The number of AI tools floating around outnumber even my home's laughably massive collection of dog toys. Everywhere you turn, there's a new AI tool claiming it can do everything from research and writing to website building and customer support. But if you're a small business owner or freelancer, or you're just looking to experiment, paying for every new AI app just isn't realistic.
The good news is that you don't have to. There are plenty of genuinely useful free AI tools that let you experiment with and even run real business workflows without spending a dollar. Whether you're looking for a free AI chatbot, AI writing assistant, sales or marketing tool, or something to help with everyday admin, solid free options exist in nearly every category.
Here's a massive roundup of the best free AI apps so you can put AI to work without adding another subscription to your budget.
The best free AI tools at a glance
| Category | Standout feature |
|---|---|---|
AI chatbot | Powerful and easy to use | |
AI search engine | Ability to organize your searches | |
AI browser | Learns how you browse, and it comes with a reliable autonomous agent | |
AI image generator | Very easy to use and a best-in-class model | |
AI photo editor | Modular photo editor; includes AI Cutout and Backdrop features | |
AI video generator | Prompt-based video generation | |
AI voice generator | 300 voice options; control over voice tone and style with stability settings | |
AI writing generator | Affordable upgrades for AI content | |
AI automation | Automates workflows across over 8,000 apps with no-code setup | |
AI app builder | Easy app creation; integrates with Airtable and Google Sheets for data storage | |
AI meeting assistant | Generates meeting summaries and transcriptions, and organizes insights with playlist feature | |
AI email assistant | Deep Google Calendar integration | |
AI agent builder | Natively connects with 8,000+ apps | |
AI scheduling assistant | Automatically reschedules calendar events when conflicts arise | |
AI project management software | Creates projects from a prompt | |
AI presentation maker | App and web page embedding available; lots of powerful customization tools | |
AI social media manager | AI-powered post and image generation with trending topic suggestions | |
AI CRM tool | Intuitive user experience and smooth onboarding | |
AI sales assistant | Generative AI for personalized emails; engagement metrics for sales | |
AI notes app | AI search can answer questions across notes, PDFs, images, and handwriting | |
AI grammar checker | Grammar check; tone adjustments; works across multiple apps and browsers | |
AI website builder | Backed up by Wix's mature site builder ecosystem | |
AI chatbot builder | Connects chatbot conversation data to thousands of apps | |
AI resume builder | Resume matching; tracks job applications across stages | |
AI recruiting tool | AI-powered resume parsing; integrates with 75+ job boards | |
AI content detector | Constant updates to keep its AI detection abilities sharp |
How I selected the best free AI tool in each category
There are plenty of AI tools out there that offer free trials or severely limited free subscriptions, but here, I was looking for tools that are worth your time even if you never upgrade to a paid account. That means the free plan offers a lot of value and access to the core features of the app.
Of course, I haven't tried every single free AI app in existence—I'm pretty sure even monkeys typing into infinity couldn't do that at this rate—so I relied on other trusted app testers for support. Zapier app testers have spent thousands of hours tinkering with AI apps, and every app I'm recommending has been vetted by a real person (sometimes me!).Â
Based on all the research and testing done by the Zapier team, these are the best free AI tools.
The best free AI tools by category
Jump to the category you're most interested in, or read through the entire list.
Best free AI chatbot
ChatGPT
ChatGPT pros:
Powerful
Easy to use
Honestly fun to play withÂ
ChatGPT cons:
Chatbots are only accessible through ChatGPT
The best starting point is the category that made AI mainstream. AI chatbots let you hold conversations with a large language model (LLM) or large multimodal model, and the best models can use advanced logic and reasoning, write code, do math, create images, search the web, and almost anything else you might ask a robot to do.
ChatGPT is the original AI chatbot, and it's still the industry leader, with hundreds of millions of weekly active users. With new models constantly being released, free users get access to powerful, modern versions of ChatGPT for everyday tasks, including writing, reasoning, file uploads, and limited image generation. You can also use custom-built GPTs created by other users to handle specific workflows. An upgrade to ChatGPT Plus is required to get things like higher limits, access to newer models, custom GPT creation, advanced voice features, and more powerful tools for research and agent-style workflows. As with most ChatGPT features, newer tools often roll out to paid plans first before gradually becoming available to free users.
