THE SEARCH LEDGER · CHARLESTON, SOUTH CAROLINA · FOOD & DINING
Every month Charleston types 1,013,700 food & dining searches into Google. This is the public record of what those searches are, what they cost, and who currently answers them.
Relative search interest by month, indexed 0–100. The pink outline marks the peak. Interest runs highest in MAY and lowest in JAN.
SRC: Google Trends relative interest for the Food & Dining category in Charleston — a 0–100 index, not a search count. One curve per category is the granularity available; it is not split per keyword.
The 20 highest-volume of 257 tracked keywords, priced at what advertisers actually bid. The dearest click here is “big bad breakfast charleston sc” at $1.68.
| # | KEYWORD | VOL/MO | CPC | DIFFICULTY | INTENT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | restaurants near me | 450,000 | $0.42 | 9 | transactional |
| 2 | breakfast near me | 60,500 | $0.38 | 23 | transactional |
| 3 | coffee shops near me | 40,500 | $0.38 | 0 | transactional |
| 4 | pizza near me | 40,500 | $1.26 | 0 | transactional |
| 5 | bars near me | 33,100 | $0.27 | 0 | transactional |
| 6 | hall steakhouse charleston | 27,100 | $0.51 | 59 | commercial |
| 7 | hyman's seafood charleston | 27,100 | $0.24 | 7 | commercial |
| 8 | okra grill charleston sc | 27,100 | $0.86 | branded | |
| 9 | shem creek charleston restaurants | 22,200 | $0.39 | 33 | commercial |
| 10 | charleston restaurants | 14,800 | $0.57 | 31 | commercial |
| 11 | 82 queen restaurant charleston | 14,800 | $0.31 | commercial | |
| 12 | snob restaurant charleston | 12,100 | $0.21 | 5 | commercial |
| 13 | best restaurants charleston | 9,900 | $0.40 | 0 | commercial |
| 14 | park circle restaurants north charleston | 9,900 | $0.50 | 0 | commercial |
| 15 | restaurants west ashley | 8,100 | $0.38 | 0 | commercial |
| 16 | the vendue rooftop charleston | 8,100 | $0.22 | branded | |
| 17 | charleston italian restaurant | 6,600 | $0.47 | 14 | commercial |
| 18 | peninsula grill charleston sc | 6,600 | $0.93 | branded | |
| 19 | brunch charleston sc | 5,400 | $0.50 | 16 | commercial |
| 20 | big bad breakfast charleston sc | 5,400 | $1.68 | 10 | commercial |
SRC: DataForSEO, Charleston metro, Aug 30, 2026. Volume and CPC are Google Ads twelve-month averages, so neither moves week to week. Difficulty is DataForSEO’s 0–100 score; blank where it has not been scored.
Live position tracking for 2 of the tracked keywords in this vertical — who Google puts in the map pack, and who holds page one.
SRC: DataForSEO, Charleston metro, Aug 30, 2026. LOCAL marks an organic domain that matches a business tracked in this metro; an unmarked domain is simply not one of them, which includes directories and firms we do not track.
The 12 most-reviewed businesses we track in this vertical, with the profile signals that put them where they are.
| RANK | BUSINESS | RATING | REVIEWS | CATEGORY | WEBSITE |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Hyman's Seafood | 4.9 ★ | 50,561 | Seafood | YES |
| #2 | Fleet Landing Restaurant & Raw Bar | 4.6 ★ | 12,060 | Seafood | YES |
| #3 | Poogan's Porch | 4.3 ★ | 6,649 | Southern | YES |
| #4 | Toast! All Day Meeting Street | 4.4 ★ | 5,887 | Brunch | YES |
| #5 | Charleston Crab House | 4.5 ★ | 5,363 | Seafood | YES |
| #6 | Magnolias | 4.7 ★ | 5,311 | American | YES |
| #7 | The Rooftop at the Vendue | 4.6 ★ | 4,662 | Grill | YES |
| #8 | The Rooftop at the Vendue | 4.6 ★ | 4,662 | Grill | YES |
| #9 | Church and Union Charleston | 4.4 ★ | 4,465 | Restaurant | YES |
| #10 | Husk | 4.5 ★ | 4,436 | American | YES |
| #11 | Millers All Day | 4.7 ★ | 4,001 | Southern | YES |
| #12 | 82 Queen | 4.5 ★ | 3,547 | Southern | YES |
SRC: Google Maps listings, DataForSEO, Charleston metro, Aug 30, 2026. Ranked by review count, which is a proxy for how established a listing is — not a ranking claim.
Branded demand is the clearest read on who has built recall here — searches for a business by name, the volume nobody has to bid for.
SRC: DataForSEO, Charleston metro, Aug 30, 2026. Brand searches identified from the tracked keyword set.
People Also Ask questions collected verbatim from Charleston food & dining results — the literal wording Google is already surfacing.
What is the 30/30/30 rule for restaurants?
What are some must-eat restaurants in Charleston, SC?
What are some hidden gem restaurants in Charleston SC?
What is the best casual dinner place in Charleston?
What is the 2 hour rule for pizza?
Where can I find good pizza near West Ashley, Charleston, SC?
Who has the best pizza deals out right now?
Who has the best pizza in Mechanicsville, VA?
SRC: Google People Also Ask, DataForSEO, Charleston metro, Aug 30, 2026. Questions are reproduced as collected; we do not answer them here.
Everything above is the market. If you want to be in it, start with where you stand today.
Every other vertical we track in this metro, with its monthly search demand.
FOOD & DINING IN OTHER METROS
HOW THIS PAGE IS MADE
Every figure is collected, not estimated. Keyword volume and cost-per-click come from Google Ads via DataForSEO and are twelve-month averages, so neither moves week to week — a weekly delta on either would measure the averaging window, not the market. Map-pack and organic positions are a live SERP read taken Aug 30, 2026. Sections with no data are omitted rather than filled.
Charleston, South Carolina · Food & Dining · 257 keywords · collected Aug 30, 2026
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