Google Keyword Planner is the free keyword research tool built into Google Ads. It shows search volume ranges, competition levels and cost-per-click estimates for any keyword, straight from the same data Google uses to run its own ad auctions. It was built for advertisers, but it is one of the most widely used tools in SEO, simply because the numbers come from the source.
This guide walks through exactly how to access it, how to read its data correctly, how to avoid the mistakes that waste people’s time, and when you need a second tool alongside it. By the end, you will be able to set it up in under five minutes and use it with confidence.
How to Use Google Keyword Planner
If you only have 30 seconds, here is the short version.
- Go to ads.google.com and sign in with any Google account.
- Create a Google Ads account (free), then switch to Expert Mode so the full toolset appears.
- Open Tools & Settings > Planning > Keyword Planner.
- Click “Discover new keywords” and enter a few seed terms or a competitor’s URL.
- Filter and export the keyword list as a CSV for use in your content plan.
You do not need to spend money on ads to do any of this. A billing profile on file is enough.
What Is Google Keyword Planner?
Google Keyword Planner is a keyword research and forecasting tool that lives inside Google Ads. Advertisers use it to find keyword ideas, check estimated search volume, and forecast what a campaign might cost. SEOs and content marketers use the exact same tool for a different purpose: finding what people actually search for, in Google’s own words, before writing an article.
The tool does two main things.
“Discover new keywords” takes a handful of seed words, a phrase, or a website URL and returns a list of related keyword ideas, each with volume, competition and bid-range data.
“Get search volume and forecasts” takes a list of keywords you already have (up to 1,000 at once) and returns historical data plus performance forecasts for each one.
Because the data is pulled directly from Google’s own search and ad systems, it is treated as one of the more reliable sources for raw search volume, even by sites that primarily sell other SEO tools, such as Ahrefs and Semrush.
Is Google Keyword Planner Really Free?
Yes. This is the most searched question about the tool, and the direct answer is yes, Google Keyword Planner is free to use. You do not need an active ad campaign and you do not need to spend money.
What you do need is a Google Ads account with billing information on file. Google asks for a card during setup, largely to confirm you are a real business, but you can pause or skip launching any campaign and still use the research tools at no cost.
One honest caveat: accounts with no ad spend typically see volume as a range (for example, “1K–10K”) rather than an exact number. Accounts that have run even a small amount of ad spend tend to unlock tighter, more specific figures. This is one of the tool’s most common pain points, and we cover how to work around it in the “ranges” section below.
How to Set Up a Google Ads Account for Keyword Planner
If you have never used Google Ads before, setup takes about five minutes.
Step 1: Go to Google Ads. Visit ads.google.com and sign in with any Google account, or create one through accounts.google.com.
Step 2: Switch to Expert Mode. During the guided setup, Google defaults new users into “Smart Mode,” a simplified dashboard aimed at small advertisers. Smart Mode hides Keyword Planner. Look for a small “Switch to Expert Mode” link, usually in the bottom corner of the setup screen, and click it.
Step 3: Enter basic business details. You will be asked for a business name, website URL and billing country. This information creates your account profile; it does not launch anything.
Step 4: Skip or pause the campaign prompt. Google will try to walk you into creating your first campaign. You can set a campaign up and pause it immediately, or in many account flows skip it entirely and go straight to the tools.
Step 5: Open the tool. Click the wrench icon (“Tools & Settings”) in the top navigation bar, choose Planning, then click Keyword Planner.
From here, you have full access to both “Discover new keywords” and “Get search volume and forecasts,” at no cost.
Step-by-Step: Using Keyword Planner for SEO
Once you are inside the tool, this is the process most SEOs and content teams follow.
1. Start with seed keywords or a URL
Click “Discover new keywords.” You have two input options:
- Enter up to 10 seed keywords that describe your topic or product.
- Enter a competitor’s URL and let Google extract keyword ideas directly from that page.
Entering a competitor’s best-performing page is a fast way to see what Google already associates that content with, which is a useful shortcut for competitive content research.
2. Set your targeting
Before results load, confirm the location and language targeting in the filters at the top. If you only serve customers in the UK, for example, set location to United Kingdom; leaving it on a default or worldwide setting will skew every volume number you see afterward.