As ChatGPT evolves, it's becoming less of a chatbot and more of a flexible AI workspace that combines conversation, research, documents, and task execution in a single interface.
You can also incorporate ChatGPT directly into your existing processes using Zapier. This lets you use ChatGPT's abilities from wherever you need them. Learn how to automate ChatGPT, or get started with a pre-made template.
What you get on ChatGPT's free plan: Writing and problem-solving assistance with access to the latest models. You can also interact with custom GPTs and get limited access to data analysis, file uploads, image generation, and web browsing.
Read more: The best AI chatbots
Best free AI search engine
Perplexity
Perplexity pros:
Ability to organize your searches
Great user experience
Perplexity cons:
Lots of duplicate features can be confusing
Generates some controversy
Perplexity is an AI-first search engine that rethinks what search looks like. Instead of returning a page full of blue links, it gives you a direct, conversational answer—and then lets you keep asking questions without starting over.
When you run a search, Perplexity responds with a generated summary and a follow-up box right underneath it. Because it keeps track of context, you don't need to restate your original query. If you start by asking about the iPhone's camera specs, you can follow up with something like "how's the battery life?" and Perplexity knows exactly what you mean.Â
Perplexity has also gotten better at handling live events and breaking news. With the right prompt (sometimes as simple as asking what's happening "right now"), it can fetch real-time updates instead of relying solely on static sources.
To help you keep track of your research, Perplexity saves searches as threads in the sidebar. You can organize them into Spaces or turn them into Pages you can revisit or share later. There's some overlap between features with different names, but the overall effect is that your research doesn't disappear the moment you close a tab.
It's worth noting that Perplexity hasn't been without controversy. Like many AI tools, it's been criticized for occasional inaccuracies and sourcing issues, so you shouldn't treat it as a single source of truth. Our testers found it to be generally reliable—but as with any AI-powered search tool, it's best used as a starting point, not the final word.
Even as competitors catch up, Perplexity still feels like the most complete AI search experience available today. And because it integrates with Zapier, you can turn research into action by automatically routing answers into docs, spreadsheets, CRMs, or Slack channels. You can learn more about how to automate Perplexity, or get started with a pre-made template.
What you get on Perplexity's free plan: Quick searches and limited access to advanced search tools and models.
Read more: The best AI search engines
Best free AI browser
Perplexity Comet
Perplexity Comet pros:
AI-powered browsing tools
Reliable autonomous agent
Perplexity Comet cons:
Not the most powerful AI model
Slightly intimidating search engine interface
Perplexity's Comet was one of the first AI browsers to pop up, and it shows. It's easily the most polished option, and it avoids giving off the too-common impression that someone just bolted an AI feature onto an existing tool.
Comet's AI is always working in the background, not just when you ask a question. It learns how you browse and adapts in subtle ways (which, if you can get past the creepiness, is pretty useful). Tabs you're unlikely to revisit get deprioritized. Pages you tend to open at the same time each day load before you even click.
The Comet Assistant feature is a mix of a chatbot and an agent that can actually take action in your browser. Say you want to ask an Airbnb host whether the room has an office chair. Instead of opening the site yourself, you can ask Comet to handle it. It will navigate to Airbnb, open the message thread, draft a clear (and polite) note, and send it all on its own.
Comet will attempt almost anything you'd normally do in a browser, with sensible guardrails around security and payments. In that Airbnb example, it will stop at the login screen and ask you to authenticate instead of touching your password manager. I also like that you can watch everything it does in real time and pause or step in if something doesn't feel right. It's perfect for small but annoying tasks you usually avoid, like grouping dozens of open tabs or tracking down a random link from weeks ago.
On the privacy front, Comet keeps your browsing data local and only sends information to Perplexity's servers when you actively make a query. Perplexity also states it doesn't sell your data. Outside of the AI features, it feels like a normal browser: Chrome extensions work, tab groups behave as expected, and multitasking is smooth. For a free AI browser, Comet sets a surprisingly high bar.
What you get on Comet's free plan: Core AI browsing features, form-filling, and summariesÂ
Read more: The best AI browsers
Best free AI app for creating images
ChatGPT
ChatGPT pros:
Very easy to use and a best-in-class model
Integrates with Zapier
Chat cons:
Very slow
Controls can be hit and miss
OpenAI kicked off the modern text-to-image wave with DALL·E, then let other image models steal the spotlight. Now it's back in a big way. The multimodal GPT-4o model can generate images natively and is one of the strongest image generators you can use today.
