How to Find Keywords for App Store Optimization with DataForSEO APIs

Keyword research for App Store Optimization (ASO) can be handled in several ways. You can build and maintain your own App Store and Google Play scrapers, use dedicated but often limited and high-cost ASO tools or you pull ranking data manually across every client app you manage. But these options are time-consuming, difficult to scale, and increasingly costly. When you need to manage multiple apps, build in-house ASO systems and reports, or analyze keyword data at scale, an API-based approach stands out. With a few DataForSEO API requests, you can uncover the keywords an app ranks for, the apps competing with it, and the search volume behind each term. This guide covers which endpoints help you find keywords for App Store Optimization, and how to use them.

What keyword data for App Store Optimization you need

App Store Optimization is the practice of improving where an app ranks in App Store and Google Play search, so more people find and install it. The keyword work behind it splits into two jobs.

The first is getting the keywords an app, yours or a competitor’s, already ranks for with the exact position it holds for each. That shows you where an app is winning, where it’s slipping, and which terms are worth defending. The second job runs the other direction: start from a keyword and see which apps appear. That’s how you size up a category and find rivals you didn’t know you had.

DataForSEO covers both through two products. The DataForSEO Labs API handles the analytics side (ranking keywords, competitors, and keyword-level metrics) and returns everything through Live-mode endpoints in response to a single API request, so there’s no polling to manage. Our App Data API handles the raw search side, returning the apps and listings ranking for a given query. You can chain the two into a full ASO keyword research workflow, starting with the ranking keywords.

Pull the keywords an app already ranks for

The core endpoint here is Keywords for App, one of the App Store endpoints in the DataForSEO Labs API. You pass an app_id, and it returns the keywords that the app ranks for on the App Store, each with its ranking position and search volume. Point it at your own app to audit visibility, or at a competitor’s app_id to lift their whole keyword set in one call. Worth knowing up front: the App Store Keywords for App endpoint currently returns only English-language results for the US location.

A couple of limits shape how you page through the results. The default response holds 100 keywords and the maximum is 1,000 per call, so a deep keyword profile means using offset to walk through the results in batches. It’s a simple loop in practice.

The request below is the smallest working example. It uses HTTP Basic auth and one filter to skip low-volume noise, so you don’t pay for keywords nobody searches.

# Keywords for App (App Store): the keywords an app ranks for, with positions.
login="login"
password="password"
cred="$(printf ${login}:${password} | base64)"
 
curl --location --request POST "https://api.dataforseo.com/v3/dataforseo_labs/apple/keywords_for_app/live" \
--header "Authorization: Basic ${cred}" \
--header "Content-Type: application/json" \
--data-raw '[
    {
        "app_id": "686449807",
        "location_name": "United States",
        "language_name": "English",
        "limit": 100,
        "filters": [
            ["keyword_data.keyword_info.search_volume", ">", 100]
        ]
    }
]'

The Keywords for App endpoint docs offer the full parameter list. Swap apple for google in the endpoint’s URL path to run the same request against Google Play: https://api.dataforseo.com/v3/dataforseo_labs/google/keywords_for_app/live

The response comes back as structured JSON. Each item pairs a keyword and its search volume with the app’s position for that term. Below is a single-keyword example with some of the fields collapsed, so the shape of what you’ll get is easy to see.

{
    "version": "0.1.20260610",
    "status_code": 20000,
    "status_message": "Ok.",
    "time": "0.1487 sec.",
    "cost": 0.024,
    "tasks_count": 1,
    "tasks_error": 0,
    "tasks": [
        {
            "id": "06261220-8284-0619-0000-bcca7c0a6b25",
            "status_code": 20000,
            "status_message": "Ok.",
            "time": "0.1171 sec.",
            "cost": 0.024,
            "result_count": 1,
            "path": [...],
            "data": {...},
            "result": [
                {
                    "se_type": "apple",
                    "app_id": "686449807",
                    "location_code": 2840,
                    "language_code": "en",
                    "total_count": 3412,
                    "items_count": 100,
                    "offset": 0,
                    "items": [
                        {
                            "se_type": "apple",
                            "keyword_data": {
                                "keyword": "youtube",
                                "location_code": 2840,
                                "language_code": "en",
                                "keyword_info": {
                                    "se_type": "apple",
                                    "last_updated_time": "2026-07-03 09:41:05 +00:00",
                                    "competition": null,
                                    "competition_level": null,
                                    "cpc": null,
                                    "search_volume": 53456251,
                                    "low_top_of_page_bid": null,
                                    "high_top_of_page_bid": null,
                                    "categories": null,
                                    "monthly_searches": null
                                }
                            },
                            "ranked_serp_element": {
                                "se_type": "apple",
                                "serp_item": {
                                    "type": "app_store_search_organic",
                                    "rank_group": 26,
                                    "rank_absolute": 26,
                                    "position": "left",
                                    "app_id": "686449807",
                                    "title": "Telegram Messenger",
                                    "url": "https://apps.apple.com/us/app/telegram-messenger/id686449807",
                                    "icon": "https://is1-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Purple221/v4/47/eb/23/47eb2348-e809-32b7-ff02-446dd3dc743c/Telegram-0-0-1x_U007epad-0-1-0-sRGB-85-220.png/512x512bb.jpg",
                                    "reviews_count": 273257,
                                    "rating": {
                                        "rating_type": "Max5",
                                        "value": 4.01,
                                        "votes_count": 273257,
                                        "rating_max": 5
                                    },
                                    "is_free": true,
                                    "price": {
                                        "current": 0,
                                        "regular": 0,
                                        "max_value": 0,
                                        "currency": "USD",
                                        "is_price_range": false,
                                        "displayed_price": ""
                                    }
                                },
                                "check_url": null,
                                "se_results_count": 194,
                                "last_updated_time": "2026-07-03 09:41:05 +00:00",
                                "previous_updated_time": null
                            }
                        },
                        {...},
                        {...}
                    ]
                }
            ]
        }
    ]
}

