If you're trying to track your App Store keyword rankings without paying $60–300/month for an enterprise ASO platform, you've probably landed on two names: Tryastro and AppFollow.
Both track keyword positions. Both are significantly cheaper than AppTweak or Sensor Tower. But they're built around different assumptions about who's using them and why.
This comparison breaks down what each tool actually does, what it costs, and which one makes sense depending on where you are with your app.
The short version
Tryastro is built for indie iOS developers who want clean, fast keyword rank tracking on their iPhone — without a subscription, without a dashboard to manage, and without enterprise features they'll never use.
AppFollow is a web-based platform with a broader feature set: keyword tracking, review monitoring, competitor analysis, and team workflows. It has a free tier, but meaningful functionality requires a paid plan.
If you want to know where your app ranks for a list of keywords right now — Tryastro. If you want review management, competitor tracking, and a team dashboard — AppFollow.
Tryastro
Tryastro is an iOS app for App Store keyword rank tracking. You add your app, add the keywords you want to track, and it shows you your current position for each keyword — updated in real time, directly on your device.
What it does:
- Real-time keyword rank tracking on iPhone
- Track rankings across multiple countries
- Clean, minimal interface — no bloat
- See exactly where your app appears for a given search, the way a real user would
What makes it different: Tryastro tracks rankings the way a real user experiences them — by actually running searches on device. This removes the discrepancy you sometimes see between ASO platform data and reality. When you want to know if your metadata update worked, you open the app and see your position change.
Price: Free to use. Tryastro has no subscription wall between you and keyword rank tracking.
What it doesn't do:
- No keyword research (you need to know what keywords to track before using it)
- No competitor keyword gap analysis
- No review monitoring
- No web dashboard
Best for: Indie developers who already know their target keywords and want to track whether their metadata changes are working.
AppFollow
AppFollow is a web-based ASO and review management platform. It's been around since 2015 and is positioned as a mid-market tool — more affordable than AppTweak or Sensor Tower, more feature-complete than most free options.
What it does:
- Keyword rank tracking (web-based)
- Review monitoring and reply workflows
- Competitor keyword tracking
- Rating and review analytics
- Basic keyword research
- App Store and Google Play support
Price: AppFollow has a free tier with limited daily query capacity. Paid plans start around $23–39/month depending on the plan, scaling with the number of apps and keywords tracked.
What it does well: If you need to monitor reviews and respond to users across multiple apps in one place, AppFollow is genuinely useful. The review management workflows are solid and the notification system is reliable.
What it doesn't do as well:
- Keyword research depth is weaker than AppTweak or ASOdesk
- The free tier hits limits quickly if you're tracking more than a handful of keywords
- The interface is more complex than necessary if all you want is rank tracking
Best for: Developers or small teams who need review monitoring and keyword tracking in one tool, and don't need the deepest keyword research data.
Side-by-side comparison
| Feature | Tryastro | AppFollow | |---|---|---| | Keyword rank tracking | ✅ Real-time, on device | ✅ Web-based, updated daily | | Free tier | ✅ Free | ✅ Limited | | Paid plans | No subscription | From ~$23/month | | Keyword research | ❌ | ✅ Basic | | Competitor tracking | ❌ | ✅ | | Review monitoring | ❌ | ✅ | | Multi-country tracking | ✅ | ✅ | | Google Play support | ❌ iOS only | ✅ | | Mobile app | ✅ iPhone | ❌ Web only | | Team features | ❌ | ✅ |
Which one should you use?
Use Tryastro if:
- You're an indie developer with one app
- You want to track whether your latest metadata update moved your rankings
- You want real-time data, not 24-hour-delayed snapshots
- You don't want to pay a monthly subscription just to track keywords
- You're doing your keyword research separately (Apple Search Ads, AppTweak trial, App Store autocomplete) and just need a clean tracker
Use AppFollow if:
- You manage multiple apps and need everything in one dashboard
- Review management is as important to you as keyword tracking
- You have a small team and need shared access to ASO data
- You're on both the App Store and Google Play
Use both if:
- You want AppFollow's web dashboard for review monitoring and competitor data, plus Tryastro on your phone for quick real-time rank checks after metadata updates
This is a legitimate combo. AppFollow is your command center; Tryastro is your real-time check.
The missing piece both tools share
Neither Tryastro nor AppFollow replaces keyword research.
Tryastro tells you where you rank for the keywords you already know about. AppFollow gives you basic research capability, but for deep keyword gap analysis — especially across international markets — you'll either need AppTweak or a done-for-you localization service.
If you're tracking rankings in one market and your metadata is already well-researched, Tryastro is the simplest and cheapest way to stay on top of what's working.
If you're looking at international expansion and need to find the right keywords in German, Japanese, or Spanish before you can track anything — that research phase comes first. LocalizeRank handles the keyword research, competitor gap analysis, and localized metadata build across 5–20 markets, so you have something worth tracking.
Bottom line
For pure keyword rank tracking with no subscription fee, Tryastro is the best option for indie iOS developers. It's fast, accurate, and gets out of your way.
AppFollow is worth paying for if you need review management and team workflows alongside keyword tracking. For keyword research and localization work, neither tool is the right primary tool — they're both designed for tracking, not discovery.