100+ High Domain Authority Sites for Backlinks (2026 List)

The fastest way to find high domain authority sites for backlinks is to start with platforms that already carry enormous link equity and let you publish, pitch, or create a profile yourself. Below is a free, categorized list of 100+ real sites: profile pages, directories, guest-post-friendly publications, Q&A communities, and Web 2.0 publishing platforms, grouped so you can pick the right type for your campaign. Each table entry includes an approximate authority band so you know roughly what you're working with. The point is not to claim a link on every site, but to choose a handful of relevant targets and earn placements that actually pass value.

Last checked: October 2026. For this update we requested every site on the list with a script and removed six entries that have closed, stopped accepting new content, no longer resolve, no longer serve a working site, or now redirect to a different business: Moz Q&A, HubPages, Designer Hangout, Spoke, Tupalo, and Convince & Convert. Well-known platforms that answered our script with a bot-protection page rather than content (Yelp, G2, Quora, Product Hunt and others) are operating normally and stay on the list.

One caveat up front: "domain authority" is a third-party score, not a Google metric. Moz publishes Domain Authority (DA) and Ahrefs publishes Domain Rating (DR). They measure roughly the same thing, the strength of a site's backlink profile on a 0 to 100 logarithmic scale, but the numbers won't match between tools. The DR bands in the tables below were recorded when this list was compiled in June 2026 and were not re-measured for this update, so treat them as rough tiers and verify each site's current DR before you spend time pitching or building a profile.

What makes a site worth a backlink

A high score on its own means very little. A DR 95 platform that lets anyone drop a self-made link is worth far less than a DR 70 niche publication that editorially chose to cite you. Google's link spam policy defines link spam as creating links primarily to manipulate rankings, and its examples include buying or selling links for ranking purposes, low-quality directory or bookmark site links, forum comments with optimized links in the post or signature, and optimized anchor text in guest posts or press releases. A platform's authority does not launder a placement that fits one of those patterns.

It also helps to remember why these scores exist. Both DA and DR model the same idea behind Google's original PageRank: a link is a vote, and votes from trusted, well-connected pages count more. Moz's beginner's guide to link building frames the goal well: earn links you would still want even if they passed no ranking value, because those are the ones that survive algorithm updates and send qualified visitors. That principle should govern how you read every table below.

So before treating any name below as a "high domain authority site for backlinks," run it through three filters:

• Relevance. Is the platform topically connected to your niche? A link from a design community helps a design studio more than a generic directory ever will.
• Link type. Is the link followed, or marked nofollow, ugc, or sponsored? Most profile, forum, and Q&A links on large platforms carry one of those attributes. They still have value for referral traffic and brand signals, but set expectations accordingly.
• Effort vs. payoff. Some placements take five minutes (a profile link). Others take a real pitch and a real article. Spend your time where the editorial bar is highest.

If your domain is still young, pair this list with a deliberate plan. Our walkthrough on raising Ahrefs Domain Rating from 0 to 50 covers the sequencing: what to build first, and what to ignore until later. For a site with no links at all, our guide to getting backlinks for a new website covers the first ten or so.

High domain authority websites: profile and social sites (DR 80+)

Profile links are the easiest entry point. You create an account, complete your bio, and add your website URL. Most are nofollow, but they're legitimate brand-presence signals, they get crawled, and they're a normal part of a natural link profile. Build them out properly, with a real bio, real logo, and real activity, rather than leaving empty shells.

Other strong profile targets in the high-authority range: Tumblr, Vimeo, SoundCloud, Slideshare, Flickr, Goodreads, Disqus, AngelList/Wellfound, Product Hunt, CodePen, Stack Overflow (developer profile), Trello, Notion (public pages), Patreon, Ko-fi, Linktree, Gumroad, Eventbrite, Meetup, Strava, Last.fm, ReverbNation, 500px, DeviantArt, Hashnode, Dev.to, Replit, and Kaggle. That's 40 reputable profile platforms before you touch a directory.

Directories and business listings (DR 70+)

Directories earned a bad reputation in the low-quality-SEO era, and Google's spam policy still names low-quality directory links as link spam. The curated, widely used ones are a different thing: they belong in a healthy profile, especially for local and B2B businesses, and citations on major business directories reinforce your name, address, and phone consistency, which feeds local search. Expect most directory profile links to be nofollow.

Worth adding for breadth and niche coverage: Glassdoor, Indeed (company pages), F6S, Owler, Manta, Hotfrog, Brownbook, Cylex, MerchantCircle, EZLocal, n49, GoodFirms, DesignRush, Sortlist, Software Advice, TrustRadius, and your regional Chamber of Commerce site. Together with the table above, that's close to 30 directory options: prioritize the ones your real customers browse. For a longer, local-first list, see our directory submission sites list.

