Spam score
A domain's spam score indicates the degree to which one of our data partners believes it to be a 'spam' or junk domain, based on a scoring system outlined further below. This score can be a factor in determining whether a domain will appear on the following lists:
- Consider disavowing
- Consider for backlinks: friends of friends
- Consider for backlinks: friends of competitors
Due to the sampling methodology, spam scores may not be available for principal and/or competitor domains.
Interpreting spam score values
Spam score values are on a scale from 0 to 100:
| Spam score | Description |
|---|---|
| 0 | This is the best possible score |
| 1-15 | This is a low score |
| 16-30 | This is a medium score, and will usually contribute towards making a domain eligible for the consider disavowing list |
| 31-59 | This is a high score, and will usually contribute towards making a domain ineligible for the consider for backlinks: friends of friends and consider for backlinks: friends of competitors lists |
| 61-100 | This is a very high score, and almost always indicates a junk (or even malicious) domain |
Calculating spam score
A score is calculated per page, based on 18 signals, which are listed in the table below. The domain's spam score is calculated by taking the average score of its pages.
| Signal | Impact on score |
|---|---|
| Domain name length (including TLD*) is less than 3, equal to 3, or greater than 20 characters | +10 |
| Main domain contains more than or equal to 2 numeric characters | +15 |
| Subdomain contains more than or equal to 2 numeric characters | +20 |
| Domain contains one of the TLDs associated with spammy websites* (see the list below) | +20 |
| Page doesn’t contain link or script tags from trustworthy sources (Google, Bing, Facebook, Twitter) inside the head element | +20 |
| Page contains link or script tags from trustworthy sources (Google, Bing, Facebook, Twitter) inside the head element | -(number of sources * 5) |
| Page contains social meta tags | -15 |
| Page contains contact info | -20 |
| Page utilizes non-local rel canonical tag | +20 |
| Website uses the insecure HTTP protocol instead of HTTPS | +30 |
| Page doesn’t have a title tag or its title tag is less than 30 or greater than 65 characters | +5 |
| Page has a title tag and its title tag is greater than 30 and less than 65 characters | -5 |
| Page doesn’t have a description tag or its decsription tag is less than 40 or greater than 200 characters | +5 |
| Page has a description tag and its description tag is greater than 40 and less than 200 characters | -5 |
| Page has more than 10 keywords in the meta keywords tag | +15 |
| Page has more than 100 external links | +20 |
| Page has more than 500 internal links | +15 |
| Ratio of external links to internal links is greater than 3 | +15 |
*TLDs associated with spammy websites: .surf, .cn, .cfd, .ga, .biz, .hk, .pw, .icu, .top, .tw, .gq, .work, .cf, .cam, .ml, .bit.ly, .bit.do, .ow.ly, .goo.gl, .x.co, .rebrand.ly, .tinyurl.com, .t.co, .is .gd, .ht.ly, .xyz, .best
Visualising spam score
In the report interactive, Explore further > Quality metrics > Spam score applies the spam score palette to all non-dimmed domains in bands. This palette aligns to the 0-100 scale detailed above.
Viewing spam score values
All worksheets in the data tables (MS Excel file) for a report that list domains contain a
Spam score column for this attribute.