How to Name an App for Search and Recall

The App Store name is 30 characters. It is the word people have to remember after a friend says it in a noisy restaurant, and it is the strongest indexed field you have. Those two jobs fight. A name that is only a brand, like “Lumo,” is easy to say and invisible to someone searching “split bill.” A name that is only keywords, like “Split Bill for Trips,” can match a search and still be impossible to recall or to trademark in any serious way.

The default that survives both tests is a short brand plus one keyword phrase, inside 30 characters, with the second idea moved to the 30-character subtitle. Apple’s limits and the warning about improper keywords are on Creating your product page . Every other box, including the subtitle and the 100-character keyword field, is sized in the character-limit reference. Count the finalists in the ASO Character Counter before you fall in love with one.

The name is doing two jobs at once

Recall is what happens when someone hears the name once. Search is what happens when a stranger types the job and your app is eligible to appear. A name can be good at one and useless at the other. Indies often pick the recall name, because it feels like a company, and then wonder why the only people who find the app already know the founder.

Indexed text on iOS is the name, the subtitle, and the keyword field: 30 + 30 + 100. The name is the piece every searcher sees in the result. Hiding the job in the keyword field and leaving the name as an invented word means you are eligible for the query and still look like an unknown brand in a list of clearer titles. Put the job where it is seen, as long as the brand still fits in front of it.

Brand only, or brand plus a keyword

Brand only works when people already type the brand. That is a later problem. At launch, almost nobody is searching your invented word. You can still own that word by keeping it at the front of the name, then spend the remaining characters on the job. “Tab: Split Travel Bills” is a brand plus a keyword. “Tab” alone is a brand that hopes the subtitle and the hidden field will explain it. They can index the explanation. They cannot make the search result obvious.

Keyword only, with no brand, has the opposite failure. You may match “split bill,” and you will also match every other generic in the category. There is nothing for a friend to repeat that is not also the competitor’s description. If you later run ads or a landing page, you will wish you had a proper noun. The budget split between your brand and generic terms is laid out in branded vs generic keywords.

Five names for a travel split-bill app

The app splits a restaurant check or a rideshare across friends on a trip, in the currencies they actually paid. It is not a general bank and not a group chat. The name has to say “split” or “bill” or “trip” in some form if you want a stranger’s search to have a chance, and it has to contain a word you can say twice without explaining it.

“Tab: Split Travel Bills” is 23 of 30 characters and keeps a brand plus the job. “Lumo” and “Tab” alone spend the strongest indexed field on a word nobody is searching yet.

“Tab: Split Travel Bills” leaves 7 characters. Do not stuff them with “app” or with a second idea like “currency.” Currency belongs in the subtitle or the keyword field. The colon is a character. Count it. If the brand you love is long, this pattern breaks: a 20-character brand leaves no room for the job, and you are back to a brand-only name whether you meant to be or not.

The subtitle carries the second idea

Once the name is “Tab: Split Travel Bills,” do not write a subtitle that repeats split, travel, or bills. Those words are already indexed. The subtitle’s 30 characters are for the next promise: “Shared costs on the road” is 24 characters and adds shared, costs, and road. A gallery of subtitle patterns, so you can see tone without copying one, is in App Store subtitle examples.

The keyword field then takes what neither line could hold: currency, itemized, roommate, receipt, settle, fx. Not “split,” not “bill,” not “travel.” How combination works, and why you should not paste “split travel bills” again as a phrase, is in long-tail App Store keywords. The comma rules for that field are in the keyword field guide.

Say it out loud before you submit it

Read the name to someone who has not seen the icon. Ask them to type it from memory an hour later, and ask a second person what they would search if they wanted the app and did not know the brand. You want the first person to get the brand roughly right, and the second person to type words that actually appear in your name. If both fail, the name is clever and unfinished.

Check the store, not only your head. Search the brand and the keyword phrase on a phone in the storefront you will launch in. If the brand collides with an unrelated app that already owns that word, pick a different proper noun. If the keyword phrase is a wall of famous apps, you can still use the words, but you should expect the subtitle and screenshots to do more of the conversion work. Collision is not a reason to switch to a competitor’s name.

• The brand is something you can spell after hearing it once.
• The keyword is a job the current build does, not a job you plan to add.
• The subtitle does not repeat the name’s words.
• Neither line contains another company’s product name.
• The whole name is 30 characters or fewer, counted with spaces and punctuation.

Changing the name later is a version, not a tweak

The name ships with a version in App Store Connect, the same way keywords and screenshots do. It is not promotional text. Promotional text is 170 characters, can change without a new binary, and Apple says it does not affect search ranking. Do not park a naming experiment there. If you rename, you also have to re-check the keyword field, because words that used to live only in the field might now be duplicates, and words that used to live in the name might need a new home.

Pick the name before you commission a lot of screenshot text that repeats a different brand. The first screenshot caption and the name should sound like the same product. “Tab” on the icon and “Lumo” in the caption is how a searcher decides the listing is confused and goes back to the results.