A word on local SEO specifically: for a brick-and-mortar or service-area business, the directory links above do double duty as citations. Consistent name, address, and phone details across Google Business Profile, Apple Maps, Bing Places, and the major aggregators feed the local pack and reinforce the same entity in Google's knowledge graph. If you run a single-location business, this category often delivers more ranking value per hour than chasing a guest post on a national publication, because the relevance is exact and the competition for those citations is local rather than global.

Guest-post-friendly publications (DR 70+)

This is where the real link equity lives. Editorial links from publications that vet contributors are the closest thing to the links Google rewards. The bar is higher (you need a genuine pitch, a useful angle, and writing that holds up), but a single contextual link from a respected industry site can outperform fifty profile links. Every publication in this table publishes outside contributors in some form as of October 2026; the last column says how you get in.

Two patterns stand out when you read the contributor pages. Forbes Councils and Entrepreneur's Leadership Network are paid memberships with an application step, so the link is a byproduct of a business decision, not a free guest post. And the open editorial programs are explicit about promotion: Search Engine Journal excludes promotional content with self-serving links, and Smashing Magazine says pieces full of links to your product will be rejected. Plan for a byline and an author bio, not a keyword-anchored link in the body.

HuffPost, Business Insider, The Next Web, and CSS-Tricks also carry very high authority and appeared in earlier versions of this table, but we could not find an open guest-post program at any of them in October 2026. Links from outlets like these come from being quoted or covered, which is a digital PR for link building job rather than a guest-post pitch.

Other high-authority outlets that have published outside contributors include Social Media Examiner, Content Marketing Institute, the Moz Blog, HubSpot's blog, GoDaddy's blog, Shopify's blog, A List Apart, SitePoint, MarketingProfs, Jeff Bullas, Addicted2Success, Lifehack, Tiny Buddha, Elephant Journal, Make A Website Hub, and Business 2 Community, plus the trade publications specific to your industry. Contributor programs open and close often (Content Marketing Institute's old "write for CMI" page now redirects to its news section, for example), so check each site's current guidelines page before you pitch. The niche-specific ones usually convert best.

One practical note on pitching: editors at these publications receive a steady stream of identical "I'd love to write a guest post" emails, and almost all of them get ignored. What gets a reply is a specific, story-shaped angle the publication has not already covered, ideally backed by original data or first-hand experience their staff writers don't have. Lead with that angle and a one-line reason it fits their audience, not with a request for a backlink. The link is the byproduct of a piece worth publishing, which is why a single editorial link from a relevant DR 80 outlet can outweigh a month of profile-link grinding. Our outreach email templates show what that pitch looks like in practice.

Q&A sites and forums (DR 80+)

Q&A platforms and forums earn links and referral traffic when you answer real questions well. Most outbound links here are nofollow or ugc, moderators remove anything that reads like spam, and Google's link spam policy names forum comments with optimized links in the post or signature as a violation. The play is to be genuinely helpful and link only when a resource truly answers the question.

Round out the category with niche communities that match your audience: Webflow Forum, WordPress.org support, Shopify Community, HubSpot Community, Salesforce Trailblazer, Spiceworks, the Adobe community forums, Stack Exchange verticals (Server Fault, Super User, Mathematics, and the rest), and topical subreddits in your space. Across these you have about 20 community targets, and the conversations themselves often surface link and content ideas you wouldn't have found otherwise.

Web 2.0 and publishing platforms (DR 80+)

Web 2.0 properties let you publish long-form content on a high-authority domain and link back to your own site. Used in moderation with genuinely useful content, they're a legitimate way to host supporting pages. Used to mass-produce thin posts, they're a footprint Google ignores or penalizes, so favor quality over quantity, always.

More publishing properties worth a slot: LiveJournal, Penzu, Evernote (shared notes), Google Sites, Strikingly, Carrd, Webnode, Site123, Jimdo, Bravenet, Edublogs, and Hashnode (which doubles as a dev profile). That brings the Web 2.0 group to roughly 20 named options.

Dofollow vs nofollow: how much each link type is worth

Almost every list of high domain authority sites for backlinks mixes followed and nofollow opportunities without saying so, which leads people to overvalue links that pass little or no PageRank. Here's the honest breakdown. A followed editorial link from a relevant page is the gold standard: it passes ranking signals and sends referral traffic. A nofollow link from the same page still has real value (it drives clicks, builds brand familiarity, and contributes to the natural link diversity of a legitimate site), but it won't move rankings the way a followed link can.

Google's documentation on qualifying outbound links sets out three attributes: sponsored for ads and paid placements, ugc for user-generated content such as comments and forum posts, and nofollow when the others don't apply. Since Google's 2019 change, all three are treated as hints about which links to consider or exclude, not as absolute blocks. In practice that means profile, forum, and Web 2.0 links on big platforms are mostly marked and carry limited weight, while editorial links in the body of a publication are where followed links still live. Our analysis of whether nofollow links help SEO goes deeper on the evidence.

The mistake is treating the two as equals or ignoring nofollow links entirely. A backlink profile that is entirely followed looks engineered; real brands accumulate a mix of nofollow mentions from social profiles, forums, and news coverage alongside their editorial links. So rather than filtering this list down to "dofollow only," use it to build a profile that looks the way a genuinely popular site's profile looks: varied across platform types, weighted toward relevance, and earned rather than manufactured.

