You don’t wake up and think “today I’ll switch broken link checkers.” You switch because your current tool did one of these: timed out, missed half the site, or gave you a report that’s technically correct but emotionally unhelpful.

This post is a practical list of alternatives — by category — so you can pick the right kind of tool and move on with your life. (Bonus: a tiny selection checklist so you don’t buy a spaceship when you needed a bicycle.)

When it’s time to switch

  • It times out or caps crawls before you get anything useful.
  • It misses JS-rendered links (React/Vue routes, client-side nav, etc.).
  • No “found on” context — you get broken URLs but not where they came from.
  • Exports are painful (or non-existent), so fixing becomes manual detective work.
  • You need a workflow: recurring checks, team handoff, or client reporting.

Alternatives by type (pick your lane)

1) Web-based checkers (fast, shareable, usually simplest)

Use a web checker when you want quick results, a clean export, and no installation. This is ideal for small-to-mid sites, content audits, or quick “is this page full of 404s?” checks.

  • Try: TinyUtils Dead Link Finder (great for “paste URL → export results”).
  • Also consider: tools like Dr Link Check for a more monitoring/reporting vibe.

2) Desktop crawlers (deep crawling + rules + full control)

If your site is large, complex, or JS-heavy, desktop crawlers are the grown-up tools. They can crawl deeper, apply rules, extract data, and generally tell you more. The tradeoff is time: setup time, crawl time, and “why is my laptop fan doing this?” time.

  • Screaming Frog — powerful, flexible, widely used for audits.
  • Sitebulb — strong reporting and “explain the issue” output.
  • Integrity (Mac) — lightweight option for simpler scans.

3) SEO suites (broken links + audit + backlinks + reporting)

If you’re already paying for an SEO suite, the “broken link” problem often shows up inside a bigger job: site health, backlink cleanup, content planning, and reporting. Suites can be great because they connect errors to context.

  • Ahrefs — excellent for backlink-driven prioritization.
  • Semrush — strong project and reporting workflows.

4) Monitoring tools (alerts instead of audits)

If your site changes constantly, running “big crawls” is like sweeping during a sandstorm. Monitoring tools are built for “tell me when it breaks” and “show me what changed.”

  • ContentKing (example of this category) — continuous checks and alerts.
  • Or roll your own routine: schedule a crawl, export, and track deltas. (If you like control, this can be surprisingly effective.)

A simple selection matrix

Pick the row that matches your reality:

Your situation Pick this Why
Small site, quick checks Web checker Fast feedback, easy export, minimal setup
Large / JS-heavy site Desktop crawler Deeper crawling, more control, better diagnostics
Backlink cleanup & prioritization SEO suite Connect broken pages to link and traffic signals
You want alerts (not quarterly audits) Monitoring Catch issues early, reduce “surprise” outages

The “don’t regret this later” checklist

Before you commit to a new tool, confirm it can do these:

  • Exports: CSV (at minimum). Bonus: include “found on” pages and anchor text.
  • Redirect detail: show chains/loops (or at least final destination).
  • Controls: crawl limits, include/exclude patterns, and a polite rate limit.
  • JS support (if needed): if your site relies on client-side rendering, basic crawls can lie to you.
  • Repeatability: can you run the same check next week and compare results?
Tiny rule of thumb: if you can’t hand the export to “future you” (or a teammate) and fix links in under an hour, you didn’t pick a tool — you picked a hobby.

A note on “false positives”

Sometimes a link checker reports a bunch of 403/429 errors and you panic… but the site is just rate-limiting crawlers. Before you treat it as a real broken link wave:

  • Re-test a few URLs in a normal browser.
  • Check whether the failures cluster on one domain (often a sign of blocking).
  • Look for a tool that can slow down per host, or retry politely.

Quick picks (if you’re impatient)

  • Fast scan + CSV export: TinyUtils Dead Link Finder
  • Deep technical audit: a desktop crawler (Screaming Frog / Sitebulb style)
  • Backlink-driven cleanup: an SEO suite that shows referring domains and link value
  • Ongoing monitoring: an alerting/monitoring tool (or a scheduled crawl you control)

Next steps

If you want the simplest starting point, run a scan with TinyUtils Dead Link Finder. Then use the workflow in How to Find and Fix Broken Links for SEO to prioritize and ship clean fixes.