Are you searching for the best free SEO plugin for a WordPress blog? If so, you have landed in the perfect place. This article discusses the most popular and best free WordPress SEO plugin and its settings. The plugin name is the Rank Math SEO plugin. It is the best Yoast SEO alternative plugin.

Rank Math WordPress SEO plugin settings 2021
Rank Math WordPress SEO plugin settings 2022

What is Rank Math SEO?

Rank Math is a new generation of SEO plugin for WordPress. All SEO professionals are waiting for the most popular plugin Yoast SEO. Because of this multiple focus keyword optimization feature. So here is the Rank Math SEO plugin.

So today I wish to write about the Rank Math SEO plugin settings in this post. I have been using this plugin for a few months.  It is a great WordPress SEO plugin for writing content that is SEO-friendly and getting a higher ranking in search engines in 2020.

Why you need this Rank Math SEO Plugin?

WordPress is the most popular open source Content Management System (CMS) software. By using this CMS, you need to optimize your content as per SEO regulations. So you can rank the content on the first page of the search engines.

This is very difficult for non-techie guys to improve their SEO using no WordPress SEO Plugin. Even webmasters feel boredom coding updates to perform all SEO activities on their blog/website by looking at their source code. There are plenty of the best WordPress SEO plugins available in the WordPress plugin directory.

The Rank Math SEO plugin helps you optimize your content for search engines and outrank your competitors. This is the best SEO plugin for WordPress 2022.

Here is the time to say goodbye to the code editing process for blog SEO purposes. Here it simplifies your SEO activities in one place.

For WordPress users, WordPress SEO plugins simplify your SEO activities. It helps you optimize your content for better search visibility through advanced SEO activities by adding Schema Microdata, 404 error monitoring, etc. It is the best SEO plugin for WordPress users.

Rank Math WordPress SEO plugin and its settings 2022

It comes with awesome features to manage your content and website optimization features like in-built content optimization, keyword managing features, redirection manager and more.

Why is it available for free? Here the team explains why this plugin is given free of charge.

Features of Rank Math SEO Plugin

Every blogger and webmaster wants to find the perfect SEO plugin to perform all SEO activities from one place. It saves more time and produces better results.

Here is the perfect WordPress SEO Plugin—Rank Math SEO Plugin—if you are searching for the same thing.

The Rank Math SEO plugin is the best SEO plugin for on-page activities and technical optimization.

Here are the awesome features of Rank Math SEO. After reading these features, you cannot leave this plugin without grabbing it.

  • It is Light Weight and fully optimized for Speed.
  • Simple Modular Interface design
  • Simple User-Friendly Interface
  • Helpful Content In-depth SEO Analysis
  • Advanced SEO settings
  • Easy Rich Snippet setup
  • XML Sitemap creation
  • 404 Monitoring
  • Redirection
  • Social Media Sharing set up the feature
  • Easy Schema setting
  • Robots.txt and .htaccess editor

How to install and Configure Rank Math SEO plugin?

A rank Math SEO plugin is free. It is available in the WordPress Plugin repository.

Here are the steps to install.

Step 1: First login into your WordPress blog and

Step 2: go for Plugins > New and type Rank Math in the plugin search box. 

install plugin from wordpress
Search Rank math plugin from the WordPress plugin dashboard

Step 3: Install the Plugin and Activate it

After the plugin installation is done, you will be prompted with an authentication screen with a Rank Math official server like this.

rank math seo authentication
Connect Rank math Free account

It helps you get regular updates and support. If you want to know how to install a WordPress plugin, here is the article that explains this.

Now the plugin is visible in their menu on the left side column as “Rank Math”.

Rank Math option in side bar
Rank math complete options at backend of the wordpress

How to set up Rank Math Plugin for the first time?

Once you install and activate the Rank Math SEO Plugin, you need to grant permission from MyThemeShop’s official site.

To do this, click on Rank Math from the left side column and enter the Rank Math account login and activate the plugin officially.

If you did not have an account in Rank Math official site. Create a new account from here.

It is free. Once authenticated, the plugin performs a compatibility check and shows the Setup Wizard button. Click the button.

