Is a Popularity-5 Keyword Worth It? What Low App Store Keyword Popularity Really Means

TL;DR

• Apple's keyword popularity score runs from 5 to 100, and 5 is the floor, not zero. Independent studies estimate that roughly 90–98% of App Store keywords sit at 5.
• A score of 5 means "below Apple's reporting threshold". It doesn't mean nobody searches it. Two keywords that both show 5 can have very different real traffic.
• In ASOWorld campaigns we have repeatedly seen some popularity-5 keywords bring in traffic similar to keywords scored 25–30, usually long, specific phrases with strong intent and little competition.
• Use the five checks below to tell a live "5" from a dead one. Then run a two-week test before putting a real budget on it.
• The aim isn't to win one big keyword. It's to rank Top 10 on many relevant keywords. Leading apps add dozens of new Top-3 and Top-10 keywords each month this way.

 

What does keyword popularity mean in the App Store?

Keyword popularity is Apple's relative index of how often a search term is used in the App Store. It is shown in Apple Search Ads and in most ASO tools, on a scale from 5 (lowest) to 100 (highest).

 

Three things about the scale often get misread:

1. It's relative, not absolute. A popularity score doesn't tell you a number of searches per day.
2. It's non-linear. MobileAction's analysis found that impressions rise exponentially as popularity rises. The gap between 30 and 31 is much larger than the gap between 5 and 6.
3. It has a floor. Any keyword below Apple's minimum threshold is shown as 5. That covers a very large share of all keywords.

 

Google Play doesn't publish an official popularity score. ASO tools estimate Google Play volume from other signals, so Google Play "volume" numbers are best treated as rough guides.

 

Why do so many keywords show a popularity of 5?

Because 5 is the default for every keyword under the threshold.

 

Source	What they found
MobileAction, Apple Search Popularity Decoded	Nearly 90% of keywords they looked at received a score of 5; 5 is the lower bound
Sonar, low-competition keyword study (US sample of 3,510 keywords)	94.5% sat at the floor; across ~1.67M iOS keywords, about 98% did

 

So when your keyword tool shows a long list of 5s, it isn't telling you those keywords are dead. It's telling you the tool can't see how much traffic they have.

 

Can a popularity-5 keyword really drive as much traffic as a 25 or 30?

Sometimes, yes. In keyword campaigns we've run, we have seen some keywords scored 5 bring in traffic comparable to keywords scored 25–30. That runs against how most developers pick keywords.

 

There are three reasons this happens:

• The threshold hides real demand. A keyword just under the cutoff shows 5, the same as one with almost no searches.
• Long phrases convert better. Someone searching "receipt scanner for taxes" knows what they want. Someone searching "scanner" might want a QR reader, a document app or a printer utility.
• Competition is thin. Sonar found that on the App Store, the exact keyword phrase appears in a top-10 app's name 45% of the time for one-word keywords, but only 1.6% of the time for phrases of four or more words. About one in six top-10 results is led by an app with fewer than 100 ratings.

 

A popularity-5 keyword that you can rank #1–3 for may bring in more installs than a popularity-30 keyword where you sit at #25.

 

But not every 5 is a hidden gem. Most really are low-traffic. You need a way to tell the two apart.

 

How do you tell a "live 5" from a dead one? Five checks

Run these before adding any popularity-5 keyword to a campaign.

 

Check	How to do it	Live 5	Dead 5
1. Autocomplete	Type the first 2–3 words into the store search bar in the target country	The phrase or a close variant is suggested	Not suggested at all
2. Competitor rankings	Look at who ranks Top 10	Relevant apps with reasonable ratings; at least one competitor clearly targets it	Random or unrelated apps
3. Relevance	Would a user typing this phrase be happy to find your app?	Directly describes a core feature	Only loosely related
4. Your impressions after indexing	Add it to metadata, wait 7–14 days, check impressions (App Store Connect / Play Console)	Impressions appear once you rank Top 10	No impressions even at Top 5
5. Country fit	Compare the phrase in each local language and storefront	Natural local wording	Literal translation nobody types

 

Two "live" signals from checks 1–3 are enough to put a keyword into a small test. Check 4 is the real proof.

 

Popularity 5 vs. 25–30 vs. 50+: what are you really choosing between?

 

	Popularity 5 (live)	Popularity 25–30	Popularity 50+
Typical form	3–5 word specific phrase	2–3 word feature term	1–2 word category head term
Competition	Usually low	Medium	High, led by big brands
Time to reach Top 10	Short	Medium	Long, often not realistic for new apps
Cost to hold a position	Low	Medium	High
Conversion after a search	High (clear intent)	Medium	Lower (mixed intent)
Best role in a portfolio	Volume through many terms	Core growth terms	One or two "reach" terms, if any

 

That's why ASOWorld's keyword selection guide recommends a 10–30% core / 70–90% long-tail mix, and scoring every candidate on volume, difficulty and chance together rather than on volume alone.

