Best Free ASO Tools in 2026: What's Genuinely Free (and What's Just a Trial)
What you can genuinely do free in ASO in 2026: store consoles, four real free tiers, the honest limits of free, and when it's time to pay.
Short answer: yes, you can do real ASO for $0 a month in 2026 — if you combine the stores' own consoles (the only place your numbers aren't estimates) with the handful of third-party free tiers that actually exist: Appfigures, AppFollow, ASOMobile, and Asodesk. Most everything else calling itself "free" is a trial with a countdown timer. Here's the honest map, with every claim checked against the vendor's own site in August 2026.
Start with the consoles — your best free data isn't a hack
Before you sign up for anything, squeeze the two dashboards you already have. They're the only ASO data source where the numbers are actuals, not modeled estimates.
App Store Connect: App Analytics
Included with the $99/year Apple Developer Program you already pay for. App Analytics shows impressions, product page views, conversion rate, and source types — App Store Search vs Browse vs web referrers vs campaign links — plus retention, cohorts, and peer group benchmarks against similar apps in your category.
If you do exactly one free ASO thing this month, make it this: open App Analytics, filter by source type, and look at your search conversion rate. That one number tells you whether your problem is visibility (few impressions) or your product page (impressions that don't convert).
Google Play Console
A $25 one-time registration fee — not a subscription. The headline feature is store listing experiments: real A/B tests of your icon, feature graphic, screenshots, and descriptions against a control, measured on unique install clicks. Google recommends testing one asset at a time and auto-stops experiments after six months. On iOS, people pay third parties to approximate this. On Android, it's included.
The consoles' limit: they show what happened on your listing. They can't tell you what people are searching for, or what your competitors just changed. That's where third-party free tiers come in.
Free tiers that are actually free (verified August 2026)
| Tool | The free tier gets you | The catch |
|---|---|---|
| Appfigures Starter | Downloads & revenue tracking, subscription analytics, global ranks & ratings, unlimited review replies | Keyword tracking starts on paid plans (Connect, $9.99/mo as listed, August 2026) |
| AppFollow Free | 2 apps, keyword tracking, 10 competitors, 100 manual review replies/month, unlimited teammates | Historical data spans just 7 days |
| ASOMobile Free | 20 keywords, 2 apps, 10 competitors, 100 review responses | 20 keywords is about one metadata iteration |
| Asodesk Free | 200 keywords, 1 app, 100 replies/month, top charts, review analytics | One app only; 9 competitor apps per country |
A quick feel for which fits you:
- Asodesk Free has the most generous keyword cap on this list — 200 tracked keywords on one app is enough to run a genuine keyword spreadsheet through a full optimization cycle.
- AppFollow Free is the pick if reviews are your pain: two apps, integrations (Slack, Zendesk, email), and 100 manual replies a month, per AppFollow's own plan guide. Paid plans start from $19/month billed yearly.
- Appfigures Starter is analytics-first — one place for downloads, revenue, and ratings across both stores — with keywords held for paid tiers.
- ASOMobile Free is a small taste of a full suite; useful for kicking the tires before its $59/mo Indie plan.
"Free trial" is not "free"
Worth being blunt about, because these tools rank for "free ASO tools" too:
- AppTweak — no free plan. A 7-day free trial, then the cheapest plan (Essential) is $79/month as listed, August 2026.
- App Radar — no free plan. The 7-day trial requires a credit card and converts to a paid subscription automatically unless you cancel.
- MobileAction — 7-day trial on its Basic and Pro plans; the Lite plan is $15/month.
Trials are still useful if you use them deliberately: batch your work. Block a weekend, run keyword research for the next quarter, export everything, and set the cancellation reminder before you start — not after.
The honest limits of free
- Keyword volumes are estimates. Everywhere. No third-party tool sees Apple's or Google's real search logs; popularity scores are modeled from partial signals. Treat them as rank ordering ("this term is bigger than that one"), not truth. Your consoles are the source of truth for what actually converts.
- History windows are short. AppFollow's free plan keeps 7 days of data. You can't spot a slow three-month rank slide with a one-week window.
- Caps arrive fast. 20–200 keywords sounds fine until you localize into three languages and want competitor terms too.
- Trials expire mid-habit — usually right when the tool has become part of your Sunday routine. That's the business model.
- Free tiers change. Everything above was checked on vendor sites in August 2026; re-verify before you build a workflow around any of it.
When it's time to pay
Some honest signals that $0 has stopped being the cheap option:
- Your app earns real money and you're making metadata decisions on 20 tracked keywords.
- You're localizing, and each language needs its own keyword set.
- A competitor is climbing and you can't see what they changed.
- Review volume has passed what you can hand-answer with a 100-reply cap.
If two of those are true, a $50–80/month plan usually pays for itself in one avoided bad metadata release. We've broken down every real plan under $100 — with verified prices — in our companion guide: ASO tools under $100 a month.
Where Kintsu fits
Kintsu is a mobile-app intelligence platform in private beta, built specifically for indie developers and small studios. It combines unified analytics across App Store Connect, Google Play, and ad networks with ASO keyword tools, AI-assisted review management, store screenshot generation, and competitor monitoring — one workspace instead of four tabs. It's currently open as a 100-seat founding cohort; details at thekintsu.com.
Sources
- https://developer.apple.com/programs/whats-included/
- https://developer.apple.com/app-store-connect/analytics/
- https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/6112435
- https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/6227309
- https://appfigures.com/pricing
- https://appfollow.io/blog/new-plans-at-appfollow-and-how-to-choose-the-right-one
- https://asomobile.net/en/pricing/
- https://asodesk.com/pricing/
- https://www.apptweak.com/en/pricing
- https://appradar.com/pricing
- https://www.mobileaction.co/pricing/
Questions, answered.
Is there a completely free ASO tool with no trial?
Yes. As of August 2026, Appfigures (Starter), AppFollow, ASOMobile, and Asodesk all publish permanent free tiers on their own sites. AppTweak and App Radar offer only 7-day trials - App Radar's requires a credit card and auto-converts.
Are free keyword volume numbers accurate?
No tool - free or paid - sees Apple's or Google's real search logs, so all keyword volumes are estimates. Use them to rank terms against each other, and use App Store Connect and Play Console for the actual impressions and conversions.
Do I have to pay extra to see my own store analytics?
No. App Analytics is included with the $99/year Apple Developer Program, and Play Console analytics and store listing experiments are included with the one-time $25 Google Play registration fee.