Here are the 6 steps

1. Import

  • The plugin has the inbuilt feature to import your existing SEO settings from the current SEO plugin. Here the plugin will scan and detects your exited SEO plugin settings, and it allows the required settings to import.
  • If you are using the Yoast SEO plugin, you will get the screen like below. Just choose and click on Start Import from SEO. It takes a few seconds to import the data from Yoast SEO to Rank Math SEO.
  • Once the process is complete, click the Continue button.
Getting started start wizard
Start setup wizard

2. Your Site

In this step, enter your blog’s details like blog type, Logo upload, and default social share image details. Once you fill in the details, click on Save and Continue.

  • Setup for the general blog: Choose any of the given – Personal blog (or) Personal Portfolio (or) Other Personal Website forms the drop-down-list
  • Setup for Business: Choose any of the given – Small Business (or) WebShop (or) other Business Website from the drop-down list
Your site details

3. Search Console

Connect your Google Search Console account here by clicking the Get Authorization Code.

google search console integration

Enter Google Search Console login details

Grant the access of your account by clicking on Allow button 

allo google search console

Google will provide an authentication code. Just copy the code and paste it in the Search Console settings and click on Allow

copy the authorization code

Choose your blog from the account and click on the save and continue button.

4. Sitemaps

  • Sitemaps are the search engine indexing files, and it helps you discover the blog content to index properly.
  • It would be best to choose which files to be included in this file like Posts, Pages, Media (images, Videos, and Audio), Products, categories, and tags.
  • Just select the options which you want to include in the sitemap of your blog. Finally, click the Save and Continue button to go for the next step.
sitemaps creation

5. Optimization

This step helps you to optimize your site as per SEO instructions. It provides great SEO value and saves a lot of time. It has No-follow Image links, No-follow External links, redirect status, and Search engine validation zones. Just choose the options as per your SEO requirements.

optimization setup

6. End of Setup

This is the last step of the Rank Math SEO Plugin. Just click the Allow button. Once the site is ready, scroll down and click the link “Return to Dashboard” link for an additional option.

Ready the final step

Now Your site ready with Rank Math SEO plugin.

What are the basic options and it’s Rank Math Settings?

The Rank Math WordPress SEO Plugin settings:

1. Dashboard

After installation and activation of this plugin, it will redirect the page to the Plugin Dashboard. This dashboard is having the following options.

welcome to rank math
  • About: This tab gives information about initial guidance.
  • Modules: This is the place to Enable/Disable 404 Monitor, Redirections, Rich Snippets, Role Manager, Search Console, SEO Analysis, and Sitemap. You can activate any module as per your site requirements.
  • Help: This is a knowledge center. Here, you may get the product support by raising the ticket for technical support.
  • System Info: The system info tab gives the complete details of WordPress Environment, Server environment, Client Environment, Theme Information, and Installed Plugin details. It is a helpful option.
  • Setup Wizard: It helps you to configure the plugin in 6 steps. The wizard designed in 6 steps–Getting Started, Import, Your Site, Search Console, Sitemaps, Optimization, and Ready to use.
  • Import & Export: You can import and Export your plugin settings from one site to another.

2. Analytics

Rank math Analytics feature is a newly added feature with limited features in free version. The complete version is in development mode. May be this feature will be available in the pro version.

Rank math plugin - ANALYTICS feature

First, you have to connect your blog’s Google search console and Google Analytics accounts by completing their systematic authentication process. After a few steps, you get the complete Analytics dashboard.

Rank math Analytics dashboard

The Analytics Dashboard is having 4 different tabs. they are Basic dashboard, Site Analysis, SEO performance and Keywords.

  • Basic dashboard: This area gives the overall optimization score, General analytics (Search impressions, Total keywords, Search Clicks, and CTR), and keyword positions data. You can check these data from the specified boxes by clicking on the Open report link. This data will be sync from your Google Search Console and Google Analytics accounts.
  • Site Analysis: This tab explains the SEO score of your existed posts score-wise. It separated the optimized and unoptimized posts. You can concentrate on the unoptimized posts for further improvements.
  • SEO Performance: This is the place to know your blog performance in the Search engines by understanding the data like Search impressions, total keywords, search clicks, CTR, and Average positions of your content.
  • Keywords: This is the place to know the positions of your ranked keywords in the search engines.

let us see more advanced features like adsense integration in their Rank Math pro versions.

