ASO Keyword Difficulty: What the Score Means and How to Use It
ASO keyword difficulty is a third-party estimate of how hard it is for your app to rank near the top of store search for a given term. It is not a number Apple or Google publishes, and it is not a promise. Treat it as one input next to relevance, search demand and your app’s own strength, and you will pick better keywords than by chasing the lowest number on the screen.
This guide explains what the score estimates, how to read ranges without over-trusting them, how to find lower-difficulty terms, and how to group them into a keyword list you can maintain.
TL;DR
- Keyword difficulty is a tool-specific estimate of ranking competition, usually on a 0 to 100 scale. Scores from two tools are not interchangeable.
- A low score on a term nobody searches or that does not describe your app is worthless. Judge difficulty together with popularity and relevance.
- Easier terms often come from combining two or three words, narrowing by use case, or entering a less crowded storefront language.
- Group keywords by theme and by intent, keep one list per locale, and review it on a regular schedule, because rankings and demand move.
- Our free keyword difficulty checker gives you a quick read before you commit a term to your metadata.
Table of Contents
- What an ASO keyword difficulty score actually means
- Why scores differ between tools and between stores
- How to read difficulty ranges
- How to check keyword difficulty
- Finding lower-difficulty keywords
- Grouping keywords into themes
- Building an ASO keyword list you can maintain
- Our perspective on difficulty scores
- Keeping the list current without the spreadsheet
- FAQ
- Sources
What an ASO keyword difficulty score actually means
When you search for a word in the App Store or Google Play, the store returns a ranked list of apps. Difficulty tools try to answer one question: how strong are the apps already sitting at the top of that list, and how likely is it that yours can join them?
No store publishes this number. Every score you see is a calculation by the tool vendor, built from signals such as how many apps target the term, how well the current top results are optimized for it, and how established those apps are. Because each vendor chooses its own inputs and weights, the same keyword can read 35 in one tool and 58 in another. That is normal, and it is why you should compare terms inside one tool rather than across tools.
Three things the score does not tell you:
- Whether people search for the term. Difficulty measures competition, not demand. A term can be easy because nobody types it.
- Whether the term fits your app. A relevant term pulls installs. An irrelevant one pulls impressions that never convert.
- What will happen to your app. The estimate describes the field, not your icon, ratings, conversion rate or update history.
Why scores differ between tools and between stores
Two tools can disagree for good reasons. One may measure the top 10 results, another the top 30. One may weight ratings counts heavily, another may weight title matches. Some refresh daily, others weekly. Always check which storefront and which country the score was calculated for, because a keyword that is crowded in the US can be wide open in Germany or Brazil.
The two stores also index text differently, so a score built for one store misleads on the other. Google Play’s own guidance says a full description can run to 4,000 characters and a short description to 80, and it warns against stuffing the description with repeated terms, according to the Play Console store listing best practices. That means Google Play rewards natural, descriptive writing in long fields. On the App Store, the title, subtitle and keyword field do most of the work, so a term you could only mention in a description would be a weaker play there. If a tool shows one blended score for both stores, be skeptical.
How to read difficulty ranges
People ask what a good score is. There is no universal answer, but there is a sensible way to think about it.
Most tools split their scale into rough bands: easy, medium and hard. Use those bands as a sorting device, not as verdicts. Here is how we suggest reading them:
| Band (typical 0 to 100 scale) | What it usually suggests | How to use it |
|---|---|---|
| Low | Few strong competitors or weakly optimized top results | Good for a new or small app, if the term is relevant and has real demand |
| Medium | Competitive, with some established apps present | Realistic once you have ratings, a clean listing and decent conversion |
| High | Dominated by large, long-established apps | Treat as a long-term goal, or skip and target a narrower variant |
The cut-off points differ by tool, so read the vendor’s own explanation before applying a rule such as “avoid anything above 60.” A number that is hard for one tool may be medium for another.
A worked example
Imagine you run a habit tracker. Your candidate list looks like this:
| Keyword | Popularity | Difficulty | Relevance | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| habit tracker | High | High | Perfect | Long-term goal; do not rely on it yet |
| daily routine planner | Medium | Medium | Strong | Strong candidate for title or subtitle |
| habit tracker for adhd | Low to medium | Low | Strong, if you support that use case | Good early win |
| gratitude journal | Medium | Medium | Partial | Only if the app really offers journaling |
| free calendar | High | High | Weak | Skip |
The table is illustrative, not live data. The point is the logic: the best picks are rarely the easiest or the most popular terms. They are the ones where relevance is high and difficulty is something your app can plausibly overcome.
How to check keyword difficulty
A simple routine works for most teams:
- Collect candidates. Start with what your app does, how users describe the problem, and what competing apps put in their titles and subtitles.
- Look up each term in one tool, one storefront. Our keyword difficulty checker covers both the App Store and Google Play, and our free ASO keyword tool needs no signup.
- Look at the actual results. Search the term in the store. If the top results are apps unlike yours, the term does not fit your category, whatever the score says.
- Record popularity next to difficulty. On iOS, popularity scores come from Apple’s own search data, but they are a rough guide to demand, not a forecast of installs. We wrote about that in why Apple search popularity does not predict installs.
- Shortlist, then test. Put the shortlist into your metadata and watch rankings and installs, not only impressions.
If you want the full workflow, our App Store keyword research process walks through it step by step.
Finding lower-difficulty keywords
A low-difficulty keyword is usually a more specific one. These tactics reliably surface them.
