Rilea SEO vs Rank Math.

Two generous plugins, one big difference

Rank Math earned its popularity by giving away more in its free version than most SEO plugins did. Its free plugin includes a redirect manager, up to five focus keywords per post, a schema generator, and Google Search Console data inside WordPress. If you're coming from Rank Math, you're used to a lot of features at no cost.

Rilea SEO takes the same idea further. It includes everything Rank Math's free version covers on the page itself, plus the SEO features Rank Math keeps for its paid plans: Google News and video sitemaps, local SEO for multiple locations and GTIN in product schema. There's no paid tier at all, and no restriction on using it for client sites. This page compares the two in detail, including the areas where Rank Math is ahead.

Where the two are alike

Both plugins handle the essentials well, and in a similar way:

• SEO titles and meta descriptions with templates and variables
• Multiple keywords or keyphrases per post, free
• Content and readability analysis as you write
• A redirect manager in the free version
• Schema markup in the free version
• XML sitemaps at /sitemap_index.xml
• Breadcrumbs, robots controls and canonical URLs
• Open Graph and X tags for sharing
• Import from other SEO plugins

If you only use these, either plugin will do the job. The decision comes down to the paid features, licensing and the extras covered below.

Licensing and client sites

This is the single biggest practical difference for agencies and freelancers. Rank Math PRO is licensed for unlimited websites you own, but client websites are excluded. To use Rank Math's paid features on client sites, you need the Business plan or the Agency plan, which are priced higher and have site limits.

Rilea SEO is released under the GPL with no licence key, no site limit and no distinction between your sites and your clients' sites. You install the same plugin everywhere. When a client relationship ends, nothing on their site stops working and there's nothing to transfer.

Keywords and content analysis

Rank Math's free version supports up to five focus keywords per post, and PRO removes the limit. Rilea SEO supports a focus keyphrase, up to four related keyphrases and synonyms, matched across word forms, for free. In practice, both give you enough room to target the main phrase and its close variations.

Rilea SEO adds two checks that are worth knowing about. It warns you when a keyphrase is already used on another page, so your own pages don't compete with each other, and it includes an inclusive-language analysis that suggests alternatives for words that could exclude readers. Its readability and inclusive-language checks are written for English.

Sitemaps

Both plugins build an XML sitemap index for free. Rank Math keeps its Google News sitemap and video sitemap for PRO. Rilea SEO includes both for free: a news sitemap with your publication name and chosen post types, and a video sitemap that detects YouTube, Vimeo and self-hosted video. Rilea SEO also includes IndexNow, which notifies participating search engines when you publish, update or delete content.

Local SEO

Rank Math's free version supports local SEO for a single business. Managing multiple locations needs a PRO plan. Rilea SEO supports a main business and unlimited extra locations for free, each with its own address, phone, opening hours, service area and LocalBusiness schema, plus shortcodes for addresses, hours, maps and location lists, a KML file, a locations sitemap and an optional public page for each location.

WooCommerce

Rank Math's free version includes WooCommerce SEO features, and its PRO plan adds more, including GTIN in product schema. Rilea SEO includes full Product schema for free, with brand, GTIN and MPN fields, one offer per variant, reviews, shipping and returns, and noindex for hidden products. For stores that want their identifiers in structured data, that's a feature Rank Math users pay for.

Shopify

Rank Math is WordPress only and has no official Shopify app. Rilea SEO has a free Shopify app with an SEO editor, keyphrase and readability analysis, templates, bulk editing with undo, CSV import and export, and schema for products, collections, articles and pages. It's an early release and self-hosted, so it needs a developer to set up. If you manage sites on both WordPress and Shopify, Rilea SEO lets you use the same approach on each.

