Anchor Text Checker: Free Tool to Analyze Link Anchors Online

Anchor text is simply the clickable text in a link. For example, in a link like “Free SEO tools”, those words are the anchor text.

With the WebToolar Anchor Text Checker, you can enter any webpage URL and quickly see the anchor text used across its links. The tool shows internal and external links, dofollow and nofollow links, and helps you find empty, generic, or duplicate anchor text. It’s free to use and gives you a quick overview of how your links are set up.

What Is an Anchor Text Checker?

An anchor text checker is an SEO tool that crawls a single web page and extracts every hyperlink along with its visible link text, target URL, and link attributes. Instead of manually opening a page’s source code and hunting through hundreds of <a> tags, the tool does the extraction for you and organizes the results into a readable table.

WebToolar’s version goes a step further than a basic anchor text extractor. It classifies each link as internal or external, flags whether it carries a dofollow or nofollow attribute, detects whether the link sits in the page’s header, footer, or body, and highlights anchors that look unnatural, including empty anchors, generic phrases like “click here,” and anchors repeated so often they risk looking over-optimized.

Why Anchor Text Still Matters for SEO

Google has used anchor text as a relevance signal since the earliest versions of its algorithm, and it still does.

When multiple pages link to the same URL using similar keyword rich anchors, Google treats that repetition as a strong hint about what the destination page is actually about.

This is exactly why anchor text auditing remains part of any serious link building or internal linking strategy.

The catch is that this same signal can be abused.

Following the Penguin algorithm update, Google became far better at spotting unnatural anchor text patterns, such as a site receiving dozens of backlinks that all use the exact same commercial keyword as anchor text. That pattern rarely happens naturally and often triggers manual review or an automatic ranking penalty.

A healthy backlink profile mixes branded anchors, naked URLs, generic phrases, and keyword variations, not one repeated exact match phrase.

Running your own pages, or a competitor’s, through an anchor text checker gives you a fast way to audit anchor text diversity before Google’s algorithm flags it for you.

How to Use the Free Anchor Text Checker

1. Paste any page URL into the input field at the top of the tool.
2. Click Check Anchors to let the tool fetch and scan the page.
3. Review the summary cards for a quick count of total links, internal links, external links, nofollow links, empty anchors, generic anchors, and duplicate anchors.
4. Use the All, Internal, External, Nofollow, and Duplicate filters to narrow the table to exactly what you want to review.
5. Type into the search box to filter results by a specific URL or anchor phrase.
6. Click Copy Table to paste the results straight into a spreadsheet, or Download (CSV) to save the full report for later.

No sign up, no crawl limits on a single page, and no data leaves your browser except the one request needed to fetch the page you are checking.

Key Features of This Anchor Text Analyzer

• Internal vs external link detection: Every anchor is automatically sorted by whether it points to the same domain or somewhere else, which is essential for reviewing internal linking strategy separately from outbound link building.
• Dofollow and nofollow identification: The tool reads the rel attribute on each link so you instantly know which anchors pass link equity and which ones do not, without opening developer tools.
• Link location: header, footer, or body: Links buried in a sitewide footer carry different SEO weight than links placed naturally inside body content. This tool labels each anchor’s location so you can judge context, not just count.
• Duplicate anchor text detection: Anchors reused more than twice for the same destination are flagged automatically, helping you catch early signs of anchor text over optimization before it becomes a ranking risk.
• Generic and empty anchor flags: Phrases like “click here,” “read more,” or a blank anchor tell search engines nothing about the linked page. The tool tags these so you can rewrite them into descriptive, keyword-relevant text.
• One-click export: Copy the filtered table directly to your clipboard in spreadsheet-friendly format, or download a CSV that opens cleanly in Excel or Google Sheets for reporting and client audits.

Types of Anchor Text You Will See in the Results

• Exact match anchor: the anchor text matches a target keyword word for word, for example “anchor text checker.”
• Partial match anchor: the anchor includes the keyword alongside other words, for example “try this anchor text checker tool.”
• Branded anchor: the anchor uses a company or website name, for example “WebToolar.”
• Naked URL anchor: the raw link itself is used as the anchor text, for example “webtoolar.com.”
• Generic anchor: vague call to action phrases such as “click here” or “learn more.”
• Image anchor: the link is wrapped around an image rather than text, identified here through the image’s alt attribute.

A page with a natural mix of these anchor types generally signals a healthier, more organic link profile than one dominated by a single exact match phrase.

Anchor Text Best Practices

• Keep exact match anchors to a small share of your total internal and external links.
• Vary anchor phrasing across pages that link to the same destination instead of reusing one keyword repeatedly.
• Write descriptive anchor text that makes sense even out of context, since screen readers and search crawlers both rely on it.
• Avoid linking with only “click here” or “read more,” and replace these with a short description of the destination page.
• Check that important internal pages are not relying solely on footer or navigation links for their anchor text, since body content links usually carry more contextual relevance.
• Periodically re run your key landing pages through an anchor text checker as new content and backlinks accumulate over time.

Who This Anchor Text Analyzer Tool Is For

SEO professionals use this checker before and after a link building campaign to confirm anchor diversity stays natural.

Content teams use it to audit internal linking across blog posts and avoid keyword cannibalization from repeated exact match anchors pointing to competing pages.

Site owners use it as a quick, free alternative to full site crawlers when they only need to inspect one page at a time, whether that is a homepage, a product page, or a guest post before it goes live.

FAQs

What is anchor text in SEO?

Anchor text is the clickable, visible text of a hyperlink. Search engines use it as a signal to understand what the linked page is about, which makes it an important factor in both on page and off page SEO.

Is this anchor text checker really free?

Yes. You can check anchor text for any public URL without creating an account, paying for a subscription, or hitting a scan limit on single page lookups.

Can I check anchor text for external backlinks pointing to my site?

This tool analyzes the outbound anchor text present on a page you enter. To check a page a competitor or partner site links to you from, paste that specific page URL and filter the results to external links.

What counts as a duplicate anchor text issue?

The tool flags an anchor as duplicate when the same non empty anchor phrase is used more than twice for links heading in the same direction, internal or external, which can indicate anchor text over optimization.

Does nofollow anchor text still matter for SEO?

Nofollow links generally do not pass direct link equity, but they still contribute to a natural looking link profile and can drive real referral traffic, so tracking them alongside dofollow anchors is still worthwhile.

How is this different from a full backlink checker?

A backlink checker crawls a database built from the entire web to show who links to your site. This tool instead scans one specific page in real time and reports every anchor text found on that page, internal and external alike.