AI Directory · 12 categories
Browse AI tools by category
The most popular tools in every category, re-ranked each week. Pick a category to see the full list.
Top 8 in each category. Last updated 19 October 2026.
AI Assistants & LLMs
The chat assistants you talk to directly. Start here if you're new to AI.
- 1
Anthropic's chat assistant, at its best on careful writing and long documents.
- 2
OpenAI's all-rounder: chat, images, voice, web search and agents in one app.
- 3
Google's assistant, built into Gmail, Docs, Drive and Android phones.
- 4
Ask a question and get a short answer from the web, with links to every source.
- 5
Elon Musk's AI assistant, plugged into what people are posting on X right now.
- 6
A free Chinese assistant that's strong at maths, logic and code.
- 7
Mistral's fast European assistant, with a usable free plan and a cheaper Pro plan.
- 8
Microsoft's assistant, free on Windows and built into Word, Excel and Outlook.
Coding & Dev Tools
AI that writes, fixes and explains code for you.
- 1
An AI agent that works inside your project: it reads, writes and runs the code for you.
- 2
OpenAI's coding agent. Hand it a task and it works away while you do other things.
- 3
GitHub's AI helper: it finishes your code, reviews pull requests and takes on whole tasks.
- 4
A code editor with AI built in, for people who want to watch every change happen.
- 5
Google's free coding app. You hand tasks to AI agents and review what they produce.
- 6
A fast, free, open-source code editor that runs Claude Code and other AI agents inside it.
- 7
Build, run and host an app in your browser while an AI agent writes the code.
- 8
A modern terminal where you can type what you want in plain English instead of commands.
Website & App Builders
Describe what you want and get a working website or app without writing code.
- 1
Chat your way to a full web app, with a database and user logins built in. No code needed.
- 2
Design a stylish marketing site on a canvas and publish it, with AI doing the grunt work.
- 3
The pro website builder for sites that need a big blog, a CMS or serious SEO.
- 4
An all-in-one app builder that sets up logins, data and hosting from your first prompt.
- 5
Describe a web or mobile app and get a working version to edit and publish in minutes.
- 6
A cheap AI builder for sites and simple apps, with hosting, domain and email on one bill.
- 7
Turn an Airtable base or Google Sheet into a client portal or internal tool.
- 8
Turn a sentence, screenshot or Figma file into a polished web page you can publish.
Automation & Workflows
Connect your apps so boring, repetitive tasks happen on their own.
- 1
Build automations and AI agents on a visual canvas, then host them yourself for free.
- 2
A general-purpose agent that takes a goal and works through it in its own browser.
- 3
When something happens in one app, Zapier does the next step in another. No code needed.
- 4
Pulls leads off websites like LinkedIn into a spreadsheet or CRM, then enriches them.
- 5
Build AI agents that research, scrape and enrich data across your work apps.
- 6
A Zapier-style automation builder that's open source and charges per run, not per step.
- 7
An AI assistant that handles your email, meeting notes and follow-ups from Slack.
- 8
Draw automations as a flowchart, with branches and loops, for less than Zapier charges.
Databases & Backend
Where your app's data lives. The plumbing behind anything you build.
- 1
A ready-made database, logins and file storage for apps you build with AI tools.
- 2
Fast, serious databases for apps that have outgrown the free tiers.
- 3
Spreadsheets that behave like a database, with forms, views and automations built in.
- 4
Google's backend for mobile and web apps, with logins, data and hosting in one.
- 5
A Postgres database that scales to zero when idle, so side projects cost nothing.
- 6
A backend that keeps every screen of your app in sync the moment the data changes.
- 7
A no-code backend with a visual way to build the logic behind your app.
- 8
An open-source, all-in-one backend with a database, logins, storage and hosting.
Image, Logo & Design
Generate images, logos, mockups and brand assets in minutes.
- 1
Turn product photos into ad images and short video clips, using many AI models in one app.
- 2
Google's image model. Describe an edit and it keeps faces and products looking the same.
- 3
Make and edit images inside ChatGPT by describing what you want, words included.
- 4
The design tool product teams use, now able to turn a prompt into a working prototype.
- 5
Make social posts, decks and flyers from templates, with AI that writes and edits for you.
- 6
Generates images that spell words correctly, so posters and ads come out readable.
- 7
Type a description and get striking, artful images that look nothing like stock photos.
- 8
Image and video generator trained on licensed content, so it's safer for client work.
Video & Audio
Make videos, voiceovers, podcasts and edits without a production team.
- 1
Lifelike AI voiceovers, dubbing and audiobooks from text, in thousands of voices.