Once you have a ranked keyword list, the next question is who else competes for those same terms.

Expand the list with competitor keywords and intersection data

A single app’s keyword profile only tells part of the story. For the wider field, the DataForSEO Labs API has two more App Store endpoints. The App Competitors endpoint takes one app_id and returns the apps that intersect with it on ranking keywords, along with their search volume and ranking positions. That shows you who you’re actually competing against in search, which often isn’t who you’d assume.

The App Intersection endpoint works at the keyword level instead. Give it up to 20 apps and it returns the keywords those apps all rank for within the same App Store SERP. For an agency, that maps a client against its named rivals in one request and surfaces the keyword gaps worth including into an ASO plan. You can add filters to any of these requests (say, only intersections above a chosen search-volume threshold) so the response comes back already scoped to what you’ll report on.

The Bulk App Metrics endpoint returns ranking metrics for up to 1,000 apps in one call, which is a practical way to benchmark visibility across a client roster without a request per app. All of these run through Live endpoints, and you can send up to 2,000 API calls per minute, so agency-scale batches don’t queue up behind each other.

That covers the workflow that starts with an app. The reverse direction that starts with a keyword and works back to the ranking apps is just as useful.

Go the other way: find the apps ranking for a keyword

Sometimes you start with a keyword rather than an app. Maybe you’re checking the results for a term before you target it, or you want the top-ranking apps for a category query. That’s a job for our App Data API, specifically the App Searches endpoint, which returns apps ranking for a keyword you specify on App Store or Google Play.

One difference matters here. The DataForSEO Labs API is Live-only, but our App Data API uses a task-based workflow: first, submit the request and save the returned task ID; then, check when the task is complete and retrieve the results using that ID. From there, the App Info and App Reviews endpoints add listing details and user feedback to each result, which helps when you’re profiling a competitor’s metadata for keyword ideas.

In total, the five endpoints line up like this:

Before using these endpoints, let’s look at the common mistakes to avoid before they cost you time.

Common mistakes when pulling ASO keyword data

1. Using the wrong platform endpoint. App Store and Google Play have separate endpoint paths. Send an App Store app_id to a google path and you get nothing useful back. Match the platform in the path to the ID you’re passing.
2. Using the wrong request workflow. DataForSEO Labs App Store and Google Play endpoints are Live-only, so each request returns its result at once. They do not require the task submission and polling workflow used by the App Data API, so make sure to keep them separate.
3. Requesting more data than you need. Use filters and limit to avoid pulling 1,000 keywords and discarding most of them, which creates extra processing work and increases costs. A filter on the request keeps the response lean. DataForSEO Labs API uses pay-as-you-go pricing and starts at $0.012 per request plus $0.00012 per item at current rates, so scoping the request can produce meaningful savings at scale.

If you hit a parameter you’re not sure about, our support manager will do their best to help, so reach out through the live chat. For a full walkthrough, our help center guide on finding an app’s ranking keywords goes through the request and response in more depth.

How the pieces fit

Finding keywords for App Store Optimization comes down to a short sequence. Pull the keywords an app ranks for, widen the view with competitor insights and keyword intersection data, then reverse the lookup when you want to analyze the apps ranking for a keyword. Running it on DataForSEO APIs means you don’t build or maintain the collection layer yourself. Whether you’re shipping an ASO feature into your own product or turning the data into a client report, the endpoints return structured keyword data on demand and under budget. Test the APIs for free.