Combine words into longer phrases
A single head term such as “fitness” is crowded. A phrase like “home workout for beginners” narrows the competition and the audience at once. Because store search matches combinations of the words in your title, subtitle and keyword field, a handful of well-chosen words can cover many phrases. Build the combinations deliberately instead of repeating the same word in different fields.
Narrow by use case, audience or platform
Add the situation: “for travel,” “for teachers,” “for small business.” These modifiers describe real searches, face fewer well-funded competitors and tend to convert better because the match is tighter.
Read competitor metadata
Look at the titles and subtitles of apps ranked just above yours. Terms they use that you do not are leads. Terms they all use are probably table stakes. Terms that only strong apps use may be worth postponing.
Use autocomplete and your own users
Store search suggestions reveal how real people phrase queries. Support emails, reviews and onboarding survey answers do the same. Customer language often beats marketer language for finding low-competition phrases.
Go local
Less crowded storefronts can be a real opening. Translating your metadata well, and not just literally, lets you compete in markets where your category is thinner. See our guide to App Store localization across markets.
Know when to go after harder terms
Hard keywords become reachable as your ratings, conversion rate and install velocity improve. Revisit them once your listing converts well. Conversion matters here because it is one of the signals that affect ranking among relevant apps, which is why we also track app store conversion rate alongside rankings.
Grouping keywords into themes
A flat list of 200 terms is hard to use. Grouping makes it a plan.
Group by theme. Cluster terms that describe the same feature or job: for the habit tracker, “routine planner,” “daily checklist” and “morning routine” belong together. Each cluster becomes a candidate for one metadata slot or one custom product page.
Group by intent. Separate terms people use when they know what they want (“habit tracker app”) from exploratory terms (“how to build habits”). Exploratory terms bring volume but lower intent, so they should not crowd out the terms that sell.
Group by priority. Mark each cluster as core, supporting or aspirational. Core terms are relevant and winnable now. Supporting terms fill remaining space. Aspirational terms are high difficulty and high value, kept on watch.
Keep one list per locale. Do not translate a keyword list word for word. Search habits, competitors and difficulty differ by country and language, so each locale needs its own research, then its own list.
Building an ASO keyword list you can maintain
A useful list is a table, not a paragraph. We recommend these columns:
- Keyword and locale
- Cluster or theme
- Popularity and difficulty, with the date and tool used
- Relevance rating (high, medium, low)
- Where it is placed (title, subtitle, keyword field, description)
- Current rank
- Notes (competitors, seasonality, test results)
The date column matters more than people expect. A difficulty number from six months ago is a historical record, not a current reading.
Reviewing the list over time
Rankings, demand and competitors all shift. Review in two rhythms:
- Light, frequent checks. Watch the ranks of your core terms for sudden drops or gains, and note when a competitor rewrites its listing.
- Deeper, scheduled reviews. Each time you ship a significant release, run a seasonal campaign or open a new market, recheck popularity and difficulty, retire terms that stalled, and promote terms that moved into the top results.
When you change metadata, change a few things at a time, so you can tell which edit moved which ranking. Our rank tracking overview explains how to read those movements without overreacting to daily noise.
Our perspective on difficulty scores
We look at a lot of keyword lists, and the same mistake repeats: teams treat difficulty as a filter instead of a signal. They sort ascending, take the top 100 terms, and wonder why traffic does not follow. Most of those terms are easy because nobody wants them.
We think of difficulty as a question about timing. A term that is too hard today may be right in three months, once ratings and conversion improve. A term that is easy today may be dead weight. The useful work is not finding the single best keyword. It is keeping a living portfolio of keywords at different difficulty levels, each tied to a theme, each reviewed on a schedule.
That portfolio needs constant attention, which is where manual workflows break down. Research gets done once, the spreadsheet ages, and the listing stays the same for a year. That is why we built appXL to keep researching, rewriting and shipping changes rather than just reporting numbers. The score is only worth the decision it leads to.
— Samuel
Keeping the list current without the spreadsheet
If you would rather not rebuild keyword research by hand every month, appXL runs it continuously. It analyzes competitors and market trends, rewrites metadata, localizes listings into more than 35 languages, monitors rankings daily and ships updates directly to App Store Connect. You can see how it works on our ASO agent page, compare the Starter, Growth and Scale plans on the pricing page, or read how continuous keyword research fits into the product.
FAQ
What is a good keyword difficulty score in ASO?
There is no universal threshold, because every tool builds its own scale. As a rule, lower scores are easier to win, but only if the keyword is also relevant and has real search demand. Read your tool’s own bands, and compare terms inside that tool only.
Is keyword difficulty the same on the App Store and Google Play?
No. The stores index text differently, and competitors differ by store and by country. Google Play gives you a long description to work with, while the App Store relies mostly on the title, subtitle and keyword field. Check difficulty for the specific store and storefront you are targeting.
Should I avoid high-difficulty keywords?
Not entirely. Skip them as primary targets while your app is new or has few ratings, but keep the most relevant ones on a watch list. As your conversion rate and reputation improve, they can become realistic.
How often should I update my ASO keyword list?
Check core rankings regularly, and do a full review whenever you ship a major release, launch in a new market or see a clear shift in rankings. Date every difficulty and popularity reading so you know how stale it is.
How is keyword grouping different from a keyword list?
A list is every candidate term. Grouping sorts those terms into themes and priorities so each group maps to a metadata slot, a locale or a custom product page. It turns a pile of terms into a plan.