| Keyword | Volume | CPC | Competition | 12-month trend |
|---|
How it works
The Yandex Keyword Tool harvests real autocomplete suggestions from Yandex's public suggest API. That is the same engine that powers the dropdown in the yandex.com search box, so every suggestion is something real Yandex users have searched for. We then enrich every keyword with monthly Google search volume, CPC, competition and a 12-month trend from the Keywords Everywhere API.
How the harvest works. The harvest runs in your browser, so the requests come from your IP address, not ours. It calls Yandex's suggest.yandex.com/suggest-ya.cgi endpoint with your seed term combined with every letter and digit, plus about 70 modifier words. Those cover questions, comparisons, prepositions, buying phrases and tutorials. Yandex returns up to 10 suggestions per prefix, and we keep every unique one. A typical 5-seed harvest produces 200 to 500 or more keywords. For the Russian market, enter Cyrillic seeds directly, such as купить машину.
Volume enrichment. As keywords arrive, we send them to the Keywords Everywhere API in batches of 100 for Google volume, CPC, competition and the 12-month trend. Yandex does not publish per-keyword volume, so we use Google's data as a stand-in. For Cyrillic keywords, Google volume can be far below real Yandex demand, because Google's share of the Russian market is small.
Country targeting. The Country dropdown sets the country for the volume lookup, so the Keywords Everywhere API returns Google volume for that market. Yandex's suggest endpoint ignores the country hint and returns the same suggestions everywhere. Your last-picked country is remembered for next time.
Careful pacing. The harvest sends about one request every 1.5 seconds to stay under Yandex's per-IP rate limit. A full 5-seed harvest takes about 15 minutes. You can stop at any time and keep the keywords found so far.
Plan caps. On the Free plan you can run 500 keyword lookups per day across all our keyword tools combined.
What the columns mean
- Keyword
- The exact suggestion Yandex's autosuggest returned for one prefix of your seed term. Click the link icon to open the keyword in SERP Checker for a live look at the results page.
- Volume
- Google's average monthly searches over the past 12 months, from Google Keyword Planner via the Keywords Everywhere API. Yandex does not publish per-keyword volume. For Cyrillic queries this number can sit well below real Yandex demand. Check Yandex Wordstat for a second opinion.
- CPC
- The average cost per click advertisers pay in Google Ads for that keyword, in the country's currency. Ads on Yandex itself run through Yandex Direct, which shows its own CPCs.
- Competition
- Google Ads' competition score: Low, Medium or High. It shows how many advertisers bid on the keyword on Google. Treat it as a rough guide to commercial interest. For Yandex-specific SEO competition the signal is approximate.
- 12-Month Trend
- A small chart of monthly Google search volume over the past year. Use it to spot seasonal patterns. Hover over any point for that month's exact value.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Yandex Keyword Tool?
A free keyword research tool with no signup. It runs in your browser and asks Yandex's public autosuggest for real suggestions around your seed term. Every keyword it finds is then enriched with monthly Google search volume, cost per click (CPC), competition and a 12-month trend from the Keywords Everywhere API.
Why does Yandex matter for SEO?
Yandex is the leading search engine in Russia, with roughly 50 to 60 percent of the market, ahead of Google. It also matters across Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Turkey. If you sell into Russia or the wider Russian-speaking market, about 258 million native speakers, ranking on Yandex counts for more than ranking on Google there. Yandex also ties into Yandex Maps, Yandex Market and Yandex Taxi, which drive a lot of buying intent.
How does Yandex's autosuggest work?
Yandex exposes autosuggest through the public suggest.yandex.com/suggest-ya.cgi endpoint, the same engine behind the dropdown in the yandex.com search box. Each prefix returns suggestions that real Yandex users have searched for. We combine your seed term with every letter and digit, plus about 70 modifier words, and keep every unique suggestion. A typical 5-seed harvest produces 200 to 500 or more keywords.
Should I use Russian or English seeds?
For the Russian market, use Cyrillic seeds, such as купить телефон for "buy phone". Yandex's suggestions strongly favour Cyrillic input, even for users inside Russia. English seeds return mostly English suggestions. That is fine if you target English-speaking expats or tourists searching from Russia, but it will not show what Russian speakers type. The tool accepts Cyrillic text directly.
How is Yandex SEO different from Google SEO?
Yandex weighs some signals differently. User behaviour signals such as click-through rate, time on page and returns to the results page count for more. Backlinks count for a little less. Yandex also looks closely at how commercial a site is and applies a strong site-level quality score. In practice, write useful content for the Russian audience. Use Yandex Webmaster, its version of Google Search Console, to watch indexing. And earn links from .ru, .by and .kz domains where you can.
Are the volume numbers Yandex-specific?
No, and this is the biggest caveat. The Volume column shows Google search volume for the phrase, from Google Keyword Planner via the Keywords Everywhere API. Yandex does not publish per-keyword volume. For common Cyrillic queries in Russia, Google volume can be far below real Yandex demand, because Google's share of the Russian market is small. For Yandex's own keyword data, use the free Yandex Wordstat tool. It needs a Yandex account.
Why does the harvest take about 15 minutes?
To stay under Yandex's per-IP rate limit, we send about one request every 1.5 seconds. A 5-seed harvest makes about 530 calls (5 seeds times 106 prefixes), so it takes about 15 minutes. Any faster and Yandex would throttle your IP. Leave the tab open. Results stream into the table as they arrive, and you can stop early and keep what has been found so far.
Does the Country dropdown change Yandex results?
Only the volume side. The Country dropdown sets the country for the volume lookup, so the Keywords Everywhere API returns Google volume for that market. Yandex's suggest endpoint ignores the country hint and returns the same suggestions for every country. So the keyword list itself does not change with the dropdown. For a Russia-specific volume signal, our data is not the right source, but the harvested phrases still show what real Yandex users type.