# Apple Search Ads Cost: CPT, CPI & Indie Budgets > Apple Search Ads cost explained for 2026: how the tap auction prices CPT, how to turn CPT into CPI, and what $5, $20 or $50 a day buys an indie iOS app. - **Author:** Peter Sutarik - **Published:** September 26, 2026 - **Tags:** apple search ads, apple ads cost, cpt, cpi, paid acquisition - **Reading time:** 11 min - **Canonical:** https://trysonar.app/blog/apple-search-ads-cost --- ## Apple Search Ads cost: there is no price list, only an auction Apple Search Ads cost is whatever the auction clears at for your keyword, and Apple publishes no rate card and no minimum spend. With Apple Ads Advanced you "pay only when customers engage with your ad" and "decide the maximum amount you're willing to pay for a tap" [source: [Apple Ads Advanced overview](https://ads.apple.com/en/app-store/advanced)]. Your max bid is a ceiling. Apple says "the actual price you end up paying may be less than your max CPT bid amount" [source: [Apple Ads Help, Set and adjust bids](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/bids-and-budget/0062-set-and-adjust-bids)], and its glossary describes the auction as following "second-price auction principles" [source: [Apple Ads glossary](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help-glossary)]. So the honest answer to "what is the Apple Search Ads cost for my app" is a formula, not a number. I'll give you the formula, the third-party benchmarks that feed it, and a clearly labeled hypothetical of what small daily budgets buy. How to actually set bids is covered in my [Apple Search Ads bidding guide](https://trysonar.app/blog/apple-search-ads-bidding), so I won't repeat it here. *By Peter. Apple Ads help pages and third-party benchmark reports checked September 26, 2026. Keyword data from Sonar's API, US storefront, pulled the same day.* ## What changed in 2025–2026: Apple Ads and more search slots Two changes affect Apple Search Ads cost in 2026. First, Apple renamed Apple Search Ads to **Apple Ads** on April 14, 2025, because "our ad offerings have grown beyond search" [source: [Apple Ads news](https://ads.apple.com/news); [9to5Mac, April 14, 2025](https://9to5mac.com/2025/04/14/apple-rebrands-search-ads-business-as-apple-ads/)]. I use both names in this post. Second, Apple added ad slots inside search results. On December 17, 2025 Apple announced it would "begin running additional ads in search results — where 65% of downloads start" [source: [Apple Ads news](https://ads.apple.com/news)]. The rollout started with the UK and Japan on March 3, 2026 and reached every Apple Ads market by the end of March [source: [AppleInsider, January 22, 2026](https://appleinsider.com/articles/26/01/22/the-app-store-will-have-even-more-ads-in-march-2026-starting-with-the-uk)]. Your ad now shows "either at the top of their search results or further down the page," and "you can't select or bid for a particular ad position" [source: [Apple Ads Help, Search results](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/ad-placements/0082-search-results)]. More inventory per query means more auctions to win, but a lower slot is not a discounted product you can choose to buy. ## How Apple Ads pricing works by placement Every Apple Ads Advanced placement is priced per tap. Apple's placement table lists the "cost-per-tap pricing model" for "all placements," with target cost-per-acquisition available for the "search results placement only" [source: [Apple Ads Help, Ad placement options](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/ad-placements/0081-ad-placement-options)]. |Placement|Where it shows|Pricing| |-|-|-| |Search results|Top of results, and since March 2026 further down|CPT, or target CPA| |Search tab|Search tab before the user types|CPT| |Today tab|Today tab, first screen of the App Store|CPT| |Product pages — while browsing|Top of the "You Might Also Like" list on other apps' pages|CPT| |Apple Ads Basic|Search results, automated|CPI, capped at $10,000 per app per month| Sources: [Ad placement options](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/ad-placements/0081-ad-placement-options), [Compare Apple Ads solutions](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/apple-ads-basic/0001-compare-apple-ads-solutions). ### Is Apple Search Ads CPM or CPT? It's CPT. Search tab campaigns moved to CPT on July 19, 2022, when Apple announced advertisers would "pay only when they tap your ad" [source: [Apple Ads news](https://ads.apple.com/news)]. CPM still appears in Apple's glossary as a reporting metric, "the average amount an Apple Ads advertiser pays per one thousand ad impressions" [source: [Apple Ads glossary](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help-glossary)], so you can compare it across placements, but you don't bid on it. Older guides that say the Today tab or Search tab is CPM-priced are out of date. ### Basic vs Advanced Basic charges per install ("pay only for installs at a cost you choose") and caps spend at "up to $10,000 (U.S.) per app, per month." Advanced is per tap with "No budget maximum" [source: [Compare Apple Ads solutions](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/apple-ads-basic/0001-compare-apple-ads-solutions)]. The rest of this post is about Advanced, because that's where the CPT math lives. The trade-offs are in [Apple Search Ads Basic vs Advanced](https://trysonar.app/blog/apple-search-ads-basic-vs-advanced). ## What drives your cost per tap Apple Search Ads cost per tap is set by how many advertisers want the same query and how relevant Apple thinks your app is to it. Apple states that "if your app isn't relevant to what the user is searching for, it won't be displayed — regardless of how much you may be willing to pay" [source: [Apple Ads Help, Search results](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/ad-placements/0082-search-results)]. Four factors move the price. - **Category.