Do-Follow Directories in 2026: We Checked the Links on 26
Every list of startup directories labels each site “do-follow” or “no-follow”, ours included. Founders pick directories on that label, because a followed link is the part they hope will help their SEO.
On 28 October 2026 we tested the label. We took the 30 directories people look up most on our site, read each one’s pricing page, and opened live listings to see what link a product actually gets. We could check 26. On 9 of them, our own label was wrong.
The short version
| Finding | Count |
|---|---|
| Directories checked | 26 (4 more blocked automated checks) |
| Marked do-follow on our list, but weren’t | 9 |
| Ordinary listings with a nofollow link | 9 |
| Listings with no direct link to the product at all | 2 |
| Free listing, or its followed link, requires a badge or link back | 8 |
| Followed link on free launches promised only to the top three | 6 |
| Paid only | 4 |
| Cheapest guaranteed followed link | $6 |
Where we could read the terms, no directory promised a followed link on a free listing without a condition. The condition is always one of four things: pay, win, add their badge, or wait.
What each directory actually gives you
“What we saw” is the rel attribute on the visit link of one to three live listings. We usually couldn’t tell whether a listing we checked was free or paid, so a do-follow result doesn’t prove that free listings get one. The last column is what the directory’s own pricing page says.
| Directory | What we saw | A followed link if… |
|---|---|---|
| Startups Lab | nofollow | you pay $6, or finish top three that week |
| Openhunts | do-follow | you pay $9.90, or finish top three |
| Open Launch | nofollow | you pay $12, finish top three that day, or show their badge |
| LaunchIgniter | do-follow | you pay $12, or finish top three (free also needs badge verification) |
| Toolsfine | do-follow | paid only: $16 |
| FoundrList | nofollow on free (their pricing table says so) | you pay $29 (free also needs their badge) |
| Micro SaaS Examples | nofollow | you pay $29 (free also needs their badge) |
| NextGen Tools | nofollow | you pay $29, or finish top three that week |
| startups.fyi | do-follow | paid only: from $29 |
| Turbo0 | do-follow | you link back to Turbo0, or pay $29.90 |
| TinyLaunch | do-follow on both listings | pricing only promises it to the top three and $39 Premium |
| MicroLaunch | do-follow on all three listings | the free route isn’t visible until you sign up; Launch Pro is $49 |
| Fazier | do-follow | free needs a backlink to Fazier; only $49 Premium guarantees one |
| Toolify | do-follow | paid only: $99 |
| ToolPilot | do-follow | you show their badge or logo on your site |
| findly.tools | do-follow on the tool page, nofollow on homepage cards | terms are behind a login |
| FinancesOnline | vendor links without nofollow | paid only: an advertising budget agreed with sales |
| TrustRadius | “Get started” link without nofollow on one vendor profile | unclear for free profiles |
| Launching Next | nofollow | none advertised ($99 buys faster review) |
| Tiny Startups | nofollow on both listings | the submit page says you can “earn” one |
| Open Alternative | nofollow | none advertised |
| Indie Hackers | nofollow | none advertised |
| AiTools | visit link goes through an aitools.inc redirect | none advertised; $129 skips a 30 to 90 day queue |
| Dang AI | no HTML link to the product at all | none; the free tier requires a backlink to Dang AI |
SoftwareSuggest and Killer Startups are the other two of the 26: we read their submission pages but couldn’t check a live listing’s link.
Free usually means a queue
The free option is still there on most of these sites, but it’s slow on purpose. The paid tier is sold as the way out.
- Open Launch: free launch slots were booked into 2027. $12 launches you the next day.
- Openhunts: the pricing page showed a free queue of about 60 weeks. $9.90 launches you next Monday, or their badge lets you skip the queue.
- AiTools: free listings take 30 to 90 days. $129 gets you placed in 24 to 48 hours.
- FoundrList: free launches go live in about four weeks; paid launches go live the same day.
- Dang AI: free listings can take up to four weeks to review; $49 takes about four days.
- Fazier: free listings are reviewed within 30 days.
If you’re submitting for free, plan for a long wait.
Badges are a link exchange, and sometimes a one-way one
Eight of the 26 make the free listing, or its followed link, depend on you linking back to them with a badge, a logo or a plain link. Google’s spam policies name “excessive link exchanges” and “requiring a link as part of a Terms of Service” as link spam, and in practice Google mostly ignores links like these. We cover the evidence in Do directory backlinks still help SEO?
Three cases stand out, because you link to them and get no followed link back:
- Dang AI requires a “crawlable backlink” to dang.ai for a free listing. On the two listings we checked, the product’s own page has no HTML link to the product at all: the “visit” button isn’t a link, and the URL only appears in the page’s structured data.
- FoundrList asks for its badge on free launches, and its own pricing table says free launches get a nofollow link.
- Micro SaaS Examples asks for a permanent badge on your landing page for a free listing. The free listing we checked was nofollow; the followed link comes with the $29 Pro plan.
Most “do-follow” links are for sale
The cheapest way to a guaranteed followed link on these sites is to pay: $6 on Startups Lab, $9.90 on Openhunts, $12 on Open Launch and LaunchIgniter, $16 on Toolsfine, and $29 on several others.
That’s cheap, but it’s also exactly the kind of link Google says should carry rel="sponsored" or rel="nofollow", because it was paid for (Google). Treat the fee as payment for the launch-day audience, the placement and the time saved. If the link counts, that’s a bonus.
The marketing copy and the HTML don’t always match
- Tiny Startups’ submit page leads with “Earn a DR 71 backlink” and “a powerful DR 71+ do-follow backlink”. Both live listings we checked had
rel="nofollow"on their Visit Website links. The wording is “earn”, and we couldn’t find out how a listing earns it. - Launching Next, Open Alternative, NextGen Tools and Open Launch were all marked do-follow on our list. The listings we checked were nofollow. Directories change their terms, so a label that was right once needs re-checking.
- Toolify marks its links
rel="dofollow". That isn’t a real value and does nothing. Any link withoutnofollow,ugcorsponsoredis followed, so Toolify’s links are followed anyway.
How to check a listing yourself
It takes about a minute per directory:
- Open a recent, ordinary listing, not a featured or sponsored one, since those often get better links.
- Right-click the “Visit” link and choose Inspect. Look at the
relattribute.nofollow,ugcorsponsoredmeans the link isn’t followed. Norel, or onlynoopener/noreferrer, means it is. - Check where the link points. If the address is on the directory’s own domain, such as
/go/websiteor/out?url=, it’s a redirect, not a direct link to the product. - If there’s no link to inspect, the “visit” button is probably run by JavaScript. Then there’s no link for search engines to follow.
- Check again after you’re listed. Terms change, and a free tier can switch to nofollow without notice.
How we checked
- We took the 30 directories whose profiles on our site had the most Google search impressions from July to October 2026, skipping two that had shut down.
- On 28 October 2026 we loaded each directory’s submission and pricing pages in a headless browser and noted prices, queues and badge rules.
- For each, we opened one to three recent listings and read the
relattribute of the visit link in the rendered page. Where no link appeared, we searched the page’s raw HTML for the product’s address. - We didn’t sign up, pay or submit anything, so terms shown only after login aren’t covered.
- Four sites blocked automated checks and weren’t included: SaaSHub, F6S, SoftwareWorld and StackShare.
Each directory’s profile on our site now shows what we found, the date we checked, and current pricing where we could confirm it. You can browse the do-follow directories on our list, but check the profile before you submit: “do-follow” usually comes with a condition.