Free Spam Score Checker: Check Website Spam Score in Bulk
Check the spam score of up to 5 domains at once and see what is driving it. No sign-up, with a CSV download.
- ✓ Free
- ✓ No sign-up
- ✓ DataForSEO data
- ✓ 5 domains per check
- ✓ CSV export
By Sheikh Shadi Shuvo, Founder of Backlink Express · Updated
Spam score in one sentence
A spam score is a 0–100% estimate of how many warning signs a website shares with spam sites. It is a third-party risk signal, not a Google penalty.
How to check a spam score
- Paste up to 5 domains or URLs, one per line. Full URLs are fine; we read the domain.
- Click "Check Spam Score". Results usually appear in a few seconds.
- Read the score and risk band for each site, or download the list as a CSV.
Use it to vet guest post and link prospects, to audit sites that already link to you, or to check your own domain.
What is a spam score?
A spam score is a percentage that estimates how "spammy" a website looks, based on features it shares with known spam sites. The tool on this page uses DataForSEO's Spam Score, a proprietary metric that runs from 0% to 100%.
- It is a prediction, not a verdict. A high score means "look closer", not "this site is spam".
- It is not a Google metric. Google does not publish spam scores. Each SEO data company calculates its own.
- It is calculated per page, then averaged. For a domain, DataForSEO scores each page and takes the average.
How the spam score is calculated
Unlike most spam metrics, DataForSEO publishes the signals it uses. There are 18 of them. Each one adds or removes a fixed percentage, and the total stays between 0% and 100%:
| Signal | Effect on score |
|---|---|
| Domain name shorter than 3, exactly 3, or longer than 20 characters | +10% |
| 2 or more digits in the main domain | +15% |
| 2 or more digits in a subdomain | +20% |
| Top-level domain on DataForSEO's 'spammy' list (e.g. .xyz, .top) | +20% |
| No tags or scripts from Google, Bing, Facebook or X in the page head | +20% (each one present: −5%) |
| Social meta tags present | −15% |
| Contact information present | −20% |
| Canonical tag pointing to another domain | +20% |
| Page served over HTTP instead of HTTPS | +30% |
| Title missing or outside 30–65 characters | +5% (otherwise −5%) |
| Meta description missing or outside 40–200 characters | +5% (otherwise −5%) |
| More than 10 meta keywords | +15% |
| More than 100 external links on the page | +20% |
| More than 500 internal links on the page | +15% |
| External links more than 3× internal links | +15% |
Source: DataForSEO Help Center, 'What is Spam Score and how is it calculated' (checked October 2026). Some rows combine related signals.
Example: a page on best-deals-2024-online.xyz served over HTTP, with no contact page and 150 outbound links, would pick up +15% (digits), +20% (TLD), +30% (HTTP) and +20% (outbound links) before anything else is counted. The same content on a clean HTTPS domain with contact details would score far lower.
What is a good spam score?
Lower is better. DataForSEO groups scores into three bands, and this tool uses the same labels:
| Spam score | Risk | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| 0–30% | Low | Usually fine. Still check traffic and relevance. |
| 31–60% | Medium | Look at the pages and outbound links before linking or buying. |
| 61–100% | High | Treat with caution. Avoid unless you can see clear value. |
Bands: DataForSEO Help Center. Moz uses the same 1–30 / 31–60 / 61–100% ranges for its own metric.
DataForSEO vs Moz spam score
Many checkers show Moz Spam Score. Moz describes its metric as the percentage of sites with similar features that it has found to be penalised or banned by Google, based on 27 signals. DataForSEO's score is built from 18 published on-page and domain signals. Both are useful; they are not interchangeable.
| DataForSEO Spam Score | Moz Spam Score | |
|---|---|---|
| Scale | 0–100% | 1–100% |
| Signals | 18, published with their weights | 27, published without weights |
| Based on | On-page and domain features | Features correlated with penalised or banned sites |
| Domain score | Average of page scores | One score for the site you look up |
| Google metric? | No | No |
Sources: DataForSEO Help Center; Moz Help Hub, 'Spam Score' (checked October 2026).
Spam score and Google
Google does not use third-party spam scores. What it does have is a link spam policy. Google defines link spam as creating links to or from a site primarily to manipulate search rankings. Its examples include buying or selling links for ranking purposes, excessive link exchanges, automated link building, and low-quality directory or bookmark links.
Google also says paid links are fine when they are qualified with rel="sponsored" or rel="nofollow". That is why reputable publishers label sponsored placements, and why a site's overall quality matters more than any single number.
