Free Backlink Sites

What a free backlink site is

A free backlink site is a platform where you can create a page about your business or product that links to your website, at no cost. Think of a Google Business Profile, a listing on a software directory, a launch on Product Hunt, a GitHub organisation page or a profile on a startup database. Each one is a page on someone else's site that points to yours.

These links do three jobs. They help search engines find and trust your site, they bring visitors who are already looking for something like yours, and they put your brand name in front of the AI assistants and search engines that learn who you are from what the rest of the web says about you.

How we checked every site on this list

Most free backlink lists are copied from older lists, so they're full of dead sites and paid-only directories. We built this one from scratch and checked it:

The 10 categories, and who each one suits

Dofollow vs nofollow: does it matter?

Less than most lists suggest. A dofollow link is a normal link that search engines can count as a vote for your site; a nofollow link (rel="nofollow", or rel="ugc" for user-generated content) asks them not to. Big platforms such as GitHub, npm and most review sites mark links on user-created pages as nofollow because anyone can create them, and many change this with a redesign.

Nofollow links are still worth having. They send visitors who are already looking for a product like yours, and the mention itself tells search engines and AI assistants that your brand exists and what it does. A healthy link profile has a mix of both; a site with only dofollow directory links looks manufactured.

How to use free backlink sites without hurting your site

1. Write one company description and reuse it. The same name, short description, address and contact details everywhere. Inconsistent details confuse both search engines and customers.
2. Start with the listings customers actually see: Google Business Profile, Bing Places and Apple Business Connect if you serve an area, then the main directories for your industry.
3. Fill in every field with real screenshots, a logo, categories and a description written for people. Half-empty profiles rarely get approved, and never get clicked.
4. Link to the best page for that audience, not always the homepage: a pricing or product page for a software directory, a location page for a local listing.
5. Use your brand name as the link text. Stuffing keywords into business names or profile fields is a common reason listings get removed.
6. Add a few a week, not a hundred in a day. Steady growth looks natural and lets you keep each profile up to date.
7. Keep a record of every site, login and listing address in a spreadsheet (the CSV download is a good start), and tag the links with the UTM Builder where the site allows it so you can see the visits in GA4.

Where to start, by type of business

A 30-day free backlink plan

After the month, check which listings sent visitors and keep those profiles fresh. The best links you'll ever get come later, from people who find you through these listings and write about you.

What we left out, and why

We didn't include social bookmarking sites, classified ad sites, PDF and document dumps, mass profile creation, forum signature links or paid link packages. Many free backlink lists are mostly made of these. They were popular years ago because they were easy, and that's exactly the problem: search engines treat links that exist only to manipulate rankings as link spam, and a profile full of them can drag a site down rather than lift it. They also send no real visitors. Everything on this list is somewhere a real customer, buyer, developer or journalist might actually find you.

Free backlinks and AI search

AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google's AI Overviews learn about brands from what the web says about them, and links are only part of that. A consistent name and description across directories, review sites, startup databases and community answers makes it easier for these tools to recognise your business, describe it correctly and mention it next to the competitors buyers already know. Review and comparison sites in particular are often where AI answers get their "best tools for…" lists. Once your profiles are live, run the AI Visibility Checker to make sure AI crawlers can reach your own site too.

How to check your new links

• See whether your link is followed: on your live listing, right-click the link to your site, choose Inspect, and look for rel="nofollow", rel="ugc" or rel="sponsored". No rel means dofollow.
• Check it's still there every few months; directories change templates and close accounts. The Broken Link Checker tests every link on a page.
• Look in Search Console under Links → Top linking sites. New links can take weeks to appear there.
• Watch referral visits in GA4 (Reports → Acquisition → Traffic acquisition, Session source) to see which listings actually send people.
• Check where a listing really points with the Link Safety Checker if a link goes through a redirect.

Common free backlink mistakes

• Submitting to hundreds of sites in a week with copy-pasted text and no screenshots.
• Keyword-stuffed business names such as "Best Cheap Plumber London | Plumbing".
• Different details on every listing: old addresses, old phone numbers, three versions of the name.
• Paying for "1,000 backlinks" packages, which are almost always the spam categories above.
• Posting links in communities without helping first. Reddit, Hacker News and Indie Hackers remove promotional posts and ban repeat offenders.
• Forgetting the listings exist, so they show last year's prices and a dead link.

What this list can't do

• It can't promise approval. Directories and launch platforms review submissions, and some only accept certain kinds of products.
• Free can change. Several sites offer paid upgrades or paid fast-track reviews; everything here could be joined free when we checked, but terms change.
• It's a starting point, not a link-building strategy. The links that move rankings most are earned: original data, tools, guides and real relationships.

Free backlinks on one map

Your next step

Write your one-paragraph company description today, then filter the list above by your category and claim the first five listings that fit, filling in every field. Next week add five more, and in a month check Search Console and GA4 to see which ones Google found and which sent visitors. To see where your competitors already have links and mentions, read our guide to SEO competitor analysis.