SEO Playground — SEO and Local SEO Dashboard

New: New Query Fan-Out page (surfaces the hidden sub-queries AI models generate when answering prompts, with their AI search volume). New AI Visibility page (see how often a domain/brand is mentioned by LLMs, and who dominates a topic). Nearly every results table across the app is now sortable and has a "Copy as Markdown" button. See the changelog below.

Work in progress — new DataForSEO endpoints are being added progressively.

SEO Playground is a self-hosted dashboard that lets you run SEO and local SEO queries directly against the DataForSEO API. Every search is saved locally in a SQLite database, so you can browse your history and revisit results without making additional API calls. There is no cloud infrastructure involved — everything runs on your machine.

If you find this useful, consider supporting the project:

Screenshots

Local Finder: grid search showing local rankings across a geographic area

Rank Tracker: monitor keyword positions over time for any domain

Google Reviews: rating distribution, monthly review chart, and rating goal calculator

Features

• Rank Tracker — Track keyword positions over time for any domain
• SERP Checker — Analyze Google organic results with target domain highlighting
• Ranked Keywords — Discover what keywords a domain ranks for
• Keyword Overview — Metrics (volume, CPC, competition) for a list of keywords
• Keyword Data — Google Ads & Bing keyword research
• Keyword Difficulty — Bulk difficulty scores via DataForSEO Labs
• Keyword Ideas — Keyword ideas from a seed with volume, difficulty and intent
• Search Intent — Classify keywords by search intent (informational, navigational, commercial, transactional)
• Related Keywords — Related keyword suggestions from a seed keyword
• Competitors — Find competing domains in the SERPs
• Domain Intersection — Common keywords between two domains
• Historical Rank — Ranking history overview for a domain
• Domain Categories — Thematic categories for any domain
• Subdomains — Top subdomains by organic traffic
• Traffic Estimation — Bulk organic traffic estimate for a list of domains
• Page Intersection (Labs) — Keywords shared between multiple pages
• Backlinks — Full backlink profile: list, referring domains, anchors, referring networks, history
• Backlinks Page Intersection — Pages linking to multiple of your targets simultaneously
• Backlinks Domain Intersection — Domains linking to you and a competitor
• Bulk Backlinks / Bulk Referring Domains — Aggregated backlink metrics for a domain list
• Local Finder — Google local pack results for any keyword and location, with map-based coordinate picker
• Geo-Grid Ranking — Local visibility heatmap across a configurable grid of points (3×3 to 11×11). Choose between three API modes: Live (~6 s, instant results), Priority (~1 min, 40% cheaper) or Standard (background queue, 70% cheaper). Results are color-coded by rank position and saved locally for later review. Includes a competitive landscape panel (top competitors by grid presence, with a one-click "view on grid" toggle) and a visibility-by-distance breakdown.
• On-Page Site Audit — Full site crawl with pages, links, resources, duplicate tags and non-indexable pages
• On-Page Instant Pages — Instant single-page audit without crawling
• Microdata Analysis — Structured data inspection for any crawled URL
• Content Parsing — Quality score, readability (ARI), word count, meta tags, content blocks
• Google Reviews — Fetch and analyze Google Business reviews: rating distribution, monthly chart, and rating goal calculator
• AI Optimization — Visibility in AI-generated answers
• AI Visibility — Target overview (mentions, AI search volume, source/platform breakdown) or topic leaderboard (top mentioned domains and brands) via DataForSEO LLM Mentions
• Reddit Mentions — Discover Reddit threads linking to or discussing your URLs
• Top Searches — Local search trends
• Settings — Store your DataForSEO credentials and defaults locally

Requirements

• Node.js 18+
• A DataForSEO account (API key)

Getting Started

Option 1 — Docker (recommended)

The easiest and fastest way to run the app. Docker builds a production image so the app is fully optimized.

# Build and start (first run)
docker compose up --build

# Subsequent runs
docker compose up

The database is persisted in ./data/seo-playground.db on your machine.

Option 2 — Node.js (production mode)

Faster than dev mode — build once, then run.

npm install
npm run build
npm start

Option 3 — Node.js (dev mode)

Convenient for development but noticeably slower — Next.js recompiles on every request and skips all optimizations. Not recommended for daily use.

npm install
npm run dev

Open http://localhost:3000 and go to Settings to enter your DataForSEO API credentials.

Testing

npm test

Runs the Vitest suite (dedupe/cache helpers). No DataForSEO credentials or network access needed — it uses a throwaway SQLite file.

Configuration

All settings (API credentials, default location, language, coordinates, domain) are stored locally in seo-playground.db (SQLite). No .env file is needed — configure everything from the Settings page.

Data Storage

Search history and results are cached locally in seo-playground.db. The database is created automatically on first run.

Tech Stack

• Next.js 15 — App Router, Server Actions
• React 19
• Tailwind CSS v4
• better-sqlite3 — local SQLite storage
• Leaflet — maps
• Lucide React — icons

Changelog

Full detailed history: CHANGELOG.md.

• 2026-08-30 — New Web Mentions page (brand sentiment monitoring via DataForSEO Content Analysis API). New "Trend over time" mode on AI Visibility (month-by-month mentions/volume via llm_mentions/historical). App-wide audit: added the first automated test suite (npm test, Vitest), fixed AI Optimization page missing caching/dedupe (was re-billing on every refresh), db.ts migrations swallowing real errors (not just "column already exists"), migrated ~40 pages onto a new shared callDataForSeo() API helper (uniform auth/error handling, catching a few real bugs along the way: SERP Checker and Domain Intersection silently swallowing API errors, Reddit and Content Parsing with no try/catch around their fetch), and closed the remaining dark mode gaps across ~30 files (Local Finder, Google Reviews, Keyword Data/Difficulty/Overview, Related/Ranked Keywords, Domain Intersection, Competitors, Rank Tracker, Backlinks, Reddit, OnPage, SERP Checker, AI Optimization) — every dashboard page is now fully dark-mode aware.
• 2026-08-09 — New Query Fan-Out page (hidden AI sub-queries + their search volume). New AI Visibility page (LLM mention tracking). Sortable tables + "Copy as Markdown" across ~30 pages. Fixed location targeting on Labs pages, Domain Categories names, Bulk Backlinks columns, repeated billing on double-submits app-wide, and blank "Related queries" pills on AI Optimization.
• 2026-07-25 — Geo-Grid competitive analysis (top competitors, visibility-by-distance) and several Geo-Grid reliability/cost-tracking fixes.
• 2026-06-01 — Geo-Grid Ranking split out into its own dedicated page.
• 2026-05-31 and earlier — Labs endpoint field-mapping fixes, Docker support, UI redesign, initial release of core rank tracking, keyword research, backlinks, and on-page features.

License

MIT