Competitor Keyword Tracking for App Store and Google Play

Competitor keyword tracking in ASO means watching which search terms rival apps rank for, how their titles, subtitles and keyword fields change, and where your listing is missing from searches they win. Do it on a fixed schedule, against a short list of true rivals, and turn each finding into a metadata change you can test. This guide shows how to choose competitors, find their keywords, read what you find, and measure whether your response worked.

TL;DR

• Track five to ten true competitors per market: apps that win the searches your users type, not just apps in your category.
• Watch keyword rankings and metadata changes (title, subtitle, keyword field, screenshots) on a daily or weekly rhythm, and run a full audit every quarter.
• Treat third-party keyword data as directional estimates. Confirm with your own App Store Connect and Play Console data.
• Never copy rival brand names into your keywords. Apple and Google both prohibit it, so look for the intent behind their terms instead.
• Change one thing at a time, then compare rankings, impressions and conversion before and after.

Table of Contents

• What competitor keywords are in app stores
• Step 1: Pick the right competitors
• Step 2: Discover the keywords they rank for
• Step 3: Read their metadata the way a ranking engine does
• Step 4: Track changes over time
• Step 5: Turn findings into ASO changes
• Step 6: Measure whether it worked
• The limits of competitor keyword data
• Our perspective
• Put competitor tracking on autopilot
• FAQ
• Sources

What competitor keywords are in app stores

Competitor keywords are the search terms that rival apps rank for in the App Store or Google Play. They come from three places: the rival’s app name and subtitle (or short description on Google Play), the hidden keyword field on iOS, and the text the store indexes from the rest of the listing.

They differ from web SEO keywords in one important way. On iOS you never see a rival’s keyword field. Apple allows up to 100 characters in that field, separated by commas with no spaces, and the content is invisible to the public. So “tracking a competitor’s keywords” really means inferring them: you see which queries the app ranks for, then work backward to the metadata that likely earned the ranking.

That inference is the whole job of ASO competitor analysis. You are answering four questions:

1. Which apps compete with mine for the searches that matter?
2. Which terms do they rank for that I do not?
3. What did they change in their listing recently, and did it move their rankings?
4. What should I change in mine as a result?

Step 1: Pick the right competitors

Most teams start with the apps they already know. That list is usually wrong in two ways: it is too short, and it is too loyal to the category.

Build the list from search results instead. Take your ten to twenty most important keywords, search each one in the store, and note which apps appear in the top results. Apps that show up repeatedly are your real search competitors, even if their product is different from yours. A budgeting app and a bank’s mobile app may never meet in a pitch deck, but they meet every day in results for “save money.”

Sort the apps you find into three groups:

• Direct competitors: same product, same audience. These are the ones whose positioning you must answer.
• Search competitors: different product, same queries. These show you which terms are crowded and which are open.
• Aspirational competitors: larger apps in your space. Their metadata shows where the category is heading, though their authority means you may not outrank them on the same terms.

Keep the tracked set small. Five to ten apps per market is easier to review than fifty, and you will actually look at the results. Rebuild the list every quarter, because new entrants and category shifts change who ranks.

Competition also changes by country. A rival that dominates the US may barely register in Germany or Japan. If you ship in several markets, build a separate list for each. Our localization guide covers how to prioritize markets.

Step 2: Discover the keywords they rank for

Once you have the list, collect the terms. There are four practical methods, and the best results come from combining them.

Read the visible metadata. Start with the app name, subtitle and (on Google Play) short and full descriptions. The words a competitor puts in the most heavily weighted fields are the words they most want to rank for. This costs nothing and takes minutes.

Use a ranking database. ASO platforms keep large sets of keyword rankings for apps and let you look up the terms a given app ranks for. The figures are modeled from sampled searches, so use them to spot patterns rather than to quote exact positions. Our free keyword difficulty checker is a quick way to see how crowded a term is before you commit to it.

Run a gap analysis. List the terms your top three competitors rank for in the top 20, then mark the ones where you do not rank at all. That list of gaps is your shortlist. Sort it by relevance first, then by difficulty, and only then by volume. A high-volume term that does not describe your app brings low-quality installs and weak conversion.

Mine reviews and listings. Competitor reviews contain the language real users use when they describe what they wanted. Complaints such as “I wish it would sync offline” point to features and phrases worth putting in your own listing, if your app really does them.

