How to check if a backlink is dofollow (and what ~15 launch sites actually gave us)

redzuntrax redzuntrax — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 08:53:45 +0000

When you launch a side project, the advice is always the same: submit it to directories and launch sites for backlinks. What nobody mentions is that a lot of those links are nofollow, sit behind a redirect, or are added with JavaScript that search engines may never count.

This week we submitted one product to about 15 launch sites and checked every listing. Here's how to check yours, and what we found.

What makes a link dofollow

There's no dofollow attribute. A link is "dofollow" when it's a normal link to your site without any of these in its rel attribute:

nofollow: "don't count this link"
ugc: user-generated content (comments, forum posts)
sponsored: paid or affiliate links

noopener and noreferrer are about security and privacy, not SEO. A link with only those is still dofollow.

<!-- dofollow -->
<a href="https://yourtool.com" rel="noopener">Visit</a>

<!-- nofollow -->
<a href="https://yourtool.com" rel="nofollow noopener">Visit</a>

Check it in 30 seconds

Open your listing.
Right-click the link to your site and choose Inspect.
Look at href and rel.

Or paste this into the browser console on the listing page. It lists every link to your domain and its rel:

const domain = "yourtool.com";
[...document.querySelectorAll("a[href]")]
  .filter(a => new URL(a.href, location.href).hostname.endsWith(domain))
  .forEach(a => console.log(a.href, "rel=" + (a.rel || "(none)")));

Three ways a "backlink" isn't one

1. A redirect instead of a link. If href points to something like /go/your-tool or l.directory.com/..., the directory links to itself, not to you.

2. Added by JavaScript. If the link only appears after scripts run, the console snippet will find it, but the HTML the server sends may not contain it. Compare with View page source (Ctrl+U): if your domain isn't there, crawlers that don't run JavaScript won't see the link either.

3. Hidden from logged-out visitors. Some sites show the outbound link only to signed-in users. Check in a private window.

What 15 launch sites gave us

Several boards make free listings nofollow and give a dofollow link only to the weekly top 3 or to paid launches.
Some are dofollow only while their badge is on your site.
Free queues ranged from about 5 weeks to about 5 months.
The fastest dofollow listing came from a site that only needed its badge on our homepage: live the same day.

Re-check after a month

Directories change free listings to nofollow, or remove them, more often than you'd think. Put a reminder in your calendar for 30 days after each listing goes live.

If you don't want to open DevTools every time, we made a free checker that fetches one page (respecting robots.txt) and tells you whether your link is there and whether it's dofollow: https://dirproof.com/dofollow-checker?utm_source=devto&utm_medium=article

We launched Dirproof, the hand-checked directory list behind these notes, on Product Hunt today: https://www.producthunt.com/products/dirproof

I re-checked 22 "free" AI tool directories by hand. Here is what changed.

redzuntrax redzuntrax — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 07:02:30 +0000

Lists of "free directories to submit your AI tool" get copied from blog post to blog post. Directories change faster than those lists do. In October 2026 I went through 22 directories that were on my own list as free, opened every submit page, and wrote down what I actually saw. Nothing below is from a vendor page or a guess. If a form did not show something, I left it out.

The short version

4 of 22 are no longer free. TopAI.tools, There's An AI For That and Best AI Brands now show paid options only on their submit pages. Microlaunch's launch button offers only a paid "Pro Launch".
3 of the remaining ones are free only if you link back. ToolPilot, Vantaige and Dofollow.Tools ask you to put their badge and a link on your own site before a free listing is reviewed.
"Free" often means "slow". Launching Next showed an estimated queue of about 4 months for free submissions. ToolPilot says its free option can take up to 60 days. Vantaige says 2 to 4 weeks.
Some free links are nofollow. Vantaige's free path says its "Visit website" links stay nofollow. Trustpilot's profile links are rel="nofollow noopener".

Details worth knowing before you submit

Dofollow.Tools. Two steps: tool info, then plan. The free option has a site-wide quota of 5 submissions per day. When it is full, the button changes to "Today's Free Slots Full". The free link stays dofollow only while their badge is on your site. You need to sign in before the submission is saved.

SaaSHub. You need an account. Listing competitors gets you reviewed sooner, and verifying with an email on your product's domain gives priority. The form has two submit buttons: the first one is the paid "Priority+", the second one is "Free". Pressing Enter in the form triggers the first one, so click "Free" instead.

AlternativeTo. You must confirm your email before the "Suggest new application" form opens, and the confirmation link expires quickly. Read their rules on links in the description and UTM tags on the website URL first; I kept both out. After submitting, suggest at least one existing app as an alternative. They say apps without alternatives rarely show up in search.

BetaList. You paste your URL and it drafts the name, pitch, description and topics from your homepage in about 30 seconds. Read the draft before you accept it. Mine was accurate, but it added a little marketing language I removed.

ToolPilot. The form is long: name, company, email, logo (500x500 JPG with a background color), tagline, description, overview, five features, platform, pricing and billing options. The terms say tools that are not AI tools may not be accepted.

Peerlist. Launchpad requires a verified personal profile (ID, workplace, school or bootcamp), a real name and photo, and a project that is 100% filled in. Launches happen on Mondays.

What I would do differently

Check the submit page the week you submit, not the list you saved last month.
Keep one honest description per directory and stay within each form's limits. Some count characters, Launching Next asks for a 5 to 8 word headline.
Write down the date, the result and the link type for each directory. After a few weeks you will know which ones were worth it.

About the list

I keep the list I used for this at Dirproof. It is free: each directory shows the link type, whether it is free, whether the form works, the domain rating and the date I last checked it. When something changes, it goes on the updates page. If you find a directory on it that has changed, tell me and I will re-check it.

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