If you only ship on iOS, you'd expect Apple Search Ads to be the obvious and only choice. It's not that simple, Google App Campaigns can also put your iOS app in front of people, just through a completely different mechanism.
How each one actually reaches users
Apple Search Ads shows your app inside App Store search results, to people who typed a query related to what you built. It's a search intent channel, contained entirely inside Apple's own store.
Google App Campaigns is different. It doesn't run inside the App Store at all. Instead, Google uses your assets, text, images, video, to place your app across Search, YouTube, Discover, and the Google Display Network, then optimizes automatically toward installs or in-app conversion events. For an iOS app, this means reaching people while they're on Google, on YouTube, or browsing an app in the Display Network, then sending them into the App Store to install.
The targeting difference
Apple Search Ads targeting is keyword based. You choose, or let Search Match choose, what terms trigger your ad, and you're competing directly against other apps bidding on the same terms.
Google App Campaigns targeting is largely automated. You give Google your creative assets and a conversion goal, and its algorithm decides who sees what, where, and when, optimizing toward the outcome you specified rather than a keyword you picked. You have much less manual control over placement, and much more reliance on the algorithm having good signal to optimize against.
What each one needs from you
Apple Search Ads needs keyword research and a store listing that converts once the click lands, since the ad itself is really just your existing App Store listing shown in a paid slot.
Google App Campaigns needs creative assets, multiple headlines, descriptions, images, and video if you have it, because the algorithm tests combinations of what you give it to find what performs. Thin creative gives the algorithm less to work with and usually produces weaker results than a properly resourced campaign.
Where each one fits
Apple Search Ads is the better first channel when you want to validate that your store listing converts, since it's testing against people who already have intent and the ad experience is just your existing listing.
Google App Campaigns is worth adding once you have creative assets ready and want reach beyond people actively searching in the App Store, particularly video creative, since YouTube placement is one of its strongest inventory sources and something Apple Ads simply doesn't offer.
Running both
These two channels don't really compete for the same user moment. Apple Search Ads catches people already looking. Google App Campaigns creates awareness and captures attention outside the App Store entirely. Many iOS apps run both once they've validated conversion on Apple Ads first, using it as the cheaper, faster signal on whether the app is ready for a channel that needs more upfront creative investment to run well.
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