App name and subtitle: your 60 most valuable characters
On iOS, two fields carry more ranking weight than anything else: your app name (30 characters) and your subtitle (30 characters). The name outranks the subtitle, the subtitle outranks the keyword field, and everything indexed flows from there in the order App Name > Subtitle > Keywords > Primary Category > Secondary Category. That's only 60 characters of your highest-value real estate, and the catch is that every word is indexed exactly once: a word spent in the name is wasted if you repeat it in the subtitle or keyword field. These two fields are also unusual because they do two jobs at once. They rank you in search, and they are among the very few text fields a browsing user actually reads on the search results screen and the product page header. Your promotional text and your full description are not indexed for search at all, so the burden of both ranking and the first-impression pitch lands almost entirely on these 60 characters. Treat them as a single, shared budget of distinct, relevant, readable terms, and you extract more rank and more taps from the same space than a competitor who fills them with filler.
Why are these 60 characters the most valuable?
Apple's text-relevance weighting runs App Name > Subtitle > Keywords > Primary Category > Secondary Category. The name and subtitle sit at the top of that order, so a keyword placed there ranks you harder than the same word buried in the 100-byte keyword field. A term like 'sleep' in your name pulls more ranking power than the identical term in the keyword field; that difference is the whole reason placement matters. Both fields are 30 characters each, measured in characters, not bytes, unlike the keyword field where multibyte CJK or accented characters eat into a 100-byte cap. So a 30-character name is genuinely 30 visible characters whether it is Latin or Japanese, though localized storefronts each get their own 30+30 to fill. These are also the only indexed fields users actually read on the results list, so they do double duty: they rank you and they convince the tap. Promotional text and the description are not indexed for search at all, and In-App Events and promoted in-app purchases are the only secondary surfaces that can appear in search results, which is why these 60 characters carry such disproportionate weight. Spend them as your single most concentrated ASO investment.
What goes in the name vs the subtitle?
Lead the name with your brand, then spend the remaining characters on your single strongest keyword if it fits naturally, for example 'Lumen: Sleep & Focus Sounds' puts the brand first and the highest-value terms right behind it. A colon, dash, or pipe after the brand is the conventional separator and reads cleanly on the results screen. The subtitle is where you place your next tier of keywords woven into a readable value statement, not a comma list: 'White noise for deep sleep' indexes 'white', 'noise', 'deep', and 'sleep' while still reading like a promise. Treat the name as brand-plus-anchor-term and the subtitle as your second keyword slot that still has to sell. Note that connector words such as 'for', 'and', 'the', and '&' are not worth indexing, so use them only where they make the phrase scan naturally, never to pad. A useful test: read the subtitle aloud as if pitching the app in five seconds. If it sounds like a sentence a human would say, it converts; if it sounds like a keyword list, you have sacrificed the tap for a marginal ranking gain you could have captured in the hidden keyword field instead.
What should you never waste them on?
Don't burn characters on category names ('Games', 'Productivity'), generic filler ('app', 'free', 'best', 'the'), or your developer name. Apple already knows your category and these add no relevance. Don't stuff plurals of words you already have: if 'workout' is present, 'workouts' is wasted because Apple handles the singular/plural variation automatically. Don't restate your tagline if it carries no keyword, and don't repeat your brand inside the subtitle when it is already the lead of your name. A subtitle reading 'The best app for you' indexes almost nothing rankable and pitches nothing specific, so it fails on both axes. Also avoid superlatives and trademark claims that Apple's review team may reject ('#1', 'best', competitor names), which can stall an otherwise-ready release. Every character here should either be your brand or a term real users actually type into search. When you are tempted to add a word, ask whether a user would type it; if not, it is decoration, and decoration in your two highest-weight fields is the most expensive mistake in iOS ASO.
The no-duplicate rule across name, subtitle, and keywords
Apple indexes the name, subtitle, and keyword field separately and then combines them, so a word that appears in more than one field is only counted once for ranking but paid for in space across each field it occupies. If 'sleep' is in your name, do not put it in the subtitle or the keyword field; spend those slots on new terms instead. The practical move is to treat all three fields as one shared word pool with no repeats: maximize distinct, relevant terms across the 30 + 30 characters and 100 bytes combined. Apple also auto-combines adjacent terms, so a name word and a subtitle word can be matched as a two-word phrase without you spelling the phrase out anywhere, which means you should not waste space writing combinations Apple will assemble for you. appusula's metadata editor flags cross-field duplicates as you type so you never pay twice, and it surfaces the implied combinations so you can see the phrases you already rank for before adding more. The discipline of one word, one field is the single highest-leverage habit in metadata.