- 2
Make short AI video clips from text or images, then edit footage by describing changes.
- 3
Describe a song and get a full track with vocals and lyrics, ready for a video or ad.
- 4
Turn training docs and announcements into polished avatar videos in over 140 languages.
- 5
Type a script and a lifelike presenter reads it on camera, in your voice or any language.
- 6
Free phone and desktop editor for TikToks and Reels, with auto captions and templates.
- 7
Edit video and podcasts by editing the transcript, as easily as fixing a typo in a doc.
- 8
Google's video model: describe a scene or upload a photo and get a short clip with sound.
Marketing & Ads
Create ad creative, emails and campaigns, then run them smarter.
- 1
An AI analyst for your ad accounts that explains what's working and lines up the fixes.
- 2
One place to find ad inspiration, see which creatives win and launch Meta ads in bulk.
- 3
Shows which ad creatives are winning and why, across Meta, TikTok and YouTube.
- 4
Makes talking-head video ads with AI actors, no filming or creators needed.
- 5
Newsletter platform with AI writing help, built-in growth tools and ways to get paid.
- 6
A free CRM with AI agents that handle leads, support and content for you.
- 7
Email and SMS for online stores, with AI that writes, segments and predicts.
- 8
Turns a product shot and a few words into dozens of ready-to-run ad images.
SEO & Analytics
Find what people search for, rank for it, and understand your numbers.
- 1
Google's free report on how your site shows up in search, including AI results.
- 2
Free heatmaps and session replays that show where visitors get stuck.
- 3
Tells you what to add to a page so it can rank for a chosen keyword.
- 4
Keyword research, backlink checks and site audits, all in one toolkit.
- 5
Raw search, keyword and backlink data you pay for by the query, built for AI agents.
- 6
Tracks what competitors sell, what it costs and what is trending across ecommerce.
- 7
Crawls your whole site the way Google does and lists what's broken.
- 8
Keyword, competitor and ad research with a bigger toolbox and a bigger bill.
Productivity & Notes
Meeting notes, inbox, calendar and knowledge, handled for you.
- 1
One workspace for notes, docs, wikis and project tracking, with AI built in.
- 2
A fast email app that replaces your Gmail or Outlook inbox, with AI drafts and sorting.
- 3
Talk instead of type, anywhere on your computer or phone, and get clean text back.
- 4
A launcher that puts AI, clipboard history and shortcuts one keystroke away.
- 5
A simple to-do list that works everywhere and understands plain-English due dates.
- 6
Meta's personal agent that handles everyday chores like bookings, forms and shopping.
- 7
Records your video calls and sends you a summary, action items and transcript.
- 8
Takes meeting notes from your computer's audio, so no bot ever joins the call.
Research & Search
Ask questions and get sourced, trustworthy answers fast.
- 1
Runs dozens of searches on a question and hands back a cited report in minutes.
- 2
Upload your own documents and ask questions that only draw on those sources.
- 3
A search engine built for AI tools, so Claude can find exactly the pages it needs.
- 4
Searches academic papers and tells you what the evidence actually says.
- 5
Finds, screens and summarises research papers into a comparison table.
- 6
Google's agent that browses for minutes and writes a long, sourced report.
- 7
Turns a rough one-line idea into a detailed, well-structured prompt for any AI tool.
- 8
ChatGPT's research mode, which browses for you and writes up a cited report.
Presentations & Docs
Turn an outline into a polished deck or document in minutes.
- 1
Describe a deck, one-pager or prototype and get a polished, on-brand version.
- 2
Drafts, summarises and tidies up inside Docs, Slides, Sheets and Gmail, where you work.
- 3
Drafts documents, builds slides and summarises email inside Word, PowerPoint and Outlook.
- 4
Slides that lay themselves out neatly as you add content, so decks never look messy.
- 5
Paste an outline and get a finished, well-designed deck, document or web page in minutes.
- 6
Writes, summarises and answers questions across all your Notion pages and meeting notes.
- 7
Collaborative deck builder for teams, with AI drafts, shared templates and view tracking.
- 8
Presentations that zoom around one big canvas instead of flipping slide to slide.
How the ranking works
Every week a script scores each tool in the library on the signals below, compares it with the rest of its category, and blends in last week's score so one noisy week can't reshuffle the list. New tools only appear after I've tried them and added them to the library.
- Search demandComing soon
- How many people search Google for the tool each month.
- MomentumComing soon
- Whether those searches are rising or falling over the last three months.
- Community buzz
- How often it comes up on Hacker News and Reddit in the last 30 days.
- SentimentComing soon
- Whether those conversations are positive or negative, read by AI.