Ahrefs deserves particular respect from us, because Brand Radar validates the model our own Registry is built on: observing brands at scale whether or not they ever signed up. This page covers where that shared model leads to different products, with exact figures throughout. The wider field is in our UK B2B AI visibility tools roundup.
What is Ahrefs Brand Radar?
Ahrefs Brand Radar is the AI visibility add-on to the Ahrefs SEO platform, built by Ahrefs, the Singapore-headquartered, bootstrapped company behind one of the most widely used SEO toolsets in the world. Brand Radar sits on a 350M+ search-backed prompt index and covers six engines: Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Microsoft Copilot. Claude is not covered.
Its standout capability is brand-agnostic lookups: because the index is built from Ahrefs' own prompt runs, you can inspect any brand's AI footprint without that brand configuring anything. A YouTube, Reddit and TikTok influence module is priced at $199 per month after beta. Details are on the Brand Radar page and Ahrefs' pricing page.
How much does Ahrefs Brand Radar cost?
Brand Radar costs $199 per month per AI platform index, or $699 per month for all six, and it requires an Ahrefs base plan starting at $129 per month, so full coverage works out at roughly $828 per month all-in. That includes 2,500 prompt checks per month, a cap reviewers note is tight for serious competitive tracking.
For context against our ladder: £199 per month buys Sentinel Basic, £499 Sentinel Standard and £999 Sentinel Pro, all tracking five engines including Claude, all including up to twelve months of category history at signup. We are not the cheap option either, and at the top of our ladder Forge runs from £3,950 per month. The difference is what the money buys, which the next sections cover.
Ahrefs Brand Radar vs Fortitude Media: side by side
| Ahrefs Brand Radar | Fortitude Media | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | $199/mo per engine index, $699/mo all six, plus Ahrefs base plan from $129/mo (~$828/mo all-in) | Sentinel Free £0, Basic £199/mo, Standard £499/mo, Pro £999/mo; Forge from £3,950/mo |
| Engines | 6: Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Microsoft Copilot. No Claude | 5: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews |
| Prompt volume | 350M+ prompt index; 2,500 prompt checks/month included | Canonical buyer-intent prompt library per category, run by us |
| Any-brand lookups | Yes, no setup needed | Registry observes categories whether or not brands signed up |
| Category history at signup | Current footprint for any brand | Up to 12 months of your category's history on day one |
| Services | None | Fortitude Forge: content, digital PR, website rebuilt on the Fortitude Framework |
| Built for | SEO practitioners already in Ahrefs | Founders and MDs of UK B2B companies |
What Ahrefs Brand Radar does well
Three things stand out, and they are big ones.
- Data scale nobody should wave away. A 350M+ search-backed prompt index is an asset very few companies on earth could assemble. When Brand Radar says a brand appears or does not appear, that statement rests on serious volume.
- Any-brand lookups with zero setup. You can pull the AI footprint of a competitor, an acquisition target or a prospect without anyone installing anything. That is a capability, not a feature, and it changes how research gets done.
- A natural extension for teams already on Ahrefs. If your SEO team works in Ahrefs daily, Brand Radar arrives inside a tool, a login and a workflow they already trust, with the SEO-channel context right next to it. For those teams it is the obvious first move into AI visibility, and we would not argue otherwise.
Where Fortitude is different
Start with the kinship, because it is real. Ahrefs built its business on observing the web at scale and selling those observations, including data about sites that never became customers. Brand Radar applies that model to AI visibility, and its existence proves the model works. Our Registry runs on the same principle: we sell observations from our own runs of our own canonical buyer-intent prompt library, never customer prompts or account data. Where we differ is what we point that model at, and what we attach to it.
We point it at UK B2B categories. The Registry is a longitudinal record of how AI engines answer buyer-intent prompts in UK B2B considered-purchase categories, and new customers receive up to twelve months of their category's history at signup. Brand Radar shows you any brand's current footprint at remarkable breadth; Sentinel hands you your category's past at depth, so month one starts as a trend rather than a baseline. How we collect it is documented on our methodology page.
We cover Claude. Brand Radar's six engines do not include Claude. Our five (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews) do, on every Sentinel tier. If your buyers ask Claude for shortlists, that gap matters more than any index size.
We are built for the person who owns the outcome, not the channel. Brand Radar speaks to SEO practitioners, in SEO vocabulary, inside an SEO suite, and reviewers note the 2,500 monthly prompt-check cap bites when tracking gets serious. Our buyer is the founder or MD who does not want to operate a tool at all. The data describing the problem is step one; someone owning the fix is the actual purchase. That is why our ladder runs from a free AI Visibility Check through Sentinel to Fortitude Forge from £3,950 per month, where the content, digital PR and website work get done by us, at roughly half the cost of the equivalent in-house team (£165k to £255k per year). We have not found another UK provider that combines a tracking platform and a managed delivery service on one continuous ladder from free to full service. If you are weighing data tools against execution help, our tool, agency or both guide and how to compare AI optimisation providers lay out the decision properly.
Choose Ahrefs Brand Radar if... / Choose Fortitude if...
Choose Ahrefs Brand Radar if:
- Your team already runs on Ahrefs and wants AI visibility inside the same workflow and billing relationship.
- You need to look up any brand's AI footprint without setup, for research, sales or due diligence.
- You want AI visibility analysed alongside SEO-channel data, with a 350M+ prompt index underneath.
- You have SEO practitioners in-house who will work the data, and 2,500 prompt checks per month covers your tracking needs.
Choose Fortitude if:
- Claude coverage matters: we track five engines including Claude, Brand Radar's six exclude it.
- You want up to twelve months of your category's history on day one, not just the current footprint.
- You are a founder or MD who wants the problem owned rather than another practitioner tool.
- You want the option of the same company measuring the number and moving it, through Fortitude Forge, accountable to the same chart.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Ahrefs Brand Radar cost?
Brand Radar costs $199 per month per AI platform index or $699 per month for all six engines, and requires an Ahrefs base plan from $129 per month, so full coverage is roughly $828 per month all-in. It includes 2,500 prompt checks per month, and a YouTube, Reddit and TikTok module is $199 per month after beta.
Does Ahrefs Brand Radar track Claude?
No. Brand Radar covers six engines: Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Microsoft Copilot, and Claude is not among them. Fortitude Sentinel tracks five engines including Claude on every tier.
Is Ahrefs Brand Radar worth it?
For SEO teams already paying for Ahrefs, often yes: it is a natural extension with a 350M+ prompt index and any-brand lookups, and the data quality is real. The cautions are the roughly $828 per month all-in cost for full coverage, the 2,500 prompt-check monthly cap reviewers call tight, the absence of Claude, and the fact that it describes the problem without anyone owning the fix.
What are the best Ahrefs Brand Radar alternatives?
For UK B2B companies that want category history and delivery attached, Fortitude Media is the specialist alternative, with Sentinel from free to £999 per month and Forge from £3,950 per month. For enterprise brands, Profound is the category leader. For low-cost monitoring, Otterly.AI starts at $29 per month.
Does Ahrefs do the AI visibility work for you?
No. Ahrefs is a data company, and Brand Radar reports what its index observes; acting on it is your team's job. Fortitude Forge is a managed service that does the content, digital PR and website work, so the same company that measures your AI visibility does the work and is accountable to the same chart.
See your own footprint first
The sensible first step costs nothing with either of us. Our free AI Visibility Check shows how ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews answer buyer-intent prompts in your category today, with no card and no call. To get more from the result, read benchmarking your AI visibility against competitors, and if you are coming at this from an SEO background, SEO vs LLM optimisation explains where the disciplines part ways. Our story is on why Fortitude.