3. Review the keyword ideas table
Google returns a table with columns for:
- Keyword
- Avg. monthly searches (shown as a range for most accounts)
- Three-month change
- Year-over-year change
- Competition (Low, Medium, High — this reflects ad competition, not SEO difficulty)
- Top of page bid (low and high range)
4. Filter out noise
Large seed lists often return hundreds of loosely related terms. Use the built-in filters to:
- Exclude keywords containing a specific word (for example, excluding “free” if you sell a paid product).
- Set a minimum search volume so you are not sorting through near-zero-volume terms by hand.
- Sort by three-month or year-over-year change to catch keywords that are trending upward right now.
5. Add to a plan or export
You can add selected keywords directly into a Keyword Plan inside the tool, or click the export icon to download the full list as a CSV. Most SEO teams export the data and bring it into a spreadsheet or their content calendar tool, which is how the data is used outside of Google Ads entirely.
Understanding the Data: Volume, Competition and CPC
Reading Keyword Planner data correctly matters more than collecting it. Three columns cause the most confusion.
Average monthly searches is Google’s own estimate of how many times a term is searched per month, averaged over the past 12 months. For low-spend accounts, this shows as a range rather than a single number.
Competition measures how many advertisers are bidding on that term in Google Ads auctions. A “High” competition score means lots of businesses are paying to show ads for that keyword. It says nothing about how hard that keyword is to rank for organically in Google’s free search results. This is the single most misunderstood column in the whole tool, and mixing it up with SEO difficulty is one of the most common mistakes people make with Keyword Planner.
Top of page bid (low/high range) estimates what advertisers typically pay per click to appear near the top of the page for that keyword. It is a useful secondary signal: high bid ranges usually mean the keyword has commercial, buyer-ready intent, which is worth noting even if you only plan to target it organically.
Why Keyword Planner Shows Ranges Instead of Exact Numbers
This is worth explaining clearly, because it is the tool’s biggest limitation and the reason so many people reach for a second tool.
Google has historically restricted exact search volume numbers to accounts that are actively spending on ads. The reasoning, as Google has explained in its own support documentation, is that precise volume data is primarily useful for campaign planning, and Google ties access to advertiser activity. You can read Google’s official explanation in the Google Ads Help Center guide to Keyword Planner.
In practice, this means:
- A brand-new account with $0 spent often sees broad ranges like “10K–100K.”
- An account running even a modest, active campaign tends to see tighter ranges or specific numbers.
- Ranges still contain real signal: a term showing “1K–10K” is clearly a bigger opportunity than one showing “10–100,” even without an exact figure.
If exact numbers matter for your reporting or budgeting, the most reliable route is to compare the Keyword Planner range against a second data source, covered in the next section.
Google Keyword Planner vs. SEO-Specific Tools
Keyword Planner is an advertising tool first. For pure SEO work, it has real gaps that are worth knowing before you build a content strategy around it alone.
| Feature | Google Keyword Planner | Dedicated SEO Tools (Ahrefs, Semrush, Moz) |
|---|---|---|
| Data source | Google Ads auction + search data | Google + third-party click and clickstream data |
| Cost | Free | Usually $29–$500+/month |
| Exact search volume | Often ranges only | Specific estimated numbers |
| True SEO keyword difficulty | Not provided | Dedicated difficulty score |
| SERP features shown | No | Yes (featured snippets, People Also Ask, etc.) |
| Competitor organic keywords | Limited | Detailed, with ranking positions |
| Content gap analysis | No | Yes |
| Best for | Validating demand, PPC planning | Full SEO strategy and tracking |
The practical takeaway most SEOs land on: use Keyword Planner to confirm real demand exists (since the data comes straight from Google), then use a keyword difficulty checker or a dedicated SEO platform to judge how realistic ranking is. Tools like Ahrefs’ free Keyword Difficulty checker, Semrush’s Keyword Magic Tool, Moz’s Keyword Explorer and Ubersuggest are the tools most frequently used alongside Keyword Planner for exactly this reason.
