Footprint checker · no hosting needed
Find what joins your sites together before somebody else does
Anyone can look up your nameservers, read the tracking codes in your page source, compare two of your footers or search the public certificate logs. None of it needs special tools. The footprint checker runs those checks for you, across every site you choose at once, scores the set out of 100, and tells you what each finding means and exactly what to change.
- No hosting plan needed
- Your sites, wherever they are hosted
- From $7/month
- PayPal, card or crypto
A footprint is not something one site has. It is what a set of sites has in common — which is why the score belongs to a group of sites, and why a checker that looks at one site at a time cannot tell you anything useful.
What we check
All of it is public. That is rather the point: if we can see it, so can anyone.
Addresses and nameservers
The two lookups anyone starts with. Sites answering on one address, or using one nameserver pair, are joined up by a single public query — no comparing of pages needed at all.
Tracking codes
Analytics accounts, tag containers, advertising ids, pixels and verification codes sit in your page source where anybody can read them. There are free tools that take one code and list every site carrying it.
The build
The theme, the plugin list and the version line each site announces. One site on a popular theme means nothing; several sites on the same theme and the same plugins is a signature.
Re-used pieces
The site icon, robots.txt and the footer wording. People rewrite the words on a page and forget all three — and an identical icon is a byte-for-byte match anyone can test.
Links between your sites
The most visible connection there is, because every crawler follows links by design. We show you which of your sites point at which.
Mail records
Where each domain hands its mail. Public, and nearly always forgotten, because it has nothing to do with the pages themselves.
Registration details
The registrar, and whether a domain publishes a registrant name instead of a privacy service. Registration records are searchable by name.
Certificate history
Every certificate ever issued for a domain is written into public logs. One certificate naming several of your domains joins them up permanently — and unlike a page you can edit, a log entry cannot be taken back.
Whether the site answers directly
We ask the address in public DNS for the site by name, going around whatever sits in front of it, and report what actually happened.
Findings you can act on, not a list of numbers
Severity that means something
Severity is about how strongly a signal ties your sites together, not about how alarming it sounds. A shared analytics code is critical because one lookup returns your whole list. A shared registrar is minor, because millions of domains share one.
Which sites, every time
Each finding lists the sites it affects, so you can see whether it is two sites or forty before you decide what to do about it.
A fix in plain words
Not “shared NS detected” but what it means, why it matters and the change to make. Where we can do it for you, there is a button.
What came back clean
We tell you what we checked and found nothing wrong with — and we only ever say that about a check that actually ran and actually passed.
Filters, saved views, CSV
Filter by severity or search for a domain, save a filter you will want again, and export the lot as a CSV to hand to whoever does the work.
A score you can watch
The score history is on every report, so you can see what your changes actually did rather than guessing.
Check what you like
One site, a group, or everything
Run the whole account first to see the picture. Then use your site groups — which is usually what you want when different groups point at different money sites, because a link between two groups matters far more than one inside a group.
Add sites you host elsewhere
Your network is rarely all in one place. Add domains hosted anywhere and they are checked alongside the rest, so the report covers the whole set rather than part of it.
Fix, then re-check
Press Check now whenever you have made a change, and watch the score move.
Simple pricing
Prices in US dollars per month. Pay for 1, 3, 6 or 12 months with PayPal (which also takes cards) or crypto. No hosting plan needed. Every site you host with us is included and never uses a slot.
Monthly
- Every site you host with us, checked once a month
- One site, a group, the whole account or a selection
- 20 “Check now” runs a month on top
- An automatic re-check when something material changes
- Filters, saved views and CSV export
Weekly
- The same checks every week, so a change is caught in days rather than a month
- 60 “Check now” runs a month
- Everything in Monthly
Sites hosted elsewhere are added in packs, from $3 a month for 5, then 10, 25, 50 and 100 — up to $30 a month for 100. Packs stack and mix, so any number works: 130 sites is 100 + 25 + 5. Add or drop a pack whenever you like, and removing a site frees its slot straight away.
No hosting needed
The footprint checker is sold on its own and works on any sites you own, wherever they are hosted. Create an account, choose “No hosting needed”, and it is in your menu straight away. If you do host with us, those sites are included automatically and never use an external slot — and each site’s page gets a Footprint checker tab.
Pairs well with
Part of the PBN.LTD SEO tools — buy any three and save 20%.
Read the full guide
Step by step, with screenshots of every screen: The Footprint Checker – What Publicly Joins Your Sites Together.
Questions people ask
Do I need a hosting plan?
No. The footprint checker is sold on its own and works on any sites you own, hosted with us or anywhere else.
Can I check sites that are not hosted with you?
Yes, and you should — a report only tells you the whole story when it can see the whole set. Sites hosted elsewhere are added in packs that stack and mix, so any number works. Sites you host with us are always included and never use a slot.
What does the score mean?
100 means nothing we can find publicly ties those sites together. Each real finding costs points according to how strongly it links them and how much of the set it covers — so one shared icon across two of forty sites is not treated like the same icon across all forty. Shared infrastructure that comes from hosting with us — our mail platform, our nameservers, our edge — is never one of those findings: it is shown separately, as reassurance, because it is shared with a very large number of unrelated customers and never affects your score. The same kind of sharing on a site hosted elsewhere is a real footprint and is scored in full, with a note on how bringing the site here removes it.
Will this hide my sites from Google?
No, and nothing honestly could. What it does is show you the connections a person or a tool could follow between your sites, and tell you how to break each one. What you do about them is your decision.
How often does it run?
Every month, or every week on the higher tier. You can also press Check now within a fair-use number each month, and we re-check automatically when something material changes — a new site, a nameserver change, a move to a different content network, a theme change.
Will it e-mail me constantly?
No. We e-mail only when the score drops or a new kind of finding appears, never one message per finding, and never more than one per check. You can turn them off entirely.
What about sites hosted with you — do they share anything?
Yes, deliberately: mail, nameservers and the edge are shared with a very large number of unrelated customers, which is why none of it counts against your score — the report shows it in its own “Checked and clean” section instead of as a finding, so you can see exactly what was checked. The checker does not take our word for that: it tests the leak paths on your actual sites — certificate history, mail records, whether the address answers for the site directly — and reports what it measured. If something about the hosting ever does leave a real mark that should not be there, that is ours to fix, we fix it for everyone, and we still show it to you rather than quietly passing it — we just never mark your score down for our own mistake.
See what a competitor would find
From $7 a month, any sites you own, no hosting plan required.
Footprint checker — prices today
- Monthly$7.00/monthEvery site checked every month
- Weekly$19.00/monthEvery site checked every week
- +25 external sites$10.00/month+25 external sites
Buy several tools together and save. Put 3 or more SEO tools in one order and you take 20% off the combined monthly price. Pay for 12 months at once and you save a further 16.67% on top — about two months free. Terms offered: 1 month, 3 months, 6 months and 12 months. Build your bundle →
Step-by-step guide: The Footprint Checker – What Publicly Joins Your Sites Together in the knowledge base.
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