App Store preview tool: your icon next to competitors

App Store search and ranking preview (unofficial)

Unofficial simulation for design and ASO purposes. Not affiliated with, sponsored or endorsed by Apple. App Store is a trademark of Apple Inc. Third-party icons, names and screenshots belong to their respective owners.

Your icon and screenshots never leave your browser: they aren't uploaded to any server or stored. The only thing sent anywhere is your search, straight to Apple's public APIs.

What the App Store preview tool is for

It shows your icon and screenshots where downloads are actually won or lost: in a search results list and in your category's top chart, right next to the apps you compete with. A listing that looks perfect in Figma can vanish among ten icons in the same color.

It's most useful at two moments:

• Before you launch. To choose between several icon concepts or first screenshots, and rule out the ones that don't stand out from the competition.
• Before an A/B test. The App Store lets you test up to 3 treatments of your icon, screenshots and video against your original listing with Product Page Optimization (Apple). Each test takes weeks, so it pays to go in with treatments you've already filtered.

If you're looking for an app icon preview without publishing anything, or a quick App Store search mockup with real apps around yours, this is it.

How to use it

1. Pick the store and the language. The country decides which apps show up; the iPhone language decides the language of their names and of the store's own labels.
2. Upload your icon under "Your app." It's cropped to a square and gets the rounded iOS mask. Add the name, subtitle, developer, rating and up to 3 screenshots.
3. Search for a keyword and place your app wherever you want, say No. 3. You can reorder the list, remove apps, mark one as an "Ad" or replace a competitor's screenshots.
4. Switch to Top charts, pick the category (Productivity by default) and insert your app at the position you care about.
5. Try dark mode and the status bar, then export a 1290 × 2796 PNG to share with your team or your designer.

It all runs in your browser: your icon and screenshots aren't uploaded to any server or stored. The only thing sent anywhere is your search, straight to Apple's public APIs.

What I look at when I compare an icon with the competition

Your icon is the first thing every user sees, whether they come from search, the charts or an ad. That's why it's the first thing I test. With the tool open, these are the questions I ask:

• Does it stand out at a glance? If the top five results all use the same color or the same symbol, yours needs to break the pattern, not follow it.
• Does it work small and in dark mode? An icon takes up very little room in search results. I check it in light and dark mode: an icon that pops on white can get lost on black.
• Does it fit the moment and the market? In Soccer Star 2018 World Legend, by Redvel Games, we swapped the icon during Ramadan for one featuring the player Salah and a Ramadan crescent moon, and downloads went up 30%. The same game, adapted to what that market was living through.
• Does it look like people made it? In Applift's 2026 app marketing predictions, where I was one of the 7 invited experts, I shared something I see more and more: with everyone using the same AI tools, perfection has become generic. An overly polished icon can end up looking like all the others; sometimes the one that feels more authentic wins.

What the tool can't tell you is which icon converts better. Only a test can do that. It helps you get to the test with better candidates. If you'd like to work on it together, here's how I approach App Store ASO and, if you make games, mobile game ASO.

Limitations

It's an approximate simulation, not a real App Store screenshot:

• The order of results may not match the real one. Apple's public API returns its results, but not the personalized order each user sees. Reorder by hand if you want to copy what's on your iPhone.
• Subtitles and in-app purchases are manual. The API doesn't include them; you can type them in on each row.
• Default screenshots. If a competitor uses custom product pages or a different screenshot set for each iPhone size, you'll see the ones the API returns. You can replace them with your own.
• One iPhone. The screen is calibrated for a 430 × 932-point iPhone running iOS 26, with no accessibility settings. Outside a Mac or an iPhone, the system font looks slightly different.
• Charts: the top 50 free apps in the category, from Apple's public feed.

For your listing copy, there's also my ASO character counter, which flags fields over the limit and repeated keywords.