3. General Settings

To choose this option got for Rank Math > General Settings. You will reach the General options page. Here all the settings will be organized into tabs. Here is the list.

Links: This is the first tab. Here the settings are available that change the behaviour of links of your blog/website.

seo settings LINKS

Images: This is the tab for image SEO. Here it contains 2 settings. They are “Add missing ALT attributes” (helps you to add ALT text) and “Add missing TITLE attributes (helps you to create image ALT attribute).

seo settings images

Breadcrumbs: This is having only one setting. Just Enable it. (Recommended). Keep all default settings.

seo settings BREADCRUMBS

Webmaster tools: This is the place to verify the ownership of the site in the various search engine tools. You can verify your site by entering the verification code for various third-party webmaster tools like Google Search Console, Bing Webmaster tools, Pinterest Verification ID, Norton Safe Web verification ID.

seo settings WEBMASTER TOOLS

Edit robots.txt: You can edit your Robots.txt file from here virtually. Keep this file’s default settings with no change if you are a newbie. If you have an idea about this file, use it. This file gives the direction of crawling and indexing access to index in the search engines.

Edit .htaccess: It is a configuration file that helps users and a search engine to navigate your site. Better to leave this default setting.

SEO SETTING edit htaccess

404 Monitor: Every website has 404 errors. This option rectifies 404 error problems. Rank Math’s 404 monitor helps you to resolve this issue.

SEO settings 404 monitor

Redirections: This is a built-in redirection manager feature that helps you get rid of 404 errors.

SEO settings REDIRECTIONS

Others: This tab has some additional options like Usage Tracking, RSS content setup.

4. Titles & Meta

On this page, give the details like Global Metadata, Social Media details, Home Page details, Author details, Miscellaneous Pages, Post–Page – media set up as per Google guidelines and Taxonomies configuration like categories–tags details.

Configure this page carefully. Add titles and meta descriptions carefully by using related keywords as per your blog type (or) niche.

SEO titles and Meta settings

5. Sitemap Settings

A sitemap is an important file; it sends the signal from your blog to Search engines after update your blog. It helps you to index your blog post content. In this section, you need to choose which one to include in the sitemap, like Authors, Post types, and taxonomies. Just select the options to have which one in the sitemap.

They turn the sitemap feature ON by default. Keep the default settings with no change.

sitemap settings

6. 404 Monitor

404 Errors are not a big problem with this plugin. This plugin monitors 404 errors and informs you. You can redirect the page to other pages. It protects from bad SEO.

404 monitor

7. Redirections

You can set up temporary or permanent redirections by using this option. Combined with the 404 monitors, you can redirect fault URLs on your site or add custom redirections.

If you are getting 404 errors, this option will help you. By using this, you can redirect the error page or broken link to similar or relevant pages without disturbing the reader.

If you want to redirect the broken link or an error page, this is the best option to protect the user’s bad experience by redirection.

redirections

8. SEO Analysis

It is an awesome tool added in this plugin to analyze your site SEO from the WordPress Dashboard. This feature will start the Analysis of your site with a simple click.

On-Page optimization is essential for the article ranking in search engines. It depends on some other factors like caching, URL structure, and Pagination. So it would help if you spent hours to rectify these issues. But this feature will save you valuable time. It scans your site within 5 to 10 seconds and will give complete details about your site SEO.

To start this Analysis, just go to Rank Math > SEO Analysis then click the “Start Site-Wide Analysis” button.

SEO analysis report

The final Reports is here. by following the instructions, you can improve the site SEO.

9. Import and Export

You can Import your previous backed up settings in this section. You can export the Rank Math Settings for further reuse on another blog. In this section, you will have Export settings, Import Settings, Plugin Importer and Backup section.

import and Export settings
  • In Export Settings, you can export the panel settings by choosing which settings to export, like General settings, Titles & Metas, Sitemap settings, and Role Manager Settings.
  • In Import Settings, You can import the plugin settings page from your desktop.
  • In Plugin Importer, You can import the existed SEO plugin settings with a simple single click.

How to Optimize Content with Rank Math SEO Plugin?

The Rank Math content SEO and Yoast Content SEO is almost the same. If you have a great experience with the Yoast SEO analysis tool, you can easily optimize Rank Math content.

