KGR Calculator — Keyword Golden Ratio

KGR inputs

How the Keyword Golden Ratio works

The Keyword Golden Ratio (KGR), popularised by Doug Cummings, is a way to find keywords that almost nobody has deliberately optimised a page title for yet. The formula is simple:

KGR = allintitle results ÷ monthly search volume

• Below 0.25 is golden — very few competing pages put the exact phrase in their title, so a young site can rank quickly with a single well-made page.
• 0.25 to 1 is the gray zone — workable with strong on-page work and some patience, but not a sure thing.
• Above 1 is competitive — too many pages already target the exact phrase for a new site to win in the short term.

Only trust KGR under 250 searches/mo. The ratio was calibrated on low-volume long-tail keywords. Above that ceiling the relationship between title competition and ranking difficulty breaks down, so this tool still shows the number but flags it as directional only.

Why allintitle rather than the raw result count? A normal Google search counts every page that mentions the words anywhere. allintitle: counts only pages that put the whole phrase in their title tag — the ones actually competing for that exact query — which is a much better proxy for how hard the keyword is to rank for.

The dead-zone caveat. When allintitle is at or near zero but there is measurable search volume, a naive KGR reads it as the best possible opportunity. Often it is — but sometimes nobody targets the phrase because it has no real commercial or informational intent. Before you build the page, confirm the keyword reflects something people actually want, not just a string that happens to get typed.