Using it is about as simple as it gets. Just describe what you want to see, and ChatGPT generates the image directly in the chat. The free plan gets you limited image generation, which is usually enough if you're creating visuals occasionally rather than in bulk.
ChatGPT's image quality is excellent across the board. It handles text in images well, understands spatial relationships and numbers, and makes it easy to refine results with follow-up prompts. Instead of regenerating everything from scratch, you can ask it to tweak one specific detail—change a color, move an object, adjust the background—and it generally does exactly that.
ChatGPT tends to stick closely to what you asked for, whether you're aiming for something painterly, illustrative, or more photorealistic. Upload a reference image and ask for a specific style or transformation, and it does a remarkably good job. It's a noticeable improvement over DALL·E 3, which you can still access inside ChatGPT if you want to compare.
There are a few trade-offs, though. ChatGPT generates images more slowly than diffusion-based models, and it creates just one image at a time instead of multiple variations. If you're producing images at scale, that can feel limiting. But for occasional marketing graphics, concept art, or social visuals, it's rarely a dealbreaker.
Because ChatGPT also integrates with Zapier, you can automate image creation across your workflows—for example, generating images from Google Form submissions, HubSpot leads, or spreadsheet rows. You can learn more about how to automate ChatGPT or get started with a pre-made template.
What you get on ChatGPT's free plan: Limited image generation with GPT-4o, the ability to edit images via follow-up prompts, and support for uploading reference images.
Read more: The best AI image generators
Best free AI tool for photo editing
Pixlr Â
Pixlr pros:
Modular, so you can choose the AI apps you want
Available in any browser without signing upÂ
Pixlr cons:
Less sophisticated than popular paid tools
Some AI functions require credits, which means you'll need to buy more eventually
Pixlr has a lot to offer, even on the free plan. It has a user-friendly interface that lets you make quick edits as well as tackle larger creative projects. Use the AI Cutout feature for background removal, then Backdrop to add vibrant backgrounds and give your photos a fresh, polished look.Â
Pixlr has organized its features across several apps, each with its own specialty. Pixlr X is the hub for its AI features, while Pixlr Designer and Pixlr E cater to different editing needs. These tools all work together to offer a cohesive editing experience, and you can switch between them depending on what you need. Pixlr also offers tools like face swap, object removal, and even an AI image generator.
What you get on Pixlr's free plan: Limited AI use and 3 image saves per day.
Read more: The best AI photo editors
Best free AI app for generating videoÂ
Runway Â
Runway pros:
Helpful tutorial contentÂ
Advanced AI features
Runway cons:
Steep learning curve
Runway is like a creative playground for anyone curious about AI video generation. With just a prompt and a starting image, the tool can take your ideas and turn them into visual stories that feel almost magical. It's an intuitive and exciting way for beginners to dip a toe into AI video without needing much prior experience.
While Runway's paid Aleph model has some impressive capabilities, the Gen-4 Turbo model on the free plan is an ideal starting point. It may not be the latest, but Gen-4 gives you plenty of control over details like camera movements, visual styles, and subject actions. This model lets you generate video from an image, which helps you get comfortable with AI video creation. Plus, the Runway Academy offers guides and tutorials to help you fine-tune your prompts and understand how to shape the AI's output.
What you get on Runway's free plan: 125 one-time credits (can't buy more) and up to 3 video projects.
Read more: The best AI video generators
Best free AI voice generatorÂ
ElevenLabsÂ
ElevenLabs pros:Â
Large voice library in multiple languages
Life-like voices
ElevenLabs cons:
Some inconsistencies with output, especially when including sound effects
ElevenLabs is a great choice if you're looking for a free AI voice generator with flexibility and quality. It offers a deep library of voices to explore across a range of styles, from conversational tones to voices tailored for ads. The Voice Library makes it easy to browse or search for specific voices based on criteria like language, accent, and even age, so you can quickly find just the right fit for any project. And if you've got recommendations from friends, the search tools are perfect for pinpointing specific voices by name, too.
Once you've found a voice you like, you can add it to the Voice Lab for easy access. Generating audio is straightforward: just paste your text, pick a voice, and hit Generate. If you want to fine-tune the results, you can experiment with different settings, like stability for emotional range or style exaggeration for added emphasis. This flexibility gives you control over the nuances of each voice, letting you shape the delivery to match your vision, whether it's for narration, character voices, or business content.
