Keyword Gap

Pick two apps — yours and a competitor's — and see who ranks where in live App Store search. Keywords are derived from both apps' names plus Apple's real autocomplete, then each is checked against the current top-50 results. Green on their side and blank on yours = your gap.

App A (you)

App B (competitor)

Methodology

Candidate keywords come from both app names (words + adjacent phrases) expanded with Apple's live autocomplete suggestions. Each keyword is then checked against the current top-50 search results in the storefront you pick above. Click any keyword to score its difficulty and traffic in the keyword research tool.

Full app comparison

About this tool

Which terms does a competitor rank for that you do not?

Pick your app and a rival, and this runs both against live App Store search results to find the terms where they appear and you do not. Those gaps are the concrete version of "they are outranking us" — a list you can act on rather than a feeling.

It is most useful on a direct substitute: an app that solves the same problem for the same person, where a term they own is a term you could plausibly compete for.

How it works
  1. 1Choose two apps — yours and the competitor.
  2. 2A set of candidate terms is derived from both listings, then each term is run against live App Store search.
  3. 3Every result is checked for both apps, and the terms where only the rival appears become the gap list, with their position.
  4. 4Terms where you both rank are shown too, so you can see where you already compete head to head.
What it cannot tell you
  • No search volume, anywhere. A gap term might be searched thousands of times a day or never — Apple publishes nothing and this page will not invent it.
  • Ranking for a term is not the same as getting installs from it. Position is observable; what it earns is not.
  • The scan is bounded by the terms it tests. An empty gap list means nothing was found among those terms, not that no gap exists.
Questions

How do you pick which keywords to test?

Candidates come from both apps’ own listings — the title, subtitle and the most frequent meaningful terms in the description — then each is checked against live search results.

Can I see a competitor’s actual keyword field?

No, and nor can anyone else. Apple never exposes the 100-character keyword field publicly. What is observable is which searches an app appears in, which is what this measures.

What do I do with a gap term?

Decide whether it genuinely describes your app. If it does, it is a candidate for your keyword field or subtitle — and the rank checker will tell you whether you have started to appear for it.

Written up on the blog

Keywords & rankings

Keyword researchApple's own autocomplete, expanded and scored by live ranking difficulty.App Store keyword toolEvery term an app ranks for, pulled from live search results.Keyword rank checkerWhere an app sits for any keyword, in any of 175+ storefronts.Daily rank trackingFlag keywords and get a daily snapshot, with 7/30/90-day history and movement.Keyword cannibalizationTerms where two of your own apps land in the same result.Keyword shufflerEvery permutation of a keyword set, for filling the 100-character field.

Or browse every free App Store optimization tool.