Where Rank Math is ahead

Rank Math does several things Rilea SEO doesn't, and for some people they're the reason to choose it:

• Search Console and Analytics in WordPress. Rank Math connects to your Google account and shows search performance and traffic data in your dashboard. Rilea SEO doesn't, so you'd use Search Console directly.
• Rank tracking. Rank Math's paid plans include a keyword rank tracker. Rilea SEO has none.
• Content AI. Rank Math offers AI writing help in its paid plans, with a free trial. Rilea SEO has no AI tools.
• Maturity. Rank Math has been used on millions of sites, with a large knowledge base and community. Rilea SEO is new.
• Languages. Rank Math's analysis is used widely on non-English sites. Rilea SEO's readability checks are written for English.

Switching from Rank Math

Rilea SEO's importer reads the data Rank Math saved in your database: SEO titles and descriptions, focus keywords, robots settings, canonical URLs, breadcrumb titles, social titles and images, cornerstone flags, primary categories, category and tag settings, redirects and main settings. It doesn't change or delete anything Rank Math stored, so you can switch back if you need to.

To switch, install Rilea SEO, go to Rilea SEO, then Tools, and click Import from Rank Math. Then deactivate Rank Math so your pages don't print two sets of tags, and save your permalinks once. Both plugins serve the sitemap at /sitemap_index.xml, so the address you submitted to Google doesn't change. Your Search Console and Analytics data stay in your Google account. The import guide has the details.

Should you switch?

Switch to Rilea SEO if you're an agency or freelancer and Rank Math PRO's client-site restriction affects you, if you need news or video sitemaps, multiple locations or GTIN in product schema without paying, or if you also manage Shopify stores.

Stay with Rank Math if you rely on seeing Search Console data, analytics or rank tracking inside WordPress, if you use Content AI, or if you publish mainly in a language other than English.

Many people use both kinds of tool side by side: an SEO plugin for what happens on the site, and Search Console and a separate rank tracker for measuring results. If that's how you work, Rilea SEO covers the on-site part completely, for free.

Optimising a post in each plugin

In Rank Math, you open the Rank Math panel, enter your focus keywords, and work through a score made up of basic SEO, additional checks, title readability and content readability. Schema, social and advanced settings sit in their own tabs, and the free version gives you plenty of control.

In Rilea SEO, you open the Rilea SEO panel and enter a focus keyphrase, up to four related keyphrases and synonyms. The SEO checks update as you type, with readability and inclusive-language analysis alongside. The Google preview shows desktop and mobile results with a pixel-width meter for the title and a length meter for the description. Internal link suggestions appear in the same panel, and the advanced settings cover canonical URLs, robots directives, a per-post redirect, breadcrumb titles, the schema type and whether the page appears in the sitemap.

If you're used to Rank Math, the main adjustment is that there's one panel rather than several tabs, and no upgrade prompts for features that need a paid plan.

What it costs an agency

Consider an agency managing 30 client sites. With Rank Math, the free version works on all of them, but to use PRO features such as news and video sitemaps, multiple locations or GTIN schema on client sites, the agency needs a Business plan, because PRO excludes client websites. That's a recurring yearly cost with a site limit to manage as the client list grows.

With Rilea SEO, all of those features are free on all 30 sites, and on the 31st. There's no plan to upgrade when you take on new clients, and no licence to deactivate when one leaves.

Testing the switch on one site

If you're unsure, try Rilea SEO on one site for a week. Run the importer, deactivate Rank Math, and check your pages, sitemap and redirects. Keep using Search Console directly for your performance data. If Rilea SEO suits you, roll it out to your other sites. If not, reactivate Rank Math, which still has all its original data, and deactivate Rilea SEO. Any changes you made in Rilea SEO during the test won't carry back, so note them if you want to keep them.

Keeping your Google data

Moving away from Rank Math doesn't mean losing your search performance history. Rank Math reads that data from your Google Search Console and Analytics accounts; it doesn't own it. After switching, you can see the same reports directly in Search Console and Google Analytics, with the same history, because nothing about your Google accounts changes. If you used Rank Math's rank tracker, make a note of the keywords you were tracking before you switch, so you can keep tracking them in another tool.