** SplitMetrics' 2026 report (2025 data) puts average CPT across the top 15 categories at $2.25, with Sports at $14.41, Finance at $6.06 and Medical at $4.45 [third-party benchmark: [SplitMetrics](https://splitmetrics.com/blog/apple-search-ads-cost/)]. - **Country.** AppTweak's 2025 benchmarks put median search results CPT at $1.91 in the US, $1.35 in the UK, $1.17 in Canada and $1.11 in Japan, against a $0.92 global median [third-party benchmark: [AppTweak, July 2, 2025](https://www.apptweak.com/en/aso-blog/apple-ads-benchmarks)]. - **Brand vs generic.** Brand terms convert best. AppTweak measured US search results conversion at 73% for brand campaigns, 54% for generic and 50% for competitor (same source). Lower conversion on generic terms means each install costs more even at the same CPT. - **Relevance and TTR.** Apple defines TTR as taps divided by impressions [source: [Apple Ads glossary](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help-glossary)]. AppTweak reports a 7.40% global TTR for search results, versus 0.29% on the Search tab and 0.32% on the Today tab [third-party benchmark: [AppTweak](https://www.apptweak.com/en/aso-blog/apple-ads-benchmarks)]. A listing that nobody taps won't get shown much, however high you bid. ### Why popular generic keywords cost more A keyword with more searches attracts more bidders, and more bidders push the clearing price up. Sonar doesn't measure bid prices, but its data shows which terms are crowded. In Sonar's API (iOS, US, September 26, 2026, popularity = Apple's own Search Popularity, where 5 is Apple's floor): |Keyword|Apple popularity|Sonar difficulty| |-|-|-| |budget app|60|73| |habit tracker|57|67| |sleep sounds free|52|76| |sleep sounds|49|74| |habit tracker widget|5|47| |tip calculator|5|40| "Habit tracker" at popularity 57 is a head term that every habit app wants. "Habit tracker widget" sits at the floor of 5 with difficulty 47. You should expect more competition in the auction for the first one, and that's where your budget drains fastest. That's reasoning from demand, not a measured CPT. Apple's own suggested bid in the console is the number to check before you commit. ## How to calculate CPI from CPT Apple Search Ads cost per install is your cost per tap divided by the share of taps that become installs. Apple calls that share tap-through conversion rate: "installs resulting from taps on your ad divided by the total number of taps" [source: [Apple Ads glossary](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help-glossary)]. **CPI = CPT ÷ conversion rate** **Daily taps = daily budget ÷ CPT** **Daily installs = daily taps × conversion rate** (equivalently, daily budget ÷ CPI) **Monthly spend ceiling = daily budget × 30.4** The last line matters for budgeting. Apple says daily spend "may exceed your daily budget" on high-opportunity days, but total monthly spend won't pass the daily budget times 30.4 [source: [Apple Ads Help, Manage budgets](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/bids-and-budget/0016-manage-budgets)]. Conversion rates on search results are high. Apple reports "more than a 60 percent average conversion rate for ads at the top of search results," measured November 2024 to October 2025 [source: [Apple Ads Help, Search results](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/ad-placements/0082-search-results)]. SplitMetrics puts its 2025 average at 66.2% [third-party benchmark: [SplitMetrics](https://splitmetrics.com/blog/apple-search-ads-cost/)]. At a 60–66% conversion rate, the formula puts CPI at roughly 1.5–1.7× CPT. ### Worked example (HYPOTHETICAL) **Everything in this example is hypothetical.** It uses third-party medians as inputs, not a real campaign. Say you run a US habit-tracker app in Health & Fitness. AppTweak's US median CPT for Health & Fitness is $1.59, and its US generic-campaign conversion rate is 54% [third-party benchmark: [AppTweak](https://www.apptweak.com/en/aso-blog/apple-ads-benchmarks)]. - CPI = $1.59 ÷ 0.54 = **$2.94** - A $20 daily budget buys $20 ÷ $1.59 = **12.6 taps** - 12.6 taps × 54% = **6.8 installs a day** - Monthly: 6.8 × 30.4 = **about 206 installs** for a spend ceiling of **$608** If that app earns less than $2.94 per install over its lifetime, the campaign loses money on every install. Your break-even CPI comes from lifetime value, which I break down in [user acquisition cost: what CAC includes](https://trysonar.app/blog/user-acquisition-cost). ![Flow from a $1.59 cost per tap divided by a 54% conversion rate to a $2.94 cost per install, plus hypothetical monthly installs at $5, $20 and $50 daily Apple Ads budgets](https://trysonar.app/blog/apple-search-ads-cost-hero.png) *Hypothetical: at a $1.59 CPT and 54% conversion, $20 a day buys about 206 installs a month; a cheaper $0.80 long-tail tap more than doubles that.