 

Where do you find low-popularity keywords worth testing?

The best candidates rarely come from sorting a tool's list by popularity. Look in these four places:

• Store autocomplete, one word at a time. Type your core feature and note every suggestion that adds a modifier (for students, offline, with widget, no ads).
• Your own reviews and support emails. The words users use to describe your app are often the exact phrases they search for.
• Competitor long descriptions and subtitles. If several relevant apps repeat a phrase, someone found it worth targeting.
• Smaller storefronts and local languages. A phrase that sits at 5 in the US may be a real search term in Canada, the UK or a non-English storefront, where competition is lower.

 

Keep a shared list with three columns (phrase, source, check results) so the next test cycle starts from evidence instead of guesses.

 

How should low-popularity keywords fit into your strategy?

Think in coverage, not single positions.

 

The fastest-growing apps rarely win by taking one big keyword. They rank Top 10 on dozens or hundreds of relevant keywords at once. We have seen competitor apps add well over a hundred new Top-3 keywords and several hundred Top-10 keywords in a single month. A keyword performance case study from a Bluetooth finder app shows how quickly that coverage compounds once the long tail starts ranking. Most of those keywords would look "too small" in a popularity column.

 

A practical starting setup:

1. 2–4 core terms (popularity 20–40) that describe your main feature.
2. 10–20 long-tail terms, including live 5s that passed the checks above.
3. Group long-tail terms by feature, so one metadata update supports several of them.
4. Review every 2–4 weeks. Drop terms that stay at zero impressions and add new long-tail candidates.

 

Once a group of long-tail terms ranks well, the store sees your app as more relevant for the related core term. That relevance often helps the core term move later.

 

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How do you test a low-popularity keyword before spending more?

Use a short, two-week test:

Week 1: index and measure

• Add 5–10 candidate phrases to your metadata (iOS keyword field and subtitle; Google Play title, short and long description).
• Record your starting position and impressions for each.

 

Week 2: give them a small push

• For phrases already in the top 250 results, run a low, steady daily volume of keyword installs across all candidates. Pricing starts from $0.20 per install on Google Play and $0.30 on iOS (checked November 10, 2026). Spread the volume across all candidates rather than putting it on one.
• Keep the run continuous. On iOS, rankings fade quickly if activity stops.

 

Decide at day 14

A day-by-day 14-day ramp plan shows what those two weeks look like when the push is done properly.

 

Result	What it means	Next step
Top 10 + impressions + installs	Live 5	Move to maintenance pace; add similar phrases
Top 10, impressions but few installs	Traffic exists, page doesn't convert	Fix screenshots or description before scaling
Top 10, no impressions	Dead 5	Drop it
Still outside Top 50	Relevance or competition problem	Re-check metadata and relevance; don't add volume

 

If you want this test planned and tracked for you, the keyword ranking and organic downloads solution covers keyword discovery, ranking work and reporting.

 

Common mistakes with low-popularity keywords

1. Deleting every keyword that shows 5. You throw away most of the real long tail.
2. Adding every keyword that shows 5. Relevance still matters more than anything else.
3. Judging after three days. Run these in a keyword ranking tool before adding any popularity-5 keyword to a campaign.
4. Putting all of the volume on one long-tail phrase. Spread it so ranking growth looks like natural search demand.
5. Testing in the most crowded market first. Smaller storefronts with less competition show results faster and cheaper.

 

Not sure whether your problem is the keywords you chose, your ranking, or conversion? The badly ranked or not ranked ASO budget diagnostic walks through it step by step.

 

FAQ

What is the lowest keyword popularity score in the App Store?

5. Every keyword below Apple's minimum threshold is shown as 5, so the score is a floor, not a measure of zero searches.

 

Are popularity-5 keywords worth targeting?

Some are. Long, specific phrases that appear in autocomplete, have relevant competitors and describe your core feature can bring meaningful, high-converting traffic. Test before scaling.

 

Is a popularity score of 30 twice as much traffic as 15?

No. The scale isn't linear, and traffic rises much faster toward the top of the scale. Use popularity to compare keywords against each other, not to estimate a number of searches.

 

Does Google Play have a keyword popularity score?

Google doesn't publish one. ASO tools estimate Google Play volume from other signals, so treat those numbers as rough guides and confirm with Play Console impressions.

 

How many long-tail keywords should a new app target?

A common starting point is 2–4 core terms plus 10–20 long-tail terms, reviewed every few weeks. Add new phrases as weak ones drop out.

 

How long should I wait before judging a low-popularity keyword?

Allow 7–14 days after indexing, and at least a week of continuous activity if you are supporting it with installs. Shorter windows mostly measure ranking refresh lag.