You can do even more with ElevenLabs when you connect it to Zapier, so you can automatically convert text to speech in ElevenLabs whenever certain triggers happen in the other apps you use. Instead of manually sending text to ElevenLabs, you can keep it where you work and still have ElevenLabs work its magic.
What you get on ElevenLabs' free plan: 10k credits per month, 3 projects, API access
Read more: The best AI voice generators Â
Best free AI writing generator
RytrÂ
Rytr pros:
Good free plan and cheap unlimited plan
Rytr cons:
Limited features compared to other paid offerings
Rytr is a solid choice if you're looking to explore AI writing tools without a big financial commitment. Many AI text generators are built with businesses in mind—which often means higher price tags—but Rytr offers a basic free plan that covers around 2,500 words each month. That's enough to test it out and see how it fits into your workflow. It's ideal for hobbyists, students, or anyone curious about what AI writing can do without needing to dive into a paid subscription.
While Rytr may not have all the bells and whistles of more premium options, it still performs well for straightforward writing tasks. While not cutting-edge, it produces reliable results for casual needs like drafting emails, generating ideas, or crafting short social posts. You won't get extensive customization options, but if you're after a tool that's easy to use and gets the basics right, Rytr's simplicity is a plus.
What you get on Rytr's free plan: 10,000 characters/month and lots of other features.
Read more: The best AI writing generators
Best free AI tool for automation
Zapier
Zapier pros:
No-code automation makes it easy to connect AI tools and all your business apps
Integration with thousands of popular apps
Designed to orchestrate AI actions across your entire tech stack
Zapier cons:
Free plan is limited to two-step automations
I'm on the Zapier team, so it's no surprise I'm recommending Zapier. But bias aside, Zapier earns its place on this list because it does something most AI tools don't: it connects them. Instead of acting as a single AI app, Zapier functions as an orchestration layer that lets AI move data, trigger actions, and coordinate work across thousands of tools.
At its core, Zapier lets you build automated workflows (called Zaps) without writing code. But with AI baked in, those workflows are no longer just "if this, then that." Zapier Copilot, the AI-powered assistant, lets you describe what you want in plain language (like "create a Mailchimp subscriber when I get a new Facebook Lead Ad") and it builds the workflow for you, connects the right apps, and even tests each step.
Zapier also includes a growing set of tools designed to support more complex, AI-powered systems:
Zapier Tables for storing, organizing, and acting on structured data inside automations
Zapier Forms for building internal tools, forms, and client portals that sit on top of your workflows
AI by Zapier, which lets you use state-of-the-art models directly in workflows without managing API keys
Zapier Chatbots for creating conversational interfaces connected to your data and apps
Zapier Agents, which enable autonomous agents that can reason, browse the web, and take action across your stack
On the free plan, Zapier gives you enough flexibility to experiment with AI orchestration without committing upfront. If you're less interested in using a single AI tool and more interested in making AI work across everything you already use, Zapier is hard to beat.
What you get on Zapier's free plan: Unlimited two-step Zaps; access to Forms, Tables, Chatbots, and Agents.
Best free AI tool for building apps
Softr
Softr pros:
Builds user-friendly interfaces
Stores information easily in Airtable or Google Sheets
Softr cons:
Limited advanced logic
Softr is a fantastic free option if you need to build a custom app without any coding experience. The tool is known for its simplicity and ease of use, but it still doesn't compromise functionality. Getting started is incredibly quick—just select a category, describe what you want your app to do, and Softr takes care of the rest. In just a few moments, you'll have a basic app complete with a name, design, and even some default colors.
Once Softr finishes generating, you're placed right into the editor with a surprisingly well-rounded app with essentials like dashboards, login pages, data list pages, and forms for input. It's especially handy that it can create user roles if your app concept calls for them, which makes it ideal for things like community or team-based apps. Customization is straightforward—just click on any page element to tweak its look and functionality.Â
You can also connect your app to a Google Sheet or Airtable for data storage. And Softr also integrates with Zapier, which means you can sync even more data and add workflow automations effortlessly. Do things like adding new users from form submissions or processed payments.
What you get on Softr's free plan: 1 published app, 10 app users, and 2 user groups with basic actions and a custom domain.
