Free Website Promotion Sites: 25 Places to List and Share Your Site

The free website promotion sites that still work in 2026 fall into five groups: search engine tools, local listings, launch platforms, communities, and republishing or partner channels. We checked every place below on October 16, 2026, including whether it is still free, because several well-known ones are not. Use the list as a menu, not a to-do list: five places done properly beat fifty submissions nobody reads.

Published: 2026-10-16 · 9 min read · Satelo

How we picked these 25 places

Most lists of "free submission sites" are copied from older lists, so they are full of dead domains and directories that exist only to collect links. We kept a place only if it passed four checks:

• It is alive. The site loaded and the submission or sign-up flow existed on October 16, 2026.
• Someone moderates it. A human or a clear rule set decides what gets listed or stays up.
• Real people read it. It has an audience of its own, not just pages of other submitted links.
• The free option is real. If the "free" tier is a months-long queue or requires something in return, we say so.

We did not pick places by the kind of link they give. Google's spam policies list "low-quality directory or bookmark site links" as an example of link spam, so the goal here is visibility with real readers, not backlinks. If you want the strategy behind these channels, read our broader guide to free website promotion; this article is the checked list.

Group 1: Search engine tools (do these first)

These are not promotion sites in the classic sense, but nothing else on this list matters if search engines do not know your pages exist. All four are free.

1. Google Search Console. Verify your site, submit your sitemap and use URL Inspection on your most important pages. Its Performance report shows the queries, impressions and clicks you get from Google, which is how you will measure everything else on this list.
2. Bing Webmaster Tools. Bing lets you import verified sites from Search Console, so setup takes a couple of minutes once Google is done.
3. IndexNow. A protocol for telling search engines a URL was added or changed. Per the IndexNow FAQ, participating engines include Bing, Yandex, Naver, Seznam.cz and Yep, and a submission to one endpoint is shared with the others. Google is not on that list.
4. Yandex Webmaster. Worth ten minutes if any of your audience reads Russian or other languages common in Yandex markets; skip it otherwise.

Group 2: Local listings (if customers can visit you or you visit them)

5. Google Business Profile. Free, and the single most useful listing for a local business. Check the eligibility rules first: you need a location customers can visit or a service area you travel to, and a rented mailing address without real operations does not qualify. Purely online sites generally are not eligible.
6. Bing Places. The Bing equivalent for Bing Search and Bing Maps. Fill it in right after your Google profile so your name, address and hours match.
7. Apple Business Connect. A free tool for claiming your place card in Apple Maps, announced by Apple in January 2023. Useful if your customers use Apple Maps, Siri or other Apple apps to find places.

For the local side in depth, including reviews and consistency of your business details, see our guide on how to promote a local business website.

Group 3: Launch platforms and product directories

These suit software, tools, apps and online services. A content blog will usually get more from Groups 4 and 5. Read each platform's rules before you post; a rejected or removed launch is hard to repeat.

8. Product Hunt. Its launch guide says launching is free, makers can hunt their own product, company accounts are not allowed, and you may not ask people directly for upvotes (inviting them to visit and comment is fine).
9. Hacker News: Show HN. Free, with strict Show HN rules: it is for things people can try, that you built yourself. Blog posts, sign-up pages and landing pages do not qualify, and you should not ask friends to upvote.
10. Indie Hackers. A community of founders who share products and progress. It works best when you post something useful, such as numbers or lessons from building, rather than a launch announcement. Its pages blocked our automated check, so read the current posting guidelines when you sign in.
11. AlternativeTo. Free to suggest an app as an alternative to a better-known one. Per its FAQ, you must verify your email first, and an optional paid priority review moves you to the front of the queue without guaranteeing approval.
12. SaaSHub. Free listing for software, plus a free submit tool that helps you post your product to a monitored list of other directories after you verify it.
13. Uneed. A daily launch board. The free option gives you a launch date up to five months out; paid options are faster.
14. Launching Next. A startup directory where submission is free; a paid upgrade only speeds up review.
15. DevHunt. For developer tools, open-source projects and APIs. Its about page says listing is free, with a paid option to choose your launch week.
16. TinyLaunch. A launch board with a free standard launch that goes through a queue, plus paid tiers.

Two places that often appear on "free" lists but need a second look. BetaList's FAQ now says all submissions are paid and there is no free option. Fazier's free tier requires you to put a link back to Fazier on your homepage or footer; decide whether you are comfortable with that before you sign up.

Group 4: Communities where your readers already are

Communities can send the most engaged visitors of anything on this list, and they are also where self-promotion backfires fastest. The rule of thumb is simple: be a member first, a promoter second.

17. Reddit (niche subreddits). Reddit's content policy asks you to participate authentically in communities where you have a personal interest and not to spam. Each subreddit adds its own rules in the sidebar, and many ban self-promotion outright. Answer questions for a few weeks; link your page only where it is the best answer.
18. Quora and other Q&A sites. Search for questions your best article answers, write a complete answer in the thread, and link to your page for the details. An answer that only says "read my post" tends to get collapsed or removed.
19. Niche forums. Older forums in hobbies, trades and professions are still active and often rank in search themselves. Fill in your profile, add your site to your signature if the forum allows it, and contribute.
20. Discord and Slack groups. Many niches have active chat communities. Most have a dedicated channel for sharing your own work; use only that channel.