7 Common Mistakes People Make With Google Keyword Planner
1. Confusing “Competition” with SEO difficulty. As covered above, this column measures ad auction pressure, not organic ranking difficulty. A keyword can show “Low” competition in Keyword Planner and still be extremely hard to rank for organically if the top 10 results are all high-authority sites.
2. Leaving location targeting on default. If your account defaults to a broad or incorrect location, every volume number you see will be inflated or irrelevant to your actual audience.
3. Ignoring the three-month and year-over-year trend columns. A keyword with decent overall volume but a steep downward trend may not be worth prioritizing; one trending sharply upward may be worth moving up your content calendar.
4. Treating ranges as exact numbers. A “1K–10K” range could mean 1,100 or 9,800. Don’t build precise projections on top of an unverified midpoint without cross-checking.
5. Only entering single, generic seed keywords. Broad seeds like “shoes” return an overwhelming, mostly irrelevant list. More specific, intent-rich seeds return far more usable ideas.
6. Forgetting to export before closing the session. Keyword Planner data isn’t always saved automatically into a persistent list; export to CSV so the work isn’t lost.
7. Never checking the “Top of page bid” column. Skipping this hides a useful signal: keywords with high bid ranges tend to have strong commercial intent, which matters even for SEO-only content, since it hints at how close a searcher is to making a decision.
How to Turn Keyword Planner Data Into a Content Plan
Raw keyword lists are only useful once they are turned into an actual content plan. Here is a simple five-step process.
Step 1: Export your full keyword list. Pull everything from your Keyword Planner session into a spreadsheet.
Step 2: Group by topic, not by exact phrase. Cluster keywords that could reasonably be answered by the same article. A single, comprehensive page targeting a cluster usually performs better than five thin pages each targeting one phrase.
Step 3: Score each cluster by volume and intent. Use the volume range as a rough size indicator, and use the bid range as an intent indicator. Prioritize clusters with meaningful volume and clear intent (informational, commercial or transactional).
Step 4: Cross-check difficulty. Run your shortlisted clusters through a keyword difficulty tool before committing writing time, since Keyword Planner alone won’t tell you how competitive the organic results actually are.
Step 5: Map clusters to a publishing calendar. Assign one cluster per article, prioritizing by a mix of volume, difficulty and business relevance, and schedule publication dates.
This is the same basic workflow described in Google’s own Search Central documentation on understanding search intent, which emphasizes writing for the person searching, not just the keyword string.
Best Free and Paid Alternatives to Google Keyword Planner
Keyword Planner is rarely used completely alone. These are the tools most commonly paired with it or used as a substitute when exact data matters.
Google Trends — Free. Shows relative interest over time and is excellent for spotting seasonality and rising topics, though it does not show raw search volume.
Google Search Console — Free. Shows the exact queries your own site already ranks for, including impressions and clicks, which is first-party data Keyword Planner cannot provide.
AnswerThePublic — Free tier available. Visualizes question-based and conversational searches, useful for AEO-style content.
Ubersuggest — Free limited searches, paid plans from roughly $29/month. A budget-friendly option with estimated volume, SEO difficulty and content ideas in one place.
Keywordtool.io — Free tier for keyword ideas, paid tier for volume data. Pulls suggestions from Google, YouTube and Amazon autocomplete.
Ahrefs Keywords Explorer — Paid, typically $129+/month. Industry-standard for keyword difficulty, click metrics and SERP analysis.
Semrush Keyword Magic Tool — Paid, typically $139+/month. Large keyword database with strong competitor gap analysis.
Moz Keyword Explorer — Free tier (10 queries/month), paid plans from around $99/month. Known for its Priority Score, which blends volume, difficulty and click-through potential into one metric.
For most small sites and solo creators, a practical setup is Keyword Planner for raw Google demand data, Google Search Console for first-party performance data, and one free-tier SEO tool for a difficulty score.
Google Keyword Planner for Local and E-Commerce Businesses
Local businesses can narrow Keyword Planner’s location targeting down to a specific city, metro area, or even a radius around an address. This surfaces volume data specific to that local market rather than a national average, which is especially useful alongside a Google Business Profile for local SEO work.
E-commerce sites get extra value from the “Start with a website” option. Plugging in a category or product page returns keyword ideas Google already associates with that exact page, often surfacing product-specific long-tail terms that a generic seed-keyword search would miss entirely.
