Top 10 new ASO tools that shipped this summer, and what each one actually does

The app marketing boards have been full of new store optimisation tools for the last three months, almost all of them built by one person who got tired of paying enterprise prices. I pulled the ones that launched since May, checked each site was still up, and wrote down what each one is for. Prices are only listed where the maker stated one and the site still agrees.

1. CoreRank ASO (macOS, around $12 a month). A native Mac app instead of a web dashboard. Rank tracking from 1 to 100 with history, a keyword efficiency index that colour codes low competition terms, competitor review mining that reads 1 and 2 star reviews for pain points, and a metadata hub with character counters per country.

2. ASO Studio (macOS, $59.99 a year). The other Mac one. Keyword scoring, live rank tracking across storefronts, competitor keyword profiles, review mining. Built by someone who shipped an app, had no idea what it ranked for, and found that the tools which tell you start around $150 a month.

3. Appalize. The only one here that writes back. Keyword tracking across 175 storefronts, Search Ads automation, AI review replies, metadata localised into 32 languages and pushed to App Store Connect in one click. Its argument is that every other ASO tool is read only: they show you the problem and leave you to do the work by hand.

4. AppRankly (open source, self hosted, free). Apple and Android store analytics with an AI optimisation studio on top. Runs on your own machine, so there is no seat to pay for.

5. RespectASO (open source, self hosted, free). The other free and self hosted option, aimed at people who want the numbers without a subscription.

6. AppDrift ($9.99 a month, free keyword difficulty checker). Worth opening even if you never pay, because it publishes what its own cache measures. Two numbers from it: across 604 scored keywords the App Store averaged 61.7 difficulty against Google Play's 44.1, and of 123 apps run through its public scorer, 88% had not localised a single thing.

7. RankAnalyzerPro (free tier, 7 day trial). Plain rank tracking for both stores in one workspace, per country, with daily automated checks, change alerts, weekly email summaries and PDF export. No AI in the pitch at all, which is becoming unusual.

8. openASO (free). Built so an agent can do the work. The maker got tired of clicking through a dashboard and made something that lets Claude drive the optimisation instead.

9. AppScreenPro (browser). Screenshot decks without a subscription. Runs entirely in the browser and uploads nothing, does 3D device framing and zoom callouts, and re-exports a full localised deck in one click.

10. StoreShot AI (browser). The same job with the copy included. Upload a raw screenshot, its vision model reads your interface and writes the caption, then wraps it in device frames at the exact export sizes.

Three things about the list rather than the tools.

Eleventh place already 404s. ASOIntel was a Play Store keyword tool posted with unusually honest numbers, 3,500 views and two signups and no revenue in its second week. The domain is gone now. That is the ordinary outcome for a one person tool, and it is the reason to weight the open source and one off purchase entries higher if you intend to depend on one.

Half the list is screenshots, which tells you where the barrier to entry is rather than where the demand is. Four separate people built the same screenshot generator this summer.

Read the feature list, not the founder story. Several of the launch posts circulating next to these are the same personal account posted five times across different boards with the wording shuffled and a tool link at the bottom.