Group 5: Republishing and partner channels

These help you reach audiences that already exist on other platforms or other sites, without waiting for search traffic.

21. Medium. Its import tool republishes a post from your site and, according to Medium's help center, adds a canonical link pointing back to the original, so search engines know which version is yours. Publish on your site first, wait until the page is indexed, then import.
22. DEV Community. For technical content. The DEV editor guide supports a canonical_url field for posts first published elsewhere.
23. Pinterest. Underrated for recipes, crafts, home, travel and design. A business account is free and gives you analytics on your Pins. Each Pin can point to a specific post.
24. Newsletter and cross-promotion swaps. Find a site with a similar audience but a different offer and recommend each other in a newsletter, a resource page or a joint guide. Our list of cross-promotion ideas for websites has formats that work without anyone feeling used.
25. Article exchange networks. Instead of one listing, you get an article about your site on a related blog. On Satelo, sites of a similar level host labeled partner articles about each other in a circle (A writes about B, B about C, C about A), never as a direct swap, and links in those articles carry rel="sponsored". Satelo is in public beta with a small network, so treat it as one channel among several, not the whole plan.

More on reusing your own posts safely in our content syndication guide.

Comparison: which free promotion sites fit which site

What to avoid

• "Submit to 1,000 directories" services. Mass submissions put your site on exactly the low-quality directory pages Google's spam policies describe. They bring no visitors and can create a link profile you later want to clean up.
• Bookmarking and "web 2.0" farms. If a site exists only to hold submitted links, nobody reads it.
• Lists that ask for your username and password in a spreadsheet. These are built for automated posting, which is both spam and a security risk.
• Free tiers with a catch. A free listing that requires a link back to the directory is closer to a link exchange than a listing. Our guide on link exchange and Google's rules explains where the line is.
• Posting the same link everywhere on the same day. Community moderators notice. Space it out and tailor each post.

Your first week: a realistic order

Illustrative plan for a new site, assuming about an hour a day:

1. Day 1: Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools; submit your sitemap. Set up IndexNow if your platform supports it.
2. Day 2: Local listings if you qualify. Otherwise, pick the two communities where your readers spend time and read their rules.
3. Day 3: Start answering questions in those communities without linking to yourself.
4. Day 4: If you sell software, submit to AlternativeTo and SaaSHub and queue a free launch on one launch board. If you run a blog, set up Pinterest or prepare one post for Medium or DEV.
5. Day 5: Make a list of five sites with a similar audience and draft one cross-promotion idea for each.
6. Days 6 and 7: Share one genuinely useful post where it fits, then check Search Console for indexing problems.

Repeat the community and partner steps weekly. The listings are one-time work; the relationships are what keep paying off.

How to check a promotion site before you submit

Before you spend time on a directory or a partner site that is not on this list, take two minutes to check that it is real:

• Search its name plus "reviews" or "scam" and look for recent, specific complaints.
• Open three or four recent listings. Are they real products and sites, or spam and parked domains?
• Look for signs of an audience: comments, votes, a newsletter, social accounts that people actually reply to.
• Run the domain through Satelo's free site check. The Quality Score is built mostly from open data, such as the Tranco top-sites list, domain age, Common Crawl coverage and PageSpeed, and it shows the evidence behind each number, so a site with no visible footprint stands out quickly.

What to do next

Pick one group above that matches your site, finish it this week, and measure the result in Search Console and your analytics before adding more. Listings give you a single mention each. If you also want articles about your site on related blogs, in exchange for hosting theirs, you can add your site to Satelo: you earn satellites by publishing labeled partner articles and spend them on articles about your own site. Start by seeing your site's Quality Score, with the evidence behind each number, in about 30 seconds.

FAQ

Where can I promote my website for free?

Start with Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools so search engines can find your pages. Then add local listings if you qualify, one or two launch platforms if you sell software, and the communities where your readers already spend time, such as niche subreddits, forums and Q&A sites.

Do free directory submissions still help SEO?

Not in the way old guides promise. Google's spam policies list low-quality directory links as link spam. A handful of real, moderated directories can bring visitors and help people find you, but mass submissions bring neither.

Is Product Hunt free?

Yes. Product Hunt's launch guide says launching is free and that makers can hunt their own products. You cannot ask people directly for upvotes, and company accounts are not allowed.

Is BetaList still free?

No. As of October 16, 2026, BetaList's FAQ says all submissions are paid and there is no free submission option, with a refund if your startup is not selected.

What are the best free blog promotion sites?

For most blogs: Pinterest for visual niches, Medium or DEV for republishing with a canonical link, niche communities and Q&A sites for answering questions, and cross-promotion with similar blogs. Launch boards suit software more than blogs.

How long does free website promotion take to work?

Listings and launches can bring visitors within days, but usually as a short spike. Search traffic and community reputation build over months. Measure impressions in Search Console weekly rather than expecting quick rankings.

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