Keyword Research: Search Volume, CPC and Ideas

Get exact monthly Google search volume, CPC, competition, keyword difficulty, search intent and a 12-month trend for up to 10,000 keywords per run in 249 countries. You can also switch modes to find keyword ideas, keywords for any website, years of monthly history or AI search volume. You don't need an API key or a Google Ads account, and a keyword checked without a usable result costs only $0.0002.

One example row from a real run, shortened:

{
  "id": "2a37305c4b49a8d2",
  "keyword": "nothing phone",
  "searchVolume": 165000,
  "cpc": 0.31,
  "competition": "HIGH",
  "competitionIndex": 92,
  "lowBid": 0.03,
  "highBid": 0.38,
  "keywordDifficulty": 31,
  "searchIntent": "informational",
  "secondaryIntents": null,
  "trendMonthlyPct": 22,
  "trendQuarterlyPct": 0,
  "trendYearlyPct": 174,
  "monthlyTrend": [
    {
      "year": 2026,
      "month": 6,
      "searchVolume": 301000
    },
    {
      "year": 2026,
      "month": 7,
      "searchVolume": 246000
    },
    {
      "year": 2026,
      "month": 8,
      "searchVolume": 301000
    }
  ],
  "coreKeyword": "phones nothing",
  "wordCount": 2,
  "detectedLanguage": "en",
  "categoryIds": [
    10007,
    10878,
  …
}

Search volume mode (default), one row per keyword:

Other modes add or swap fields:

The RUN_SUMMARY record in the key value store lists:

• keywords that had no data
• keywords that were not found
• skipped keywords
• any problems
• why the run stopped (result cap or budget)
• the events that were charged

You pay per event, through your Apify account. Main price: $1.20 per 1,000 keywords on the Apify Free plan and $0.60 on Gold, plus $0.0145 per data request ($0.0151 on Gold). Every event and plan:

Every run is one HTTP request to the Apify API with your Apify token; the input below is the actor's own example. The synchronous endpoint returns the rows in the response for runs up to 300 seconds; for longer runs start a run and fetch its dataset.

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/cheapapi~keyword-research-tool/run-sync-get-dataset-items" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $APIFY_TOKEN" -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"mode":"searchVolume","keywords":["running shoes","best coffee maker","keyword research"],"country":"US","dataSource":"auto"}'

With the JavaScript client:

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: process.env.APIFY_TOKEN });
const run = await client.actor('cheapapi/keyword-research-tool').call({
  "mode": "searchVolume",
  "keywords": [
    "running shoes",
    "best coffee maker",
    "keyword research"
  ],
  "country": "US",
  "dataSource": "auto"
});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();

Typical run: search volume for your own list of 10 or 1,000 keywords. Prices are Actor fees per the public Apify Store listings, checked September 2026; user counts are rounded. ", " means the listing does not offer or state it.

What this means:

• Small and medium lists: this Actor is the cheapest option with difficulty and intent, because it has no per run or per batch minimum.
• A full 1,000-keyword list: we are not the cheapest. On the Free plan the batch priced Google + Bing Actor costs $0.70 (and also returns Bing volume, which we do not); on Gold both batch priced Actors ($0.35 and $0.40) cost less than our $0.63. They do not include keyword difficulty or the 3-month and year over year trend %.
• Platform usage: for this Actor, Apify platform usage is billed separately on top of the prices above (at the default 256 MB a small run typically uses about $0.001 to $0.005).

Keyword ideas from seed keywords (1,000 idea rows, Free plan):

For plain idea lists without difficulty, the $1.00 Actor is cheaper than this one. Those two Actors expand seed keywords into suggestions; their listings do not describe looking up metrics for a list of your own keywords.

• SEO content planning: find long tail ideas with volume, difficulty and intent. Then filter for easy informational keywords to write about.
• PPC budgeting: get CPC, top of page bid ranges and competition for thousands of keywords before you build a Google Ads campaign.
• Competitor research: list the keywords a competitor's domain or landing page is relevant for.
• Market and product research: compare demand for products across countries. Track seasonality with 12 months (or up to about 4 years) of monthly volume.
• AI search / GEO planning: see which topics people ask AI assistants about and how that demand is trending, next to classic Google volume.
• Rank tracking and reporting: add fresh metrics to your keyword lists in dashboards or Google Sheets every month.

• Bing, YouTube or Amazon volume: this Actor returns Google data only.
• Live Google search results (rankings, snippets, ads): use Google SERP Scraper.
• Visibility of a brand in AI answers (ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews): use AI Search Visibility Tracker. This Actor's AI search volume shows demand, not who gets cited.
• Backlinks and domain authority: use Backlink Checker or Domain SEO Analyzer.
• Technical on page audits: use SEO Site Audit.
• YouTube keyword ideas: use YouTube Search Scraper to see what ranks for a query on YouTube.

• Up to 10,000 keywords per run in per keyword modes and 200 seed keywords in idea modes. Each keyword can be at most 80 characters and 10 words. Longer ones are skipped and listed in RUN_SUMMARY.
• Search volume is Google only. Rare keywords may return no volume; they cost at most the $0.0002 check fee.
• Keyword difficulty, intent, overview, history, ideas and demographics come from the keyword database. They cover country level locations and the major languages, not city targeting.
• Custom date ranges, search partners and city or coordinate targeting are real time only options, without difficulty or intent.
• AI search volume is an estimate with 12 months of history, so there is no year over year change for it.
• Demographics are not available for every keyword or country. Only rows that include them are charged.
• Economy processing can take 1 to 3 hours.