Free ASO Keyword Research: A No-Paid-Tools Workflow for Indie Devs
Updated Oct 10, 2026
On this page (7 sections)
You can do solid App Store keyword research for free. The four free sources are Apple Ads search popularity (a 1 to 5 score), App Store search autocomplete, competitor product pages and your own and competitors' reviews. Combine them into a scored list, then map the best terms to your name, subtitle and keyword field.
What free sources won't give you is exact search volume. Nobody outside Apple has that, and paid tools estimate it. For an indie app with a focused niche, relevance matters more than precise volume anyway.
Quick answer
Can I do ASO keyword research for free?
Yes. Collect ideas from App Store autocomplete, competitor names and subtitles, and the words users write in reviews. Check relative popularity with Apple Ads, which shows search popularity on a 1 to 5 scale. Then score each term for relevance and competition, and place the best ones in your metadata.
Free data sources
1. Apple Ads search popularity (1 to 5)
How do I see App Store search popularity for free?
Use Apple Ads Advanced. When you add keywords to an ad group, and on the Recommendations page, Apple shows search popularity from 1 to 5, with 5 most popular. Viewing it doesn't mean you have to spend money, but you do need an Apple Ads account. Treat the score as relative, not as volume.
Apple documents search popularity as "the popularity of a keyword, based on App Store searches," shown as a number from 1 to 5. (Apple: Review Recommendations)
2. App Store autocomplete
Type the start of a search into the App Store search bar on a device and note the suggestions. They reflect what people search for. Try:
- Your core term plus each letter ("budget a…", "budget b…")
- Problem phrasing ("stop spending…", "track my…")
- Audience modifiers ("…for students", "…for couples")
Autocomplete differs by storefront and language, so repeat it in each market you care about.
3. Competitor product pages
Look at the top results for your main terms. Their names and subtitles show which terms they chose to put in visible, limited fields. Screenshots captions show how they describe benefits. You can't see their hidden keyword field, so don't guess at it. Our DIY competitor intelligence framework covers this step in depth.
4. Reviews
Reviews are where users describe your app's job in their own words. Read your reviews and the reviews of apps in your category, and copy the exact phrases people use for problems and features. "Split bills with roommates" is a better keyword idea than anything a developer would invent.
What is the best free source of App Store keyword ideas?
Reviews and autocomplete together. Reviews tell you how real users describe the problem your app solves, and autocomplete tells you which of those phrasings people actually type into search. Apple Ads popularity then helps you rank the shortlist. Competitor names and subtitles fill gaps you missed.
Step-by-step workflow
- Write a seed list. Ten to twenty terms describing what your app does, who it's for and what problem it solves.
- Expand with autocomplete. Run each seed through App Store autocomplete and add the suggestions.
- Mine reviews. Add the user phrases you found. Mark them as "user language."
- Scan competitors. Add terms from top competitors' names and subtitles that also describe your app. Skip their brand names.
- Clean the list. Remove duplicates, plurals of singulars you already have, and anything not truly relevant.
- Check popularity. Look up each term in Apple Ads and record the 1 to 5 score.
- Score and shortlist. Use the scoring method below.
- Map to metadata. Place the shortlist across name, subtitle and keyword field.
- Ship, then review. After the version goes live, check where you rank and adjust next version.
A spreadsheet is all you need. Columns: term, source, popularity (1 to 5), relevance (1 to 3), competition (low, medium, high), decision.
Scoring relevance vs competition without paid data
Without paid difficulty scores, use judgment you can repeat:
Relevance (1 to 3)
- 3: describes exactly what your app does; a searcher would be happy to find you
- 2: related, but only part of what you do
- 1: loosely connected; a searcher probably wants something else
Competition (low, medium, high), from searching the term yourself:
- High: the top results are big, well-known apps with large rating counts
- Medium: a mix of known apps and smaller ones
- Low: few closely matching apps, or the top results don't quite fit the query
Then prioritize: high relevance plus low or medium competition first, even at popularity 1 or 2. High-popularity terms with high competition go on a "later" list. For why this suits new apps, see our long-tail keyword strategy for new iOS apps.
Turning the list into metadata
- App name (30 characters): brand plus your single most important term if it reads naturally.
- Subtitle (30 characters): your main benefit with your next strongest terms.
- Keyword field (100 characters): remaining terms, comma-separated, no spaces, no repeats.
Apple's limits: Creating your product page. Formatting rules and what to leave out are covered in our iOS keyword field guide.
Keywords only change with a new app version, so change a handful of terms at a time and keep notes. That way you know what caused a ranking change.
When a paid tool is worth it
Free research works well for a single niche app. A paid ASO tool can save time when you:
- Track rankings for many keywords across many countries every day
- Need estimated volumes or difficulty scores to compare large lists quickly
- Manage multiple iOS apps and can't afford hours of manual checks
Be clear about what you're buying: estimates and speed, not Apple's real data. Many indie devs get further by connecting keyword decisions to downloads and revenue than by adding more keyword estimates.
GROWNX pulls your App Store Connect and RevenueCat data into one free-to-start dashboard, so you can see whether your keyword, metadata and paywall changes actually move revenue. Free plan available.
Want to go deeper? Take the free Keyword Research course, try the AI-assisted keyword research workflow, or learn the basics of Apple Search Ads.
FAQ
Is Apple Ads search popularity accurate?
It's real Apple data, but it's coarse. Apple shows popularity on a relative 1 to 5 scale based on App Store searches, not as a search count. Use it to compare terms against each other and rank a shortlist. Don't treat a 5 as a fixed number of searches or compare scores across countries as if they were volumes.
Do I need to run ads to see search popularity?
You need an Apple Ads Advanced account, which asks for billing details when you set it up, but you don't have to run or pay for a campaign just to view popularity while you build an ad group. Apple can change its interface, so check what your account shows. Apple Ads Basic doesn't show keyword data.
How often should I redo keyword research?
Revisit your list whenever you ship a meaningful feature, enter a new market or see rankings drop, and at least a few times a year. Search language shifts with trends and seasons. Between full reviews, keep adding new phrases you spot in reviews to your spreadsheet.
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