For a deeper process on the research side, see our guide to app store keyword research and the free ASO keyword tool.

Step 3: Read their metadata the way a ranking engine does

Raw keyword lists are only half the picture. The other half is how a competitor arranges them.

On iOS, the name, subtitle and keyword field are the main indexed text fields. Apple’s own guidance is to avoid repeating words across the app name, subtitle and category, because repeats waste space. When you study a rival, check whether they do this. If they do, they are leaving room that you can use.

A few reading habits help:

• Look for word combinations. Search ranks apps for phrases built from words across fields. If a rival has “habit” in the title and “tracker” in the subtitle, they can rank for “habit tracker” without writing the phrase anywhere.
• Note what is missing. If every competitor leads with the same generic term, a more specific phrase may be easier to win.
• Check locale differences. Localization lets you use different keywords in each locale, but keywords from different locales cannot be combined to rank for phrases. A rival with a clever secondary-locale setup is using extra space that you may be ignoring. Apple also recommends localizing descriptions, keywords, previews and screenshots for each market you serve.

The rules you must not break

Competitor research tempts people to borrow a rival’s brand. Do not.

• On iOS, keywords must be longer than two characters and cannot include names of other apps or companies.
• On Google Play, listings must not include misleading or irrelevant references to other apps or products, or text such as “#1” or “App of the Year”.

The safe approach is to study the intent behind a rival’s terms (the problem a user is trying to solve) and write your own copy for that intent. Rejected updates and removed listings cost far more than a missed keyword.

If you want a refresher on what the iOS keyword field can and cannot do, our post on five myths about the keyword field is a good start.

Step 4: Track changes over time

A one-time snapshot tells you who ranks today. Tracking tells you who is moving, and why.

The three signals worth watching are:

1. Keyword rank movements. A competitor jumping ten places for a core term usually means a metadata change, a feature launch, or a burst of ratings.
2. Metadata changes. New titles, subtitles, screenshots, icons or descriptions. A new subtitle is often the earliest hint of a repositioning.
3. Rating and review shifts. A sudden rating drop on a rival can open a window, and a spike in a certain complaint tells you what the market currently wants.

A workable rhythm looks like this:

The cadence is a working suggestion from our own practice, not a rule. Smaller teams can drop to weekly alerts without losing much. What matters is that the checks happen on a schedule and that each one ends in a decision: change, test, or leave alone.

To see what dedicated tracking looks like in practice, read how app store rank tracking works, or see our approach to ASO keyword research run continuously.

Teams that report on this work also benefit from showing it clearly. A short product video built around the use case your keyword research uncovered, like this everyday tasks app ad case study, can make the same message land in your preview and in paid channels.

Step 5: Turn findings into ASO changes

Data with no action is trivia. Use a simple decision path for every gap you find.

Is the term relevant? If your app does not truly serve the intent behind it, drop it, however much volume it has.

Is it winnable? Check difficulty. If three apps with large rating counts own the top spots, start with a longer, more specific variation where you can reach the top 10.

Where does it belong? Put your most important terms in the name and subtitle, since those fields are the most visible and carry the most weight. Use the keyword field for secondary terms, and do not repeat words already used elsewhere.

Does the creative back it up? A ranking only matters if the page converts. If you start ranking for a new term, check that your first screenshots speak to that intent. Google Play’s custom store listings can even target users who search for specific keywords, and on iOS, custom product pages and product page optimization let you tailor the message to an audience.

Our app store listing checklist and ASO checklist walk through the fields you will touch.

Worked example

Suppose you run a meditation app for sleep. Your tracked set shows two rivals ranking in the top 10 for “sleep sounds” while you sit at 45. A third rival has recently added “white noise” to its subtitle and climbed.

• Relevance: your app includes sleep sounds and a white noise mixer, so both terms are honest fits.
• Difficulty: “sleep sounds” is crowded, while “white noise for sleep” is less so.
• Change: move “sleep sounds” into the subtitle and add “white noise” to the keyword field, if it is not repeated elsewhere.
• Creative: make the second screenshot show the mixer.
• Measurement: log the date, and compare ranks, impressions and conversion over the next two to four weeks.

This is an illustration of the process, not a result from any real app.

