Keyword density measures how often your target keyword shows up as a percentage of total words on a page. Calculate it by dividing keyword mentions by total words, then multiply by 100. A page with 500 words that mentions "Ottawa SEO services" 5 times has a 1% keyword density. In 2000s SEO, many practitioners aimed for 2-5% density. That thinking is obsolete. Google's algorithms—especially after BERT and MUM updates—understand semantic relationships and topic clusters. They penalize obvious keyword stuffing while rewarding comprehensive coverage of a topic using natural variations. What matters now is topic depth, not density math. If you're writing about local SEO, Google expects to see related terms like "Google Business Profile," "local citations," "NAP consistency," and geographic modifiers. Forcing your exact keyword into 3% of sentences makes content worse for users and sends quality signals that hurt rankings. At Ottawa SEO, we track keyword usage across our 500+ domain portfolio, but we never target a specific density. Instead, we focus on: - Using the primary keyword in the title, H1, and first 100 words naturally - Covering topic variants and related questions users actually search - Writing for conversion and readability first, then checking if the keyword appears enough that the page's focus is obvious - Monitoring topical authority signals like how comprehensively we cover a subject compared to ranking competitors If you're auditing existing content and see density above 4%, you likely have a stuffing problem. Under 0.5% might mean the page isn't clearly focused. Between those extremes, density tells you almost nothing about ranking potential. Check your search intent match, content depth, and whether you're actually answering what the searcher wants. Those factors moved the needle on thousands of ranking improvements across our portfolio while density calculations gathered dust.