Why a site has a high spam score
- No HTTPS. This is the single biggest signal (+30%).
- No contact information or social profiles on the page.
- Missing or oversized titles and meta descriptions.
- A domain with digits or an unusual TLD. These are common on throwaway sites.
- Link-heavy pages. Hundreds of outbound links, or far more outbound than internal links, is a classic link-farm pattern.
Legitimate sites can trigger several of these by accident, which is why the score is a starting point for a review, not a final judgement.
How to lower your spam score
- Move every page to HTTPS and redirect HTTP to HTTPS.
- Add real contact details: an address, email or phone number, and links to your social profiles.
- Write proper titles (30–65 characters) and meta descriptions (40–200 characters) for your main pages.
- Prune link-heavy pages. Remove or noindex pages that exist only to list outbound links.
- Check canonicals. Make sure canonical tags point to your own pages unless you mean otherwise.
- Wait for a recrawl. Scores update as the data provider re-crawls your pages.
Using spam score before buying a link
Spam score is one quick filter in a proper vetting checklist. Before you buy a guest post or link insertion, check:
- Spam score: low is good; medium or high needs a closer look.
- Authority: use our DR Checker to see backlink strength.
- Organic traffic and its trend. High authority with no traffic is a red flag.
- Outbound links. Sites that link out to hundreds of unrelated domains usually exist to sell links.
- Relevance and content quality. Read a few recent articles.
- Indexing. Confirm the site's pages are in Google with our Google Index Checker.
Every publisher in the Backlink Express marketplace is reviewed manually for these signals before it is listed.
About this tool and its data
- Source: DataForSEO Spam Score (not Moz Spam Score).
- Freshness: each domain's score is cached for up to 24 hours.
- Limits: up to 5 domains per check. URLs are reduced to their hostname without "www.".
- Independence: Backlink Express is not affiliated with DataForSEO, Moz or Google.
Frequently asked questions
What is a spam score?
A spam score is an estimate, from 0% to 100%, of how many warning signs a website shares with known spam sites. It is a third-party metric from SEO data companies, not a Google penalty or a Google score.
Is this spam score checker free?
Yes. You can check up to 5 domains per check with no sign-up and download the results as a CSV.
Where does the spam score come from?
From DataForSEO's Spam Score. It is a different metric from Moz Spam Score, so the two numbers will not match.
What is a good spam score?
Lower is better. DataForSEO treats 0–30% as low, 31–60% as medium and 61–100% as high. A low score is a good sign, but you should still check traffic, relevance and content quality.
How is the spam score calculated?
DataForSEO checks 18 on-page and domain signals, such as HTTPS, contact details, title length, digits in the domain and the number of outbound links. Each signal adds or removes a fixed percentage. A domain's score is the average of its pages' scores.
Does a high spam score mean Google has penalised a site?
No. A spam score is a prediction based on patterns, not a record of any Google action. Only Google Search Console can show a manual action on your own site.
What's the difference between DataForSEO and Moz spam score?
Both run from 0% to 100% and use similar low, medium and high bands, but Moz uses 27 signals linked to penalised sites while DataForSEO uses 18 published signals. They measure similar ideas with different data.
Why does my site have a high spam score?
Common causes are serving pages over HTTP instead of HTTPS, no visible contact details, missing or very long titles and meta descriptions, digits in the domain name, a 'spammy' top-level domain, and pages with hundreds of outbound links.
How do I lower my spam score?
Fix the signals behind it: switch to HTTPS, add real contact information, write proper titles and meta descriptions, and remove pages that link out to large numbers of unrelated sites. Then wait for the data to refresh.
Should I disavow links from high spam score sites?
Not automatically. A spam score is only a warning sign. Look at the linking page first. Disavow only clearly manipulative links you can't get removed, especially if you have a manual action.
Can a new website have a spam score?
Yes. The DataForSEO score is built from on-page signals, so even a new site gets a score once its pages are crawled. A new site with few pages may show no data at first.
Why does a domain show 'No data'?
The domain may not have been crawled yet, may block crawlers, or may not exist. Try again later or check the spelling.
Can I check more than 5 domains?
Yes, run another check. If you are vetting sites for link building, every publisher in the Backlink Express marketplace is reviewed for spam signals, traffic and relevance before it is listed.
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See the marketplaceSpam Score data from DataForSEO. Backlink Express is not affiliated with DataForSEO, Moz or Google.