Localization multiplies your indexed space
Each App Store localization you add gives you a fresh app name, subtitle, and keyword field, and Apple indexes several of them together for a single storefront. In the US storefront, for example, both English (US) and English (UK) localizations are indexed, so populating the English (UK) name, subtitle, and keyword field with entirely different terms effectively doubles your indexed real estate without translating anything. The same multiplication applies across Spanish (Mexico) and Spanish (Spain), and other paired locales. The rule that name/subtitle/keyword words must not repeat still holds within and across these locales, so the win comes from filling the second localization with new, non-overlapping terms rather than copying the first. This is one of the cheapest ASO gains available: you are not paying for translation, only for thoughtful term selection. Audit which localizations your target storefront indexes, then treat the secondary localization's name and subtitle as another 60 characters of ranking space, populated with terms you could not fit the first time. Skipping this leaves a large amount of free indexed capacity on the table.
Reading versus ranking: the subtitle's dual job
The subtitle is the field where the tension between ranking and conversion is sharpest, because it is both indexed and read. A subtitle optimized purely for keywords ('sleep sounds white noise focus relax') ranks for several terms but reads like spam and depresses your tap-through rate, which feeds back into rank because Apple weighs conversion. A subtitle optimized purely for prose ('Rest better, every night') reads beautifully but indexes almost nothing. The craft is finding phrasings that are both: 'White noise for deep sleep' or 'Calm focus and better sleep' carry real keywords inside a sentence a human would say. Write three to five candidate subtitles, then score each on two axes: how many distinct rankable terms it carries, and whether it reads as a confident value statement. Pick the candidate that wins both, not the one that wins either alone. Because the subtitle can be updated with each release without re-review delays in many cases, it is also your most testable high-weight field; iterate it across releases and watch how rank and conversion move together.
How to draft the 60 characters in practice
Work in a fixed order. First, fix your brand as the start of the name; it is non-negotiable. Second, build your candidate keyword pool from the terms users actually search, ranked by relevance and relative Search Popularity. Third, assign your single strongest keyword to the name if it fits naturally after the brand without making the name read awkwardly; if nothing fits cleanly, leave the name as brand-plus-tagline rather than forcing a term. Fourth, draft the subtitle from your next two to four strongest terms, woven into a readable phrase, never a comma list. Fifth, remove from your keyword-field plan every word now sitting in the name or subtitle, since they are already indexed and higher weighted. Sixth, count the name and subtitle as characters (each capped at 30) and confirm they read aloud as a pitch. Finally, repeat the whole exercise for each indexed localization with fresh terms. Done this way, your 60 characters carry the maximum number of distinct, winnable, readable terms, and nothing is paid for twice.
FAQ
How long can the iOS app name and subtitle be?
Each is capped at 30 characters, not bytes. The keyword field is the one measured in bytes, at 100 bytes of UTF-8. Name and subtitle are plain 30-character limits, so the same 30 characters apply whether the text is Latin, accented, or CJK. Each localization you add gets its own separate 30-character name and 30-character subtitle, which is part of why localization is such a cheap way to expand your indexed space.
Should I put keywords in my app name?
Yes, after your brand. The name carries the highest text-relevance weight on iOS, so leading with brand and following with your single strongest keyword, if it reads naturally, is the most valuable placement you have. Use a separator like a colon or dash between brand and term. If no keyword fits cleanly without making the name read awkwardly, leave it as brand-plus-tagline; a forced, unreadable name hurts conversion more than the marginal ranking gain helps.
Can I repeat a keyword in both the subtitle and the keyword field?
No. Apple indexes name, subtitle, and keywords separately and counts a repeated word only once for ranking. Repeating it wastes the second slot, so use that space for a different relevant term. Treat all three fields as one shared pool with no duplicates. Apple also auto-combines adjacent terms across fields, so you rarely need to spell out a multi-word phrase yourself; it will match the combination from individual words placed in different fields.
Do plurals like 'workout' and 'workouts' both need to be included?
No. Apple handles singular and plural variation automatically, so adding the plural of a word you already have wastes space. Include one form and spend the saved characters on a new term. The same applies to obvious stem variations Apple already covers. The exception is genuinely distinct words that merely look similar; when in doubt, prefer a clearly different keyword over a near-duplicate that adds no new coverage.
How does adding a localization affect my name and subtitle?
Every localization adds a fresh 30-character name, 30-character subtitle, and 100-byte keyword field. Apple indexes certain locale pairs together within one storefront, for example English (US) and English (UK) in the US store, so filling the second localization with entirely different, non-repeating terms expands your indexed space without translation. This is one of the cheapest ASO gains available, so populate the secondary localization with terms you could not fit in the primary one rather than duplicating it.
appusula puts these checks in one self-hosted dashboard: keyword ranks, metadata validation, competitor tracking, and AI visibility.
Get started