Backlink research remains a cornerstone of competitive SEO analysis, but it’s a double-edged sword. Yes, you want a clear picture of your competitor’s link profile to spot opportunities, but spammy backlinks can easily inflate metrics and throw off your strategy. The question is: can you leverage Ahrefs’ Best Links feature to clean up competitor backlink research effectively?
In this guide, I’m diving into exactly how to use Ahrefs' Best Links feature ahrefs site explorer combined with a custom spam exclusion list to conduct competitor backlink analysis free from noise. We’ll look at how spam backlinks inflate metrics, why filtering differs from disavowing, and how to save and reuse your views efficiently inside Ahrefs Site Explorer.
Why Spam Backlinks Matter When Doing Competitor Backlink Analysis
When you pull up your competitor's backlink profile in tools like Ahrefs, you get a snapshot of all domains linking to them — including high-quality editorial links but also plenty of spammy and low-value backlinks. These spam backlinks typically come from:
- Link farms Network PBNs (private blog networks) Expired domains reused for backlinks Automated spam comments or directories
Why does this matter? Because spam backlinks can:
- Inflate Ahrefs metrics such as Domain Rating (DR) and URL Rating (UR). Distort the apparent quality of your competitor’s link profile. Waste your time vetting bad links you shouldn't emulate.
For example, in a recent audit, I uncovered 3,192 spam domains total pointing to a competitor site. Without filtering these out, it would’ve looked like this competitor has a massive, diverse link profile, when in reality most of the juice came from sketchy, low-quality sources.
Ahrefs Best Links: What Is It and Why Use It?
Ahrefs’ Best Links feature is a pre-filtered view inside Site Explorer showing only the top-performing backlinks for a website or page. “Best” usually means links that have high authority and relevance, and typically should be your focus during competitor backlink research.
The Best Links report helps you zero in on links that matter most, but note it isn’t foolproof. Since it’s algorithmically generated, some spammy or low-quality backlinks can still sneak in if they appear authoritative on the surface.
Using Best Links With a Custom Exclusion List to Clean Competitor Links
Here’s my tried-and-tested method to cleanly extract competitor backlinks leveraging Best Links and custom spam filtering:
Run a full backlink report: Enter your competitor’s domain into Ahrefs Site Explorer and export the entire backlink profile. Build your spam exclusion list: From experience, build a blocklist of domains often associated with spam — link farms, expired domains used repeatedly, suspicious subdomains, and so on. This blocklist grows over time as you audit more competitors. Combine Best Links with your exclusion list filters: Use the Best Links feature in Site Explorer and apply Exclude Domains using your spam list. This tightens the results to truly high-quality competitor backlinks. Save this filtered view as default: Ahrefs allows you to save filters as default or custom reports inside Site Explorer — a huge time saver. This way, every time you analyze a new competitor, you get a clean backlink view automatically. Analyze, vet, and export: With spam links excluded, your competitor backlink analysis is more precise, letting you identify valuable link targets without noise.Why Not Just Use Ahrefs' Spam Score or Awalytics Spam Filters?
Ahrefs itself does not provide a formal “spam score” like some other tools. Instead, your manual exclusion list is the key. Be wary of people loosely calling any filter a “spam score” — that’s a misuse of terminology and hides the manual judgment you have to make.
My personal blocklist currently contains over 200 repeat-offender domains — domains I see over and over in low-quality links across competitors. Merely relying on automated spam https://stateofseo.com/how-do-i-know-if-a-domain-is-a-pbn-network-site/ filters misses these repeated junk sources.
Filtering vs Disavow: Why It Matters In Competitor Link Research
When cleaning up your own backlink profile, disavow files are a powerful way to tell Google you don’t want certain backlinks counted. But when it comes to competitor backlink analysis, you’re only collecting competitive intelligence — no disavow needed.
You ever wonder why here are key points to keep in mind:
Filtering (In Ahrefs) Disavowing (In Google Search Console) Used to exclude spam and low-value domains during analysis Used to instruct Google to ignore harmful backlinks pointing to YOUR site Helps clean your competitor backlink reports so you can focus on quality links Has no effect on competitor profiles or your research Purely for internal research hygiene Critical for protecting your own site’s SEO healthBottom line: Use filtering inside Ahrefs to improve your competitor backlink analysis. Disavowing only applies to domains linking to your site, not competitors.
Practical Example: Cleaning a Competitor’s Links With 3,192 Spam Domains
Let me show you a quick walkthrough:
Competitor's domain shows 20,000 total backlinks but 3,192 are spam domains from my blocklist. Open Ahrefs Site Explorer > Best Links tab. Use the Exclude Domains filter field to paste your spam domain list separated by commas. Save the filter as “Clean Best Links View.” Results shrink to 12,508 backlinks — much cleaner, with much higher Domain Rating averages. Export top 200 links for outreach planning or gap analysis.This approach saved me hours by cutting out the noise and allowed me to confidently propose the best link targets to my client.
Final Thoughts on Using Ahrefs for Cleaner Competitor Link Research
Ahrefs Best Links is a powerful starting point, but relying on it alone without additional filtering risks chasing spammy, inflated backlink metrics. Building and applying a custom spam exclusion list within Site Explorer lets you:
- Exclude hundreds or thousands of low-value spam domains (e.g., 3,192 domains in one case) Save consistent filtered views for faster daily competitor link audits Avoid getting sidetracked by inflated or misleading metrics Focus your efforts on quality competitor links that offer actionable insights
Remember, filtering inside Ahrefs is an analyst’s hygiene step—disavowing is for protecting your own domain, not for competitor research.
If you want to clean competitor links effectively, make your own spam domain blocklist, combine it with the Best Links feature, and save filtered views for repeatable, clean backlink reports. This approach will save you countless hours and make your competitor backlink analysis significantly more accurate.