One more nuance: link attributes are set by the platform, not by you, and they change. A site that was dofollow when an older list was published may have switched to nofollow or ugc after a spam wave. That's why the verification step below matters as much as the score itself: you want to know both the current authority and the current attribute before you invest effort.

How to use this list without wasting time

Add up the named sites across the five categories and you're past 100 high domain authority websites, but the goal is not to claim a link on every one. A focused approach beats a checklist every time:

• Shortlist by relevance. Pick the 15 to 20 platforms that genuinely overlap with your niche and audience. Ignore the rest.
• Confirm the current score. The bands above date from June 2026 and authority scores drift. Verify before you commit time.
• Check the link attribute. Inspect an existing outbound link on the page (right-click, Inspect) and look for rel="nofollow", ugc, or sponsored, then set expectations accordingly.
• Write for people, not anchors. Use your brand name or a plain URL in bios and author boxes. Keyword-rich anchors in guest posts and forum signatures are exactly what Google's link spam policy describes.
• Don't pay for followed links. Paid placements are fine for exposure when they're marked sponsored or nofollow; buying links for ranking purposes is named in Google's link spam policy.
• Diversify. A natural profile mixes profiles, directories, editorial links, and community mentions, not 200 of one type.

Backlinks are one input into authority, but they're not the only one. If your DA or DR is lower than you'd like, our guide to increasing website authority covers the broader set of tactics (internal linking, content depth, and technical health) that compound alongside link building.

FAQ

What are high domain authority sites for backlinks?

High domain authority sites for backlinks are websites with a strong backlink profile, usually a Moz Domain Authority or Ahrefs Domain Rating of roughly 70 or higher, that let you earn or create a link back to your own site. Examples include LinkedIn, Medium, GitHub, Crunchbase, and major industry publications. A link from one of these can pass meaningful authority, but only when the placement is relevant, editorial, and not a low-effort or spammy link.

How do you get backlinks from high authority sites?

Start with the placements you control (complete profiles on the platforms above, plus the directories your customers use), then move to the ones you have to earn: contributor articles on publications with open programs, expert quotes for journalists, and original data that other sites want to cite. The first group is quick but mostly nofollow; the second takes longer and is where followed, editorial links come from. Our link building guide covers how to sequence the two.

Which high authority sites give dofollow backlinks?

On most big platforms, user-created links (profiles, forum posts, comments) are marked nofollow or ugc. Followed links are mostly found in edited content: bylined articles on publications that accept contributors, resource pages, and news coverage that cites you. Attributes change, so check the live page before assuming a site is dofollow.

Can you buy high authority backlinks safely?

Not for ranking purposes. Google's link spam policy lists buying or selling links for ranking purposes as link spam, and says paid links are acceptable only when qualified with rel="sponsored" or rel="nofollow". Vendor lists of "high DA guest posts" for sale are usually exactly that. Paying for a membership or a sponsored placement that is labeled as such is a marketing expense, not a link scheme.

Do nofollow links from high domain authority websites help SEO?

Nofollow links don't pass PageRank the way followed links do, but they still have value. They drive referral traffic, build brand visibility, and contribute to a natural-looking link profile. Google has treated nofollow as a hint rather than a strict directive since 2019, so a mix of followed and nofollow links from reputable high domain authority websites is healthier than chasing only dofollow links.

How many high domain authority backlinks do I need to rank?

There's no fixed number: relevance and quality matter far more than volume. A handful of genuinely editorial links from sites relevant to your niche typically outperform hundreds of generic profile or directory links. Focus on earning links that a real person would click, from pages topically connected to yours, rather than hitting a target count.

Should I verify a site's DR before building a backlink?

Yes. Authority scores change over time, and a site that was strong a year ago may have declined, or vice versa. Before you spend time on an account or a pitch, confirm the current Domain Rating so you know what the link is likely worth. You can do this for free with our Domain Rating Checker: enter any domain and see its live Ahrefs-based DR in seconds, no signup required.

Are free backlink lists like this safe to use?

The sites themselves are safe: they're well-known, legitimate platforms. The risk comes from how you use them. Mass-creating thin profiles or spun Web 2.0 posts purely for links creates a footprint search engines can detect and discount. Used thoughtfully, with complete profiles and genuinely useful content on a relevant subset of the list, these platforms are a safe part of a broader link-building strategy.

Related reading

• How to Increase Your Ahrefs Domain Rating (DR 0 to 50)
• How to Increase Website Authority: 9 Proven Tactics
• DR vs DA: Domain Rating and Domain Authority Explained
• What Is a Good Domain Rating? DR Benchmarks Explained
• 8 Best Domain Authority Checkers Compared (2026)
• 65+ Directory Submission Sites for SEO: 2026 Checked List
• 8 Best Blogger Outreach Tools for Link Building (2026)