Keyword Research Best Practices for 2026
A few shifts are worth factoring into how you use Keyword Planner data this year.
Write for AI-generated answers, not just the blue links. With AI Overviews and chat-based search assistants summarizing results, structuring content with clear, direct answers near the top of a section (a practice often called AEO, or Answer Engine Optimization) increases the odds of being the source an AI summary quotes or cites.
Treat search intent as the real filter, not volume alone. A lower-volume keyword with strong buying intent can be worth more than a high-volume keyword with vague or mismatched intent.
Favor topic clusters over isolated keywords. Google’s own Search Central ranking systems documentation continues to emphasize comprehensive, well-organized content that fully covers a topic, rather than many thin pages targeting near-duplicate phrases.
Keep experience and trust signals visible. Google’s guidance built around E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) rewards content written with real, demonstrable expertise, which plain keyword data can’t manufacture on its own.
Design pages for conversions, not just clicks. A page that ranks but doesn’t guide the visitor toward a next step, (an SXO, or Search Experience Optimization, concern) wastes most of the traffic Keyword Planner helped you find in the first place. Clear headings, fast load times and an obvious call to action matter as much as the keyword itself.
Free Tools to Use Alongside Keyword Planner
Once you have your keyword list, a few free calculators and tools on Every Tools help turn that research into finished content faster.
- Planning the budget behind a content or ad push? Try our hourly to salary calculator to work out campaign staffing costs.
- Explore more free tools for marketers and creators on the Every Tools homepage.
- Learn more about who builds these guides on our About page.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Google Keyword Planner free?
Yes. Google Keyword Planner is free to use with any Google Ads account. You need billing details on file, but you are not required to run an active campaign or spend any money to use the keyword research features.
How do I get exact search volume in Google Keyword Planner?
Keyword Planner shows volume ranges, not exact numbers, for accounts with little or no ad spend. Running an active campaign, even a small one, tends to unlock more precise figures. Many SEOs cross-check ranges against a second tool like Ahrefs, Semrush or Ubersuggest instead.
Can I use Google Keyword Planner without running ads?
Yes. You can open Keyword Planner, research keywords, and export the data without ever launching a campaign. You only need a Google Ads account with billing information on file.
Is Google Keyword Planner good for SEO?
It is a solid starting point because the data comes directly from Google. For SEO specifically, pair it with a keyword difficulty checker, since Keyword Planner’s competition score reflects ad auction pressure, not organic ranking difficulty.
What does “Competition: High” mean in Keyword Planner?
It means many advertisers are bidding on that term in Google Ads auctions. It does not measure how hard the keyword is to rank for in organic (unpaid) search results.
Can I export Keyword Planner data?
Yes. After running a search, click the export or download icon to save your keyword list as a CSV or Google Sheets-compatible file for use outside Google Ads.
What is the difference between Google Keyword Planner and Google Trends?
Keyword Planner shows estimated raw search volume and competition. Google Trends shows relative interest over time, on a 0–100 scale, and is better suited to spotting seasonality and trending topics than estimating actual search volume.
How many keywords can I check at once in Keyword Planner?
The “Get search volume and forecasts” tool accepts up to 1,000 keywords in a single batch.
Does Google Keyword Planner show competitor keywords?
Partially. You can enter a competitor’s URL into “Discover new keywords” to see what terms Google associates with that page, but it won’t show you a full list of every keyword that page currently ranks for, the way a dedicated SEO tool would.
Should You Use Google Keyword Planner?
Yes, almost everyone doing keyword research should have it open as one of their tools. It is free, the data comes directly from Google, and setup takes a few minutes. Its real limitation isn’t the price, it’s scope: ranges instead of exact numbers for low-spend accounts, and an ad-focused competition metric that doesn’t translate directly to SEO difficulty.
The practical move for 2026 is to use Keyword Planner to confirm real demand exists, pair it with Google Search Console for first-party data on your own site, and layer in a dedicated SEO tool when you need a true organic difficulty score. Used that way, it remains one of the best free starting points in keyword research.
Ready to put your keyword list to work? Explore more free tools on Every Tools.
