There are well over a hundred business directories on the web. Almost none of them move the needle. Here is what actually matters, in the order we would tackle it.
Start with the three that aren't really "directories"
Google Business Profile, Apple Business Connect and Bing Places aren't citation sites in the traditional sense, they're the databases that Google Maps, Siri and Bing pull from directly. If you do nothing else on this list, do these three. They carry more weight than the other hundred combined.
Then a small set of general directories
Yell, Thomson Local, FreeIndex, Scoot, Hotfrog, Cylex and 192.com are worth being on, mainly because Google cross-references your name, address and phone number against the wider web to confirm you're a real, currently trading business. Once you're consistently listed on fifteen to twenty of these, adding more brings very little extra benefit.
Trade-specific directories, if they fit
Whether these are worth it depends entirely on what you do. Tradespeople benefit from Checkatrade, MyBuilder or Rated People. Hospitality businesses benefit from TripAdvisor. Almost everyone benefits from being active on Trustpilot, since it's increasingly a source AI search tools pull from when answering "best X near me" questions.
What to skip entirely
Avoid anyone offering to submit your business to five hundred directories for under fifty pounds. These are almost always low-quality directory networks that Google has already discounted, and they can leave your business details scattered inconsistently across the web in ways that are genuinely annoying to clean up later.
The one thing that matters more than any directory
Keep your name, address and phone number identical, word for word, across every listing. A mismatched abbreviation or an old phone number sitting on a directory from three years ago does more damage to your local search visibility than being absent from that directory would.