# How to find your competitors' App Store keywords

Sam · Published November 4, 2026 · Canonical: https://rankaso.app/blog/find-competitors-app-store-keywords/


You cannot see a competitor's keyword field, but you can see every term they rank for, and that is the better list anyway. A field is what they hoped would work; their ranks are what did. The method has three parts: read their rank beside yours on the terms you already track, list the terms they hold that you do not, and read the words in their public name and subtitle that carry those ranks. RankASO's Rivals tab does all three from the same daily searches that produce your own ranks, so there is nothing extra to run.

![A rival compared keyword by keyword in RankASO, their rank beside yours](https://rankaso.app/assets/device-03.png)

## 1. Their rank on your terms

Add the rival once. From then on every daily check reads their position from the same search result as yours, in every storefront you track. The comparison screen shows the two ranks side by side with the gap. This is the first filter: a rival that is nowhere on your terms is not really a rival for search, whatever they are in the category chart.

For our own app [Escape](https://escapethegrip.com/), this screen showed that a rival with twenty times our ratings sat at number one on "block adult content" with us at three, and at number one on "temptation blocker" with us at two. Two terms, two reachable gaps, found on day one.

## 2. The terms they hold and you do not

The Gaps list is the point of the exercise. It is every tracked term where the rival ranks and you are absent or far behind. Each entry is a proven keyword: a comparable app is already earning installs from it. Half the list will be their brand and words that do not fit your app. The other half is your next field.

To widen the list, track more of the terms the store completes for your niche. Every term you add is checked for every rival from the same search, so the Gaps list grows with your tracking, not with extra work.

## 3. The words in their listing that do the work

Strengths reads a rival's public name and subtitle and shows which words carry their ranks across your terms, ordered by how many terms each word touches. Three rivals leaning on the same word you do not have is the clearest signal in ASO. On Escape's rivals, "blocker" and "block" carried most of the top-10s, and "filter" carried almost none, which is why "filter" moved down our own priority list.

## What you can infer, and what you should not copy

From ranks and the public listing you can infer the two or three words a rival's field must contain, because a rank on a two-word phrase with only one word in the name means the other word is in the field. Build that inference for five rivals and the overlap is your category's vocabulary. Do not copy a rival's brand name into your own listing; it is against the store's rules and it brings users who wanted them, not you. Target the intent behind the brand instead: the phrases those users type next.

## Turn it into a plan

For each gap, RankASO shows the top 10 apps with their rating counts and a verdict: Go for it, Climbable, Long shot, Skip. Take the Go for it and Climbable gaps where you already rank between 11 and 50. Put their words into the keyword field with the rule checker open. Record the baseline, ship, and read the before-and-after two weeks later. The rival's keywords are now yours, and they did not have to tell you.

RankASO on the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/app/id6830350753?ct=blog-en-14&mt=8 (Free to start. No account. Data Not Collected.)

## Questions

### Can I see a competitor's exact keyword field?

No, it is private to them. You can see every term they rank for among the terms you track, and the words in their public name and subtitle that carry those ranks. That is enough to infer the words that matter.

### How many competitors should I track?

Three to five apps a user would consider instead of yours. More than that and the Gaps list turns into noise. Rivals, Gaps and Strengths are part of RankASO Pro; the free plan tracks your own app.

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

No. The store's guidelines prohibit other apps' names in your metadata, and the users who typed it wanted that app. Target the intent phrases around it instead.