Domain Rating vs Domain Authority: What Each One Actually Measures

Domain Rating (DR) and Domain Authority (DA) are both 0-100 scores that estimate how strong a website's backlink profile is — but they are built by two different companies, from two different web crawls, and neither one is used by Google. DR is Ahrefs' metric. DA is Moz's. If your site scores DR 32 and DA 18, nothing is broken; you are just being measured by two different rulers.

That distinction matters the moment you start submitting your product to directories, because almost every "best directories" list ranks its entries by one of these two numbers — and the lists rarely say which. Here is what each score actually measures, how to read the gap between them, and the one thing that moves both.

What is Domain Rating (DR)?

Domain Rating is Ahrefs' 0-100 logarithmic score of a domain's backlink profile strength. It is calculated almost entirely from referring domains — how many unique websites link to you, weighted by how strong those linking sites are themselves, and divided across how many sites each of them links out to.

Three practical consequences follow from how DR is built:

• Unique domains count, not total links. One thousand links from one site move DR far less than ten links from ten different sites.
• It is logarithmic. Climbing DR 20 to DR 30 is a fraction of the work of climbing DR 70 to DR 80. Early gains come fast; that is normal, not a fluke.
• Only followed links pass equity. A nofollow link from a DR 90 site contributes nothing to your DR. If you are not sure which kind you have, our guide on how to check if a backlink is dofollow walks through the four-second check.

DR is site-wide. It says nothing about whether any individual page can rank. Ahrefs publishes a separate page-level metric, URL Rating (UR), for that.

What is Domain Authority (DA)?

Domain Authority is Moz's 0-100 score that predicts how likely a domain is to rank in search results. The key difference: DA is not a direct measurement of link equity — it is a machine-learning model output, trained against actual search results, that uses Moz's link index as its main input.

Because it is a trained prediction rather than a formula, DA behaves differently from DR in two ways founders notice:

• DA can move without your links changing. When Moz retrains the model or refreshes its index, scores shift across the whole web. A DA drop is often a recalibration, not a penalty.
• DA is relative. It is calibrated so the strongest sites on the web anchor the top of the scale. As the web grows, holding the same DA requires growing.

How do DR and DA compare?

They measure related things through different instruments, so they disagree routinely. Neither is more "correct" — they answer slightly different questions.

	Domain Rating (DR)	Domain Authority (DA)
Built by	Ahrefs	Moz
Scale	0-100, logarithmic	0-100, logarithmic
What it is	A calculated score of backlink profile strength	A machine-learning prediction of ranking ability
Main input	Referring domains, weighted by their own DR	Moz's link index, fed into a trained model
Data source	Ahrefs' own crawler	Moz's own crawler
Page-level sibling	URL Rating (UR)	Page Authority (PA)
Used by Google?	No	No

The single most common mistake is treating a gap between the two as an error. A site can sit at DR 40 and DA 22 simply because Ahrefs' crawler found backlinks Moz's crawler has not indexed yet. Compare a site to itself over time, using one metric — not to another site, using two.

Does Google use Domain Rating or Domain Authority?

No. Both are third-party estimates produced by SEO tool vendors from their own independent crawls of the web. Google has no access to them and does not consume them. Google representatives have said repeatedly that there is no single site-wide authority score in their ranking systems of the kind DR and DA imply.

So why track them at all? Because they are useful proxies. You cannot see Google's view of your link profile, but you can see whether the number of quality sites linking to you is going up. DR and DA are the cheapest available readout on that trend — and the trend is the thing that matters, not the absolute number.

How do you check your DR and DA for free?

Both vendors publish a free checker, and both are deliberately limited so you upgrade.

• Ahrefs Website Authority Checker returns DR for any domain at no cost. It does not return UR or the underlying backlink list on the free tier.
• Moz Link Explorer returns DA and PA on a free account, with a monthly query cap.
• Our free domain rating checker looks up DR without an account, so you can vet a directory before you spend an afternoon submitting to it.

Whichever you use, check the same way each time. Mixing tools between months produces a chart that measures the tools, not your site.

What actually raises DR and DA?

One thing, and it is the same thing for both: more unique domains linking to you with followed links. Not more content, not more keywords, not more total links from sites that already link to you.

That is why directory listings remain one of the few link sources a pre-launch startup can realistically get. A founder with no audience cannot land a guest post on a DR 80 publication, but they can get listed. The catch is that most directories give nofollow links, which do nothing for either score — we tested a batch of them in our dofollow backlinks list, and the results were worse than the marketing suggests.

Before you submit anywhere, run the same three checks:

1. Is the link followed? If it carries rel="nofollow", ugc, or sponsored, it will not move DR or DA.
2. Is the listing page indexable? A followed link on a page Google never indexes passes nothing. This is the check almost every directory list skips.
3. Is it a domain you don't already have? A second link from a site already linking to you adds very little.

Our roundup of the best startup directories and the wider free backlinks for startups playbook both apply those filters before listing anything.

Why the "DR 90 backlink" offers in your inbox don't work

Because DR divides a linking site's equity across everything it links out to, a link from a DR 90 page that links to 4,000 other sites is worth a rounding error. Sellers quote the domain's DR because it is the biggest number they can put in an email. Ask instead how many outbound links sit on the specific page, and whether that page is indexed. Most offers do not survive the second question.

FAQ

Is DR or DA more accurate?

Neither, because they are not measuring the same thing. DR is a direct calculation of backlink profile strength; DA is a model prediction of ranking ability. DR tends to track link-building effort more responsively; DA tends to be steadier because model retraining smooths it. Pick one, track it over time, and ignore the other.

What is a good DR or DA for a new startup?

A brand-new domain starts at 0 on both. Anything above 10 within the first year means real referring domains are arriving. Chasing a specific number is a mistake — the useful question is whether the count of unique linking domains rose this month.

Why did my DA drop when I didn't lose any links?

Most likely Moz retrained its model or refreshed its index, which shifts scores across the whole web at once. Check whether your referring-domain count actually fell. If it did not, nothing happened to your site.

Do nofollow links raise DR or DA?

No. Both metrics count followed links. Nofollow links can still send traffic and build brand awareness, which have their own value — see dofollow vs nofollow backlinks for when each is worth pursuing.

How long does it take to raise DR?

Because both scales are logarithmic, the first ten points are the fastest you will ever move. Going from 0 to 10 can happen within months on a handful of quality referring domains; going from 50 to 60 can take years.

Conclusion

DR and DA are two vendors' estimates of the same underlying reality: how many credible websites link to you. Google uses neither, both disagree with each other by design, and the absolute number matters far less than its direction. Track one, check it the same way each month, and judge it by whether your referring domains are growing.

And since referring domains are the only input that moves either score, the practical move is to go get one. Listing your startup on Launchory is free, every approved listing gets a public profile, and verifying our badge on your site unlocks a dofollow link — a followed link from an indexed page, which is exactly what both metrics are built to count. You can browse the startups already listed to see what a finished profile looks like first.