The Gap Score is a number from 0 to 100 on every idea TrendGap has enough data for. A higher score means more pain, more demand and weaker competition. It is a fixed formula over stored counts: AI never writes or changes it.
Where you see it
- On library cards, where you can also sort by it. See Browse the library.
- In the report head, with its rank among all scored ideas.
- In the "Score breakdown" section of the report, which shows how the score was built.
On a report your plan does not open, you see the score but not its breakdown.
The five parts
The score adds up five parts. Each part scores 0 to 100. Each one also has a weight, which says how much it counts toward the total and is shown next to it in the breakdown:
- "Pain": complaints in the last 90 days, how low their star ratings are, and how recent the last one is.
- "Demand": monthly searches for the idea's keywords and their growth compared with a year earlier, plus Hacker News mentions.
- "Weak incumbents": how the existing apps (the incumbents) hold up, from their average rating, its trend, and the time since their last update.
- "Room to win": how crowded it is, from the apps that store search returns for the idea's keywords, how many of them are strong, and the sites that rank for them.
- "Buildability": how hard a first version is, from the stated complexity and build time.
In the current formula, Pain carries the most weight. "How we score", at the foot of the breakdown, lists every part with its weight.
Read the breakdown
- Each part has a bar, its value, and the points it adds to the total.
- "Sum of the factors" shows the parts adding up to the score, with the formula version and the date it was computed.
- A part without data says "No data yet: left out of the score". A part that lacked some inputs lists them after "This score was computed without:".
- A confidence label ("High confidence", "Medium confidence" or "Low confidence") tells you how much of the formula had data.
- "History" shows how the score moved, once there is more than one stored score.
- The distribution chart shows where this idea sits among all scored ideas.
What Score pending means
Some ideas show "Score pending" instead of a number. That happens when there are no complaints yet, or when too few parts have data to score the idea fairly. TrendGap never shows a guess or a zero in its place. On the report, a pending idea has no score in the head and no "Score breakdown" section. The score appears once enough data comes in.
Formula versions
The formula is versioned, and the breakdown names the version that produced the score. If the formula changes, an older score says so until it is computed again. The history line only compares scores made the same way.
How to use it
- Use it to build a shortlist, not to decide. Two ideas with similar scores can have very different stories.
- Open the breakdown to see why a score is high. A score carried by Pain alone is not the same as one carried by Demand.
- Look at the evidence label next to it. A high score on Thin evidence rests on few complaints. See The complaints behind an idea.
- Come back to the report: "History" in the breakdown shows how the score has moved. When Watch is available, watch the ideas you like to follow their complaints and other measured figures on your watchlist.