App Store Optimization: Apple vs Google Play, field by field

Two stores, two different reads — and the field Apple does not use for search.

Most ASO advice treats "the app stores" as one surface with one checklist. That is the mistake: Apple and Google publish different field lists, different character limits and different statements about what their search uses. A listing tuned for one leaves the other half-empty.

For a subscription app the store is one more channel with its own index — the discipline of SaaS and app marketing, on a surface whose HTML you do not control.

This page covers the store listing only. Acquisition across channels sits in app marketing; the vertical example is fintech app user acquisition.

ASO meaning: two jobs, not one

App store optimization (ASO) covers two jobs that get blurred constantly. Ranking — being returned when someone searches the store. Conversion — turning that impression into an install.

Metadata does the first, creative the second. Different levers, different numbers, two workstreams.

Why the App Store and Google Play are not one store

The stores differ most in what they say they read. Apple names four text fields and leaves the description out. Google names none and credits the listing text as a whole.

Apple's search page says results are based on "a number of factors, including text relevance (matches for your app's title, subtitle, keywords, and primary category), as well as user behavior (downloads, ratings and reviews, and more)" (Apple, App Store search).

The long description is not in that list. Apple does not say it is excluded either — it is simply not named, which is the honest reading.

Google is broader: "the text in your store listing helps users discover your app", and "using a professional translation service for your Description can lead to better search results and discoverability for worldwide users" (Google Play search).

So on Play the description is worth writing for search. On iOS it is worth writing for the reader, because your search terms belong in a field users never see.

Field by field: what each store indexes, and the verified limits

Every limit below was read from Apple's or Google's own documentation on 7 October 2026. None of those pages displays a last-updated date, so the read date is cited instead. Limits change — re-check before briefing a rewrite.

Sources, read 7 October 2026, none dated: App information · Platform version information · Promoting in-app purchases · Create and set up your app.

The iOS keyword field has no Google Play twin

This is the difference that makes one shared listing impossible: Apple gives you a private field, Google reads your prose.

Apple's rules, in Apple's words: "one or more keywords (each greater than two characters) describing your app. You can provide up to 100 bytes of content. Your app is searchable by app name and company name, so you shouldn't duplicate these values in the keyword list. Names of other apps or companies aren't allowed."

• Bytes, not characters. Latin letters cost one byte each in UTF-8; Indic characters cost more, so a Hindi list fits fewer terms.
• Never repeat your own name — Apple says the app name and company name are already searchable. Other apps' and companies' names are prohibited outright.

On Play there is no slot to fill, so the work moves into the title and the two descriptions. The same keyword research output ships in two different shapes.

Ratings, reviews and engagement: what the stores actually say

Both stores confirm non-metadata signals matter. Neither publishes how much, and that gap is where most ASO claims stop being verifiable.

• Apple: "Ratings and reviews appear on your product page and in search results, and can influence how your app ranks in App Store search."
• Google: "Apps are ranked based on a combination of ratings, reviews, downloads, and other factors", and Play search "factors in the overall experience of your app based on user behavior and feedback."
• Google on quality: its App discovery and ranking page names ratings, reviews and engagement, plus compatibility, performance, stability and responsiveness.

Practitioner inference, not published behaviour: the weightings, which retention window counts, uninstall thresholds, and whether day-7 retention is an input at all.

The defensible version is dull. Fix crashes, answer reviews, and ask for a rating at a moment of success, not on launch.

Creative converts the impression; it does not rank the app

Icon, screenshots and preview video have no stated role in either store's text relevance. Their job is the step after ranking — and usually where the controllable gains are, because you can test them.

Apple allows up to 10 screenshots, and "depending on the orientation of your screenshots, the first one to three images will appear in search results when no app preview is available" — plus three app previews of 30 seconds each (Creating your product page).

That decides your screenshot order: on iOS, the first one to three images are your search result.

So on Play you can A/B test copy. On iOS you cannot, and text changes are a judgement call shipped against a before-and-after.

Localising the listing for India

Localisation is the lever with the most documented headroom. Start with the indexed fields, not the easy ones.

Apple's localisation table lists Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Bangla, Odia, Punjabi and Urdu among the languages you can localise App Store metadata into (App Store localizations).

On Play, Hindi appears in the supported store listing languages table. Google says users viewing an untranslated listing "can choose to view an automated translation of your app's page".

1. Localise the indexed fields first — title, subtitle and keyword field on iOS; title and both descriptions on Play.
2. Translate, then rewrite. Hindi or Tamil search terms are rarely literal translations.
3. Localise screenshot captions — Google's localised experiments let you test them.
4. Re-budget the keyword bytes per language — the 100-byte cap bites much harder in an Indic script.

How to measure ASO, and where the numbers stop

Both consoles report a funnel from impression to install. Neither reports query-level data, and that is the ceiling.

Apple defines impressions as views "on the Today, Games, Apps, and Search tabs of the App Store for more than one second" including product page views, and conversion rate as "total downloads and pre-orders divided by unique device impressions" (Metric definitions).

Play Console reports store listing visitors — "users that visited your Store Listing who didn't already have your app installed on any of their devices" — plus acquisitions and a click-through rate that replaced the legacy conversion-rate metric, split by Play search, Play explore, and ads and referrals (Understand and grow your app's user base).

Two limits worth saying out loud. Neither store gives you the query-level report Search Console gives you for the web, so keyword-to-install is modelled, not measured. And attribution from a website visit to a store install is weak — the hand-off crosses a domain you do not own.

So commit to store-side numbers you can read, such as impression-to-install conversion by storefront; our note on marketing KPIs applies unchanged. Where paid installs run alongside organic, the plan sits with your performance marketing reporting.

First-hand: what we test first on an app listing

We test the first screenshot and its caption before anything else. On both stores it is what a searcher sees inside the results, before the product page exists for them — and it is the easiest element to test.

The element clients always want to change is the icon. It is the most visible piece of brand, so it attracts the most opinion in the room — and in our experience it is rarely where the argument should start, because one small glyph competes against a caption that can state a benefit in words.

The other recurring request is rewriting the iOS long description for keywords. We push back: Apple does not name the description among its text-relevance fields, so those hours go further in the subtitle and the 100 bytes.

When ASO is not the bottleneck

ASO assumes people are searching your category and failing to find you. When that is false, listing work returns nothing.

• Nobody searches the category term. A new category has no query volume yet; demand has to be created elsewhere first, which is a product marketing problem.
• The install flow leaks before the store. Wrong storefront on a deep link, a QR landing on a page with no store button, a form before the download.
• The growth is paid. If installs come from ads, the lever is campaign structure and creative — see app marketing.

Where to go from here

Build two listings, sequenced by what each store says it reads.

1. Audit both listings against the field table.
2. Write iOS and Play metadata separately — hidden keywords one side, indexable prose the other.
3. Reorder screenshots for the search result, then test one change at a time.
4. Localise the indexed fields in one Indian language your install base skews to.
5. Report store-side: impressions and conversion rate on iOS; visitors and CTR by source on Play.

Expect organic store movement on the same timeline as organic search — three to six months to anything meaningful. Paid installs move faster and stop when the spend stops.