Here are the 4 parts in the Rank Math SEO analysis tool. This part appears below the post editor. They are

1. General

In the General tab, you will get the complete content analysis tool. Here you can see again 4 places

content analyzer GENERAL

Focus Keyword:

  • This is the central part of Content Analysis. Just add your target keyword to optimize the content.
  • You can add multiple keywords (up to 3)
  • If you optimize your content with multiple keywords, add those keywords and select every keyword before you start optimization.
  • It shows a preview of the search engine snippet if someone searches with a specific keyword in search engines.

SEO Title:

  • Write the Title here with eye-catchy lines.
  • When you add the title here, they will show it in the SERPs.

Permalink Structure:

  • Permalink means blog post URL.
  • You can edit the blog post URL from here.
  • Add the focus keyword in the permalink structure.
  • Do not add more than five words.
  • Do not add numbers and special characters

Meta Description:

  • In the Meta description, what you add, will show on the SERP page.
  • Add 160 character description here.
  • Prepare the description by including the focus keyword and some related keywords
Rank Math Post Editor Screen
Overview of the Rank math optimization panel in the Post editor

Here is the Analysing tool interface after optimization. It is optimizing with 4 different aspects like Basic SEO, Additional, Title Readability, and Content Readability.

2. Advance SEO Settings

content analyzer ADVANCED settings

Under this tab, you can configure Advanced SEO settings. Here you can choose post indexing – deindexing feature, canonical URL addition, Sitemap adding a feature, and Custom redirection setup.

3. Rich Snippets

You can set up a rich snippet feature without messing with Schema and Microdata.

content analyzer RICH SNIPPET

4. Social

You can use this place to configure Social data like Title, Description and featured Image for Facebook, and Twitter.

Rank Math - SOCIAL

Rank Math Vs Yoast SEO Vs All-in-One SEO Plugin

FeaturesRank Math SEOYoast SEOAll In One SEO
Installs With Optimal Settings
Setup Wizard
Site Compatibility Check
Automatic Canonical URLs
Integrates LSI Keyword Tool
Keyword Rank Tracking
Integrates Google Search Console
Import From Yoast
Import From AIO
Import AIO Rich Snippets
Advanced SEO Analysis Tool
70+ SEO Tests
Actual SEO Analysis Score
SEO Warnings
SEO Failed Tests
Auto Image SEO
Custom Post Type
Bulk Edit Titles & Descriptions
Google SERP Preview
Analysis Of Content
Title, Page & Meta Description Control
Adds Additional Meta Data Automatically
Focus Keyword
Robots Meta
Google Keyword Suggestion
Optimize 5 Keywords
Pillar Content
Internal Link Suggest
Capitalize Titles
Google Crawl Error Fix
XML Sitemap
Includes Redirection Manager
Auto Post Redirect (Changed URL)
301, 302, 307, 410,451 Redirects
Regex Support
Redirect Attachments To Parent
Finds All 404’s
WP Role Manager
Google Schema Rich Snippets
Rich Snippet Types: Article, Book,
Course, Event, Job Posting,
Local Business, Music, Person,
Product, Recipe, Restaurant, Review, Service, Software/App, Video
193 Local Business Types
Optimize Social Media
Overlay Icons On Social Images
Open Graph Thumbnail
Facebook Open Graph
FB Authorship
FB Open Graph For Homepage
Twitter Meta Cards
Default Twitter Card Type
Social Previews
Default Image For Sharing
Knowledge Graph Support
URL For SERPS: Google+,
Linkedin, Instagram, YouTube,
Pinterest, SoundCloud, Tumblr,
Myspace
Represent Site As Person/Company
Separator Choice
Modify Global Meta
Strip Category Base
Remove Stopwords From URLs
Verify Site With Google, Bing
Verify Site With Baidu
Verify Site With Yandex
Verify Site With Alexa
Verify Site With Pinterest
SEO Breadcrumbs
Advanced Link Options
Nofollow External Image Links
Nofollow External Links
External Links In New Tab
Ping Search Engines
Contact Info Shortcode
EDD Compatible
PHP-FIG Coding Standards
Archive Pages Optimization
Author Pages Optimization
Robots & .htaccess Editor
Optimize RSS
Multisite Compatible
Detailed Documentation
Contextual Help
Round The Clock Support??