Read more: The best AI app buildersÂ
Best free AI tool for meeting insights
Fathom
Fathom pros:
Share meetings easily
Unlimited recordings and transcriptions on free plan
Fathom cons:
Can be buggy when using it with Teams or MeetÂ
If you're looking for a no-cost way to create meeting summaries and transcriptions, Fathom is a fantastic option. Unlike other tools, Fathom's free version is genuinely robust. Right after a meeting wraps up, you can generate a quick summary and send it directly to your CRM or Slack, which makes keeping your team in the loop fast and easy. And if you want to organize insights across meetings, Fathom lets you create short clips, organize them in playlists, and share them. This makes it a great choice if you want to keep track of important points over time.
One of Fathom's clever touches is how it handles copy-pasting—anything you copy out of Fathom pastes neatly formatted, saving you time and hassle. So, whether you're moving notes to a doc or sharing action items, you won't have to spend time fixing formatting.
If you want even more functionality, Fathom has a Team plan for added organization and automation options. But if you're sticking with the free version, you'll still get all the essentials, which makes Fathom an impressive tool for organizing and streamlining your meetings without breaking the bank.
And with Fathom's Zapier integration, you can connect your AI meeting assistant to the other tools you use every day. Send meeting summaries to your task management app or Google Drive, for example. Learn more about how to automate Fathom, or get started with one of these automated workflows.
What you get on Fathom's free plan: Unlimited recordings and transcriptions using Zoom, Meet, and Teams. AI meeting summaries are available, but only chronologically and with only 5 advanced summaries, AI action items, and AI follow-up emails per month.
Read more: The best AI meeting assistants
Best free AI email assistant
ShortwaveÂ
Shortwave pros:
Deep integration with Google Calendar
AI assistant is very flexible
Shortwave cons:
Free plan only includes 3 months of email history
If you're looking for an AI email assistant that actually feels useful day to day, Shortwave is hard to beat. It has the broadest and most practical set of AI features I've seen in an email app, and—importantly—they're easy to access right where you already work.
Shortwave's AI lives inside a dedicated assistant you can open from the corner of your inbox. From there, you can chat with your email in plain language. And this is where Shortwave really shines. Instead of digging through old threads or guessing the right keyword, you can just ask your inbox questions like, "What did we decide on for the website redesign?" or "Find the last conversation where pricing came up." It reliably surfaces the right emails without sending you down a search rabbit hole.
That same assistant can also pull structured information out of threads (like listing tasks from a project discussion), generate new content based on your inbox ("turn my productivity emails into a tweet"), or answer questions in a ChatGPT-style back-and-forth—except the answers are grounded in your actual email history.
When it's time to reply, AI help is right where you'd expect it. From the compose area, you can generate a response from scratch or refine one based on a quick prompt, then drop it directly into your draft and keep the conversation moving.
The main limitations to be aware of: Shortwave only supports Gmail right now, and on the free plan, it only gives you three months of email history. The upgrade is pretty expensive, but if you have your email archive somewhere else, you can stick to the free plan.
What you get on Shortwave's free plan: Most of the tool's productivity features, including the Shortwave AI executive assistant; 3 months of email history.
Read more: The best AI email assistants
Best free AI agent builder
Zapier Agents
Zapier Agents pros:Â
Natively connects with 8,000+ apps
Enterprise-grade security
Easy to use, even for non-technical employees
Zapier Agents cons:Â
Free plan limited to 400 activities per month
Zapier Agents brings together three things that are usually hard to find in one place: powerful AI models, access to 8,000+ apps, and a builder that doesn't require you to think like an engineer. You describe what you want the agent to do, choose the tools it can use, and it's ready to take action across your entire tech stack.
The setup starts with connecting your agent to your source of truth—apps like HubSpot, Notion, Airtable, or anywhere else your data lives. Once connected, you can ask your agent questions about that data and combine information across tools. From there, you can train agents to work asynchronously: define what triggers them, how they should process or summarize information, and what actions they should take next—all without writing a single line of code.
The agent builder itself is straightforward, but there's a lot of depth once you start using it. Zapier Agents comes with a Chrome extension, so you can trigger agents directly from your browser on any website. You can group related agents into pods, share them with teammates, and reuse setups across projects, which makes it surprisingly easy to scale from personal workflows to team-wide ones.
