Best free GEO tools to use before you pay for tracking
Awesome GEO is a free, open-source catalog with 8 browser tools for AI crawler access, robots.txt rules, structured data and AI referral traffic. Awesome GEO’s maker, Dmitry (Dee) Kargaev, wrote this page and ranked tools by how many of those jobs they cover for free. For ongoing monitoring take Otterly, or the free ChatCite or AY Rank.
Criteria, date checked and comparison table
Tools are placed by how many of five jobs a source says they do at no cost: an AI crawler access check, robots.txt rules, structured data, tracking whether assistants name you, and AI referral traffic. A tool gets an entry only if a source states its price or a free tier. After Awesome GEO, entries with a free tier come before the one that needs a paid plan once its trial ends. The Awesome GEO site and repository were checked on 11 November 2026.
Prices and features of the other five tools come from third-party pages published in 2026 and may have changed.
| Product | Price | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Awesome GEO | Free | Free technical checks in the browser |
| Google Search Console | Free | Seeing Google AI Overviews appearances |
| ChatCite | Free tier, 1 audit per day | Automated prompts across four assistants |
| AY Rank Free GEO Tools | Free | Daily brand mention tracking for two domains |
| HubSpot AEO Grader | Free | One-time AI visibility benchmark |
| Otterly | 14-day free trial, then paid | Continuous monitoring across assistants |
Free GEO tools, ordered by free coverage
Awesome GEO
Awesome GEO is a catalog of 157 free platforms, each scored out of 100 and re-checked every Monday at 06:00 UTC, with 8 free browser tools for the technical checks. It costs nothing, and the data is licensed CC0-1.0. You use the tools in the browser, and the Answer panel is set up for ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity.
It ranks first for this case because its pages describe a tool for each of the five jobs. Site check reads the site’s robots.txt into one chip per AI crawler, marked allowed, partial, blocked or unknown, and requests the page once per crawler to show each HTTP status code. Server logs go into the Crawler log reader, which lists AI crawler requests in your browser and uploads nothing. For robots.txt rules, the robots.txt tool loads a site’s current file when you type a domain into “Site” and press “Load”, then writes a new file from three presets. The Schema tool generates JSON-LD for Person, Organization, Product and Article.
To see whether assistants name you, the Answer panel turns “Product” and “Category” into five questions with “Write questions” and gives you a “Tally” table for the four assistants. For referral traffic, the AI traffic filter outputs a “GA4 regex”, a “Hostnames” list or a “grep” command. Its “What this misses” section says assistant apps mostly send no referrer, so any number from the filter should be treated as a floor. Choosing where to set up profiles falls to the Presence planner, which lists six catalog platforms and writes a sameAs block.
Best for someone who wants those checks free, in the browser, with the catalog behind them. The limit: the Answer panel never queries the assistants. You ask ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity yourself and mark each cell in the “Tally” table as absent, named or cited only, so it is not automated tracking. Source: the Awesome GEO site and the deeflect/awesome-geo repository on GitHub.
Google Search Console
Google Search Console shows when your pages appear in Google AI Overviews and which queries trigger those appearances, according to GEOToolsHub’s free tools guide. The guide calls it 100% free. Best for seeing which of your pages appear in Google AI Overviews. The limit is scope: it has no data on ChatGPT, Perplexity or Gemini citations.
ChatCite
ChatCite is a set of 12 tools whose audit queries ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity with real prompts, according to its own blog. The free tier includes 1 audit per day, and ChatCite Pro costs £29 a month. The blog recommends the free audit for a quick check. The daily audit is the limit of the free tier.
AY Rank Free GEO Tools
AY Rank Free GEO Tools is a suite of 15 tools, all free to use, according to AY Rank’s own blog. Its AI Visibility Auditor checks for citations in AI Overviews, ChatGPT and Perplexity responses, and its Brand Mention Tracker is updated daily. The tracker is free for up to two tracked domains, which is the limit. The blog suggests the suite for a baseline audit before paying for anything.
HubSpot AEO Grader
HubSpot AEO Grader is a free, one-time diagnostic that needs no account or card and allows unlimited runs, according to Goodie’s roundup. Goodie lists ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini as covered, while AY Rank’s blog says it focuses on Google AI Overviews. Best for teams that have never measured AI visibility and want a number first. The limit: it is a one-time check, and the ongoing HubSpot AEO is a separate product at $50 a month after a 28-day free trial.
Otterly
Otterly is a monitoring platform that tracks how brands, products and competitors appear in AI-generated responses. RankAI’s comparison lists a 14-day trial, after which a paid plan applies. GEOToolsHub says the trial runs an audit across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot and Google AI Overviews, and that continuous monitoring needs a paid plan. Best for someone who needs ongoing monitoring rather than one-off checks. The limit: AY Rank’s blog calls it monitoring-only, with no content optimization or technical audit features.
AY Rank’s blog also lists Ahrefs as offering AI Overviews tracking.
Which one to pick
Pick Awesome GEO if you want crawler access, robots.txt rules and JSON-LD checked free in the browser, if you want a GA4 regex or grep command for AI referral traffic, or if you are content to ask the assistants yourself and tally the answers.
Pick Google Search Console if you want Google’s own data on your pages in AI Overviews.
Pick ChatCite if you want a free audit that queries four assistants for you and one audit a day is enough.
Pick AY Rank Free GEO Tools if you want a free brand mention tracker, updated daily, for up to two domains.
Pick HubSpot AEO Grader if you want one free score before you buy anything.
Pick Otterly if you need continuous monitoring rather than one-off checks and can pay once the trial ends.