* ## What $5, $20 and $50 a day actually buy At indie scale, Apple Search Ads cost is really a question of daily budget. A small daily budget buys a handful of installs a day on a competitive generic keyword, and noticeably more on cheaper long-tail terms. The table below applies the formula above to two **hypothetical** scenarios: scenario A uses the Health & Fitness inputs from the worked example ($1.59 CPT, 54% conversion); scenario B assumes a cheaper long-tail keyword at $0.80 CPT and 60% conversion (a made-up input chosen to show the effect of a lower CPT). |Daily budget|Monthly ceiling|A: installs/day|A: installs/month|B: installs/day|B: installs/month| |-|-|-|-|-|-| |$5|$152|1.7|~52|3.8|~114| |$20|$608|6.8|~206|15|~456| |$50|$1,520|17.0|~516|37.5|~1,140| All figures hypothetical, derived from CPI = CPT ÷ CR (A: $2.94 CPI, B: $1.33 CPI). Here's how I read it: - **$5/day** is a test budget. At about 3 taps a day in scenario A, you need weeks to collect enough taps to judge a keyword's conversion rate. - **$20/day** can support one tight campaign on a few exact-match terms. It's enough to learn which keywords convert, not enough to cover a category. - **$50/day** starts to buy real volume, but only if your CPI sits below lifetime value. New eligible developers get a "100 USD credit applied to their new account" [source: [Apple Ads Advanced overview](https://ads.apple.com/en/app-store/advanced)], which covers about 20 days of the $5 test. ### Paid vs organic, for scale Sonar's model estimates that ranking #1 organically for "budget app" (popularity 60, difficulty 73) brings about 710 downloads a day. Budget apps sit in Finance, where AppTweak's US median CPI is $8.44 [third-party benchmark: [AppTweak](https://www.apptweak.com/en/aso-blog/apple-ads-benchmarks)]. **Hypothetically**, buying 710 installs a day at that median price would run about $6,000 a day. That gap between organic volume and Apple Search Ads cost is the case for using ads to find converting keywords and ASO to rank for them, which I cover in [Apple Search Ads vs organic ASO](https://trysonar.app/blog/apple-search-ads-vs-organic-aso). If you're weighing Apple against Google's network, see [Apple Search Ads vs Google Ads](https://trysonar.app/blog/apple-search-ads-vs-google-ads). ## How to keep Apple Search Ads cost down The cheapest tap is one on a keyword where you're relevant and few others bid. Four levers help, each tied to the formula. 1. **Raise conversion rate.** CPI = CPT ÷ CR, so a better product page lowers CPI at the same bid. See [App Store conversion rate](https://trysonar.app/blog/app-store-conversion-rate). 2. **Bid on long-tail terms.** Floor-popularity terms like "habit tracker widget" (popularity 5, per Sonar) draw less competition than the head term. 3. **Separate brand, generic and competitor campaigns.** Their conversion rates differ by 23 points in AppTweak's US data (73% vs 50%), so one blended CPI hides losers. [Campaign structure](https://trysonar.app/blog/apple-search-ads-campaign-structure) covers the setup. 4. **Test outside the US first.** AppTweak's median CPI of $4.06 in the US vs $2.60 in the UK and $0.73 in the Philippines [third-party benchmark: [AppTweak](https://www.apptweak.com/en/aso-blog/apple-ads-benchmarks)] makes cheaper markets useful for validating creative. Before you bid, check how crowded a keyword is. Sonar shows Apple's popularity and organic difficulty for every keyword you [track for your apps](https://trysonar.app/apps), which tells you where the auction is likely to be busy. ## FAQ ### How much does Apple Search Ads cost per install? There's no fixed Apple Search Ads cost per install — CPI equals your cost per tap divided by your tap-to-install conversion rate. AppTweak's 2025 benchmarks put the global median CPI for search results at $1.80 and the US median at $4.06, rising to $26.81 in US Sports [third-party benchmark: [AppTweak](https://www.apptweak.com/en/aso-blog/apple-ads-benchmarks)]. Your number depends on category, country and keyword. ### Is there a minimum budget for Apple Ads? Apple's Advanced overview and budget help pages list no minimum spend or minimum daily budget [source: [Apple Ads Advanced](https://ads.apple.com/en/app-store/advanced), [Manage budgets](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/bids-and-budget/0016-manage-budgets)]. You set a daily budget and a max CPT bid, and you only pay for taps. Basic caps spend at $10,000 per app per month. ### Do the new search results ad slots cost extra? No separate price exists. Since March 2026, existing search results campaigns are eligible for the extra positions automatically, and you can't bid for a specific position [source: [Apple Ads Help, Search results](https://ads.apple.com/app-store/help/ad-placements/0082-search-results)]. You still pay per tap in the same auction. *Sonar shows Apple's own Search Popularity and organic difficulty for every keyword you track, so you can see which terms are crowded before you spend on them. Plans start with Indie — [start free trial](https://trysonar.app/pricing).* --- Source: https://trysonar.app/blog/apple-search-ads-cost — published by [Sonar](https://trysonar.app), an App Store Optimization platform for keyword research, difficulty analysis, and rank tracking.