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Free keyword density & phrase analyzer
Keyword density is the percentage of your content made up of a given word or phrase. This free tool — built by a Singapore SEO agency — counts your single words, two-word and three-word phrases, ranks them by frequency, and checks a specific target keyword’s density against the healthy range. It filters out stopwords so you see the terms that actually matter. Everything runs in your browser — nothing is uploaded.
What’s a healthy keyword density?
There’s no magic number, but a target keyword sitting around 0.5%–2.5% of the text is a safe, natural range for most pages. Push much above 3% and you risk keyword stuffing — repetitive, awkward writing that Google’s spam systems recognise and that reads badly to humans. Too far below and the page may not clearly signal its topic. The aim isn’t to hit a percentage; it’s to use your keyword and its variations naturally enough that both readers and search engines understand the subject.
Why phrases and entities matter more than single words
Modern search doesn’t just count keywords — it understands topics and entities. That’s why the two- and three-word phrase views matter: they reveal whether you’re actually covering the concepts around your topic, not just repeating one term. Strong content for both Google and AI search covers the related subtopics a searcher expects — for an SEO page, that might be “technical SEO”, “keyword research”, “backlinks” and “organic traffic”. If your phrase list is thin, your topical coverage probably is too.
How to use this in your workflow
Paste a draft, set your target keyword, and check three things: is the target keyword in the healthy range, do your top phrases match the subtopics you meant to cover, and are any terms over-represented in a way that reads unnaturally? Then compare against the pages already ranking — if they cover entities you’ve missed, add them. Pair this with our readability checker to make sure the optimised draft still reads clearly.
Read density as a diagnostic, not a target
The most useful way to treat keyword density is as a symptom checker rather than a dial to tune. If your target phrase barely appears, that often signals the page hasn’t genuinely committed to the topic — the fix is deeper, more specific content, not mechanically inserting the phrase three more times. If a term spikes unnaturally high, that’s a prompt to vary your language with synonyms and related concepts so the copy reads naturally to a human. In both cases the number is pointing you toward a writing decision, not a quota to fill.
Compare your draft against the pages already ranking for your term. If they naturally weave in related entities — locations, product names, comparison terms — that you’ve omitted entirely, that gap usually matters more than your headline keyword’s exact percentage. Coverage of the surrounding topic beats repetition of a single phrase.
What the analyser can’t see
Density is a blunt instrument: it counts words but understands nothing about placement, intent or search context. A keyword sitting in your H1, first paragraph, image alt text and a subheading carries far more weight than the same word buried five times in a footer — yet both look identical to a raw density figure. Use the analyser to catch obvious problems, then judge placement with your own eyes. Position and prominence do the heavy lifting that percentages can’t measure.
Modern search and AI answer engines increasingly work with meaning and entities rather than string-matching, so a page that thoroughly and clearly covers a topic will outperform one that’s been density-optimised to a magic number. If you want content built for both traditional rankings and AI-search visibility, our answer engine optimisation team approaches it from the topic-and-entity angle rather than keyword counting.
Frequently asked questions
Is keyword density still a ranking factor?
Not as a direct formula — Google moved beyond simple density years ago in favour of understanding topics and intent. But density is still a useful diagnostic: it catches both keyword stuffing and pages that never clearly state their topic. Use it as a guide, not a target.
What counts as keyword stuffing?
Unnaturally repeating a keyword to manipulate rankings — often a density well above 3–4%, awkward phrasing, or lists of near-identical terms. It reads badly and can trigger spam demotions. Natural, varied language is always safer.
Why do you remove stopwords?
Common words like “the”, “and” and “your” dominate any text but carry no topical meaning. Filtering them out surfaces the words and phrases that actually describe what your page is about.
Does this work for AI-search optimisation?
Yes — the phrase and entity views help you check topical coverage, which is central to being cited by AI assistants. Models favour content that thoroughly and clearly covers a topic, not pages that merely repeat one keyword.
What density should I aim for on a long article?
Don’t aim for a fixed figure. On a long, well-researched piece your main keyword will naturally land somewhere low — often under 1% — simply because there’s so much supporting content around it. That’s healthy. A lower density on a comprehensive page is usually a better sign than a high density on a thin one.
Should I include my keyword in headings and alt text?
Where it reads naturally, yes — a keyword in your title, one or two subheadings and relevant image alt text signals topic focus more effectively than repeating it in body copy. But force nothing: an awkward heading written for a crawler hurts readability, and the analyser won’t reward you for placement it can’t detect anyway.