Step 6: Measure whether it worked

Measurement is where most competitor tracking fails. Rankings move for many reasons, so you need a before-and-after discipline.

• Change one thing at a time, or at least one group of related things, and write down the date.
• Watch the funnel, not just rank. Impressions, product page views and conversion rate in your store console tell you whether the move actually brought users in.
• Allow time. Metadata updates on iOS require a new app version submission, and rankings settle over days to weeks, not hours.
• Compare against the competitors you track. If everyone moved up, it was likely a seasonal swing. If only you moved, your change probably mattered.
• Test creative separately. For conversion changes, use store A/B testing so you read results with a proper sample size.

Keep a simple change log: date, what changed, expected effect, result after four weeks. Over a year it becomes the most valuable ASO document you own.

The limits of competitor keyword data

You will make better decisions if you know what third-party data can and cannot tell you.

• Ranks are sampled. Tools check rankings from a set of devices, locations and times. Your users may see slightly different results because the stores personalize.
• Volume is modeled. Search popularity numbers are estimates. Use them to compare terms against each other, not as a forecast of installs.
• You cannot see their conversion. A rival may rank for a term and convert it badly. Their ranking tells you the store trusts them for that term, not that the term is profitable.
• Causes are guesses. A jump in rank could be metadata, a feature, a promotion, a featuring slot or a burst of ratings. Look for the change in the listing, but hold the conclusion loosely.
• Your own data is the ground truth. Search terms and impressions in your store console reflect your real audience. Use competitor data to generate hypotheses and your own data to confirm them.

Our perspective

Most ASO tools hand you a spreadsheet and leave the work to you. Competitor tracking is a good example: you collect rankings, notice a gap, and then somebody has to rewrite the metadata, localize it, submit it and check back. That gap between insight and action is where most teams lose weeks.

We built appXL to close it. It keeps analyzing competitors and market trends, proposes keyword and metadata changes, localizes your listing into more than 35 languages, and ships updates directly through App Store Connect. It also monitors rankings daily and helps manage reviews, so the loop of watch, decide, change and measure keeps running without a manual rebuild each time.

Our view is simple: tracking competitors is only worth the effort if it ends in a shipped change. Startups that need growth fast and established teams that cannot spare a person for weekly metadata work both benefit from an agent that does the implementation, not just the reporting.

Samuel

Put competitor tracking on autopilot

If you would rather not rebuild this process by hand each week, appXL runs it for you: it tracks the keywords your rivals win, rewrites your metadata, localizes it, and sends the update to App Store Connect. Compare the Starter, Growth and Scale plans on the pricing page, or see how the AI ASO agent works.

Want a first look before you commit? Run your listing through the free ASO audit tool and see where your keyword coverage falls short.

FAQ

How many competitors should I track?

Five to ten per market is a good range. It is enough to see patterns and small enough to review regularly. Include a mix of direct competitors, apps that win the same searches, and one or two larger apps that show where your category is heading.

Can I see the exact keywords a competitor uses on the App Store?

No. The iOS keyword field is hidden from the public, so tools infer keywords from the terms an app ranks for and from its visible name and subtitle. Treat any list as a well-informed estimate and confirm it against your own search data.

Is it allowed to use a competitor’s name as a keyword?

No. Apple’s rules say keywords cannot include names of other apps or companies, and Google Play prohibits misleading references to other apps in listings. Target the need behind the competitor’s terms instead.

How often should I review competitor keywords?

Use daily alerts for big rank or metadata changes, a weekly look at trends, and a full audit every quarter. If your category moves slowly, weekly alerts may be enough. The key is to decide something after each review.

How do I know if a change based on competitor data worked?

Log the date of each change, then compare keyword ranks, impressions and conversion rate over the following weeks. Compare against the rivals you track to rule out category-wide swings, and test creative changes with a proper A/B test.

Sources

• App Store search, Apple Developer
• Platform version information, App Store Connect Help
• Creating your product page, Apple Developer
• Best practices for your store listing, Play Console Help
• Create custom store listings, Play Console Help
• Increasing the number of keywords through localization

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• App Store Keyword Research: Free Tool + Process
• Free ASO Keyword Difficulty Checker (App Store & Play)
• The Best Android ASO Tools for Google Play
• Free ASO Keyword Tool — No Signup