Pros and Cons of Rank Math WordPress SEO Plugin

👍 PROS

  • More Premium SEO features in a single plugin
  • Lightweight & Speed Optimized
  • Completely Free
  • Beginner Friendly User Interface
  • Modular Design
  • Easy to import all SEO settings from other Plugins

👎 CONS

  • Content SEO Analysis need to improve
  • Switching to another plugin is a little harder

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) on Rank Math Plugin

  1. What is rank math SEO?

    Rank math is an SEO plugin for WordPress, which helps you optimize content with built-in suggestions based on the best practices. It gives you complete control over your entire website’s on-page SEO.

  2. Is rank math free?

    Yes. The Rank math plugin is entirely free for starters with a wide range of features. If you need advanced features like keywords tracking, schema generator, and priority support, you need to upgrade to the premium version.

  3. How do I switch from Yoast to Rankmath?

    The switching from Yoast to rank math is relatively easy. There is an option to import the Yoast SEO settings. First, you need to install the rank math plugin and activate it. After successfully activating the rank math SEO plugin, you need to import Yoast SEO settings to rank math. Total SEO settings will be imported within a few seconds, and you will be deactivated automatically.

  4. What is an SEO plugin for WordPress?

    The plugin covers all the SEO problems like technical SEO and on-Page SEO of the site, which is called “SEO Plugin for WordPress” sites. The best SEO plugins for WordPress 2023are Rank math, Yoast SEO, SEOPress, All in one SEO pack, SEO squirrely, etc. These plugins will cover 90% of the site SEO, including technical and On-Page SEO.

  5. What is pillar content?

    Pillar content is the in-built feature of the Rank math plugin. It is substantive, and Pillar content is the in-built feature of the Rank math plugin. It is a substantive and informative piece of content on a specific topic divided into small parts. The rank math allows you to add the range designed to answer age-old questions bound to be asked for years to come. Simply pillar content is an evergreen piece of content.

  6. What is the best free SEO plugin for WordPress?

    There are more than 10 WordPress SEO plugins are available in the WordPress plugin directory free of cost. Among all, Rank math and Yoast SEO plugin are more popular with their active installations. I used the Yoast SEO plugin for eight years. In 2019, I switched to Rank math because of their uniqueness and advanced feature at free of cost. Most of the features which are offered in the Yoast premium as free options in rank math. So I am very much happy with the Rank math WordPress plugin than Yoast.

Final Words on Rank math SEO plugin

The Rank Math SEO plugin stores no data on its servers. It stores the data within your WordPress blog database only. So they protect your data. The team is giving more priority to the webmaster’s data safety. The group adds more features like internal linking in future versions, providing the best performing keywords-pages using the Analytics feature to make it the best website ranking tool.

In the last step of the Wizard setup, we are permitting by clicking the button ALLOW. Here the developers see your Rollbar data only.

The Rollbar is an error tracking and crash-reporting tool. Using this Rollbar data, the developers will suggest better options according to your site type for better performance and ranking in search engines.

Note: Personally, I recommend this free SEO WordPress plugin for all types of blogs and WordPress sites. The plugin was updated with the FAQ Schema feature in Version 1.0.39. It helps you display the questions and answers in the SERPs.

No doubt Rank math WordPress SEO plugin is the best Yoast SEO alternative. Rank Math is quickly becoming the best SEO tool for a WordPress site.

Rank Math SEO Plugin

Satish Ithamsetty

Ease of Use
Support
Performance
Optimization

Summary

Rank Math SEO WordPress plugin is one of the best WordPress SEO tools for every SEOs working on the WordPress platform. It is a free plugin. It helps you to optimize your site and pages with simple clicks.

5

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2 Comments

  1. RankMath is one of the finest SEO plugin and creating a buzz with all its fully loaded features. Users are shifting to it from Yoast, as it is offering mode SEO premium features for absolutely free..

    Certainly worth giving a try. Thanks Saying, have a great day ahead!

    Navin

  2. RankMath is one of the finest SEO plugin and creating a buzz with all its fully loaded features. Users are shifting to it from Yoast, as it is offering mode SEO premium features for absolutely free..

    Certainly worth giving a try. Thanks Saying, have a great day ahead!

    Navin

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