 credit. Heavy users burn through credits fast and hit walls even on paid plans. If you're consistently hitting credit limits, you're overpaying for rationed data — another reason the "subscribe, export, cancel" strategy makes more sense.
Bottom line: Ahrefs is the gold standard for backlink data, but most users don't need gold-standard backlink data every month. The "subscribe quarterly, export, cancel" cycle saves $1,500-4,000/year with minimal data loss. Ahrefs Webmaster Tools (free) covers 60% of what you need for your own sites.
Direct cancel link + step-by-step instructions
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