In practice, Zapier Agents can handle everything from inbox triage and content creation to project management, lead routing, expense tracking, and schedule coordination. And because it's built on Zapier's platform, agents can securely access all your work data across thousands of apps—without custom integrations or fragile workarounds.
You can start from scratch if you have a specific workflow in mind, or use a pre-built template to get something useful up and running quickly.
What you get on Zapier's free plan: 400 activities/month, live data sources, web browsing, and a Chrome extension
Read more: The best AI agent builder software
Best free AI app for schedulingÂ
Reclaim
Reclaim pros:
When it catches a conflict, it quickly reschedules and adjusts your calendarÂ
Manages recurring events well
Reclaim cons:
Clunky native task managementÂ
Reclaim.ai is a powerful yet easy-to-use AI scheduling app that makes sticking to your goals and routines a lot simpler. It's designed to help you build consistency, whether you're trying to carve out time for important habits or just keep your schedule organized. From the start, Reclaim's setup process guides you through defining your work hours, priority habits, and task management preferences, so you're always in control. Unlike some scheduling tools, Reclaim is refreshingly clear about how it manages your time, so you don't end up with a calendar full of surprises.
The main hub, the Planner screen, puts everything in one place, with a central calendar view and lists for high-priority habits, open tasks, and lower-priority habits on the side. It's easy to get a quick overview of what's coming up and what's left to do, which is perfect for staying focused as you work through the day. And if you have particular habits you want to protect—like a regular workout or quiet focus time—you can adjust each one's priority level to control how easily they get rescheduled.
Reclaim also integrates with Zapier, so you can set up automatic importing from your favorite task management app even if it doesn't integrate natively with Reclaim. If you're working on building consistent habits or simply want a better way to handle a busy schedule, Reclaim is a flexible, free tool that takes the stress out of planning your time.
What you get on Reclaim's free plan: Unlimited tasks, 1 scheduling link, 1 habit, and limited integrations
Read more: The best AI scheduling assistants
Best free AI app for project management
Hive
Hive pros:
Customizable dashboards
Feature set expandable with add-ons
Hive cons:
Mobile apps could be better
Hive's project-from-a-prompt tool is not only fun to play with, but it also cuts down on your project management admin. Just add a project title, and let the AI assistant (Buzz) handle the rest. It'll create a stream of tasks, split by phase and including both start and end dates. From there, you can ask Buzz to make tweaks as needed, then click Create Project to finalize the new set of tasks.
Hive's AI features can also generate content, edit and translate text, and create more subtasks for a project. It absolutely means less time spent in your project management app and more time working on your projects.
You connect Hive to Zapier to automate task creation and notifications and otherwise streamline your project management workflows.
What you get on Hive's free plan: AI project planner and content generator, 200MB storage, unlimited tasks and notes, and up to 10 workspace members.
Read more: The best AI project management tools
Best free AI app for creating presentations
Gamma
Gamma pros:
App and web page embedding available
Lots of powerful customization tools
Gamma cons:
AI credits don't refill monthly on the free plan
If you've ever sat through a deck where every slide looked like it came from a different designer or even decade, Gamma is a quick way to restore some visual clarity. It uses AI to generate presentations that actually look cohesive without requiring design skills or a lot of setup.
Getting started is straightforward. You enter the topic of your presentation, choose how many slides you want, and Gamma generates an outline first. This step is underrated but really useful: you can reorder cards, delete sections, or add new ones before committing to the final deck. From there, you can fine-tune how much text appears on each slide and decide where images come from (AI-generated or web images).
If you dig a little deeper, Gamma gives you more control than you might expect—especially on the free plan. In the advanced settings, you can specify your target audience, adjust tone, choose aspect ratios, and decide whether the AI should generate full content, summarize what you provide, or simply focus on layout. You can also paste in an existing document or expand on the outline manually before generating the slides.
Once you hit Generate, the presentation builds in real time. The layouts stay consistent, the color palette doesn't jump around, and the AI-generated visuals match the theme instead of clashing with it. If something feels off, you can make changes using simple commands. Tell Gamma what to revise, and it handles the edits without you needing to tweak every slide by hand.
Gamma isn't limited to presentations, either. You can also use it to create documents and simple landing pages with the same AI-assisted controls, which makes it a solid all-around content creation tool for small teams.
On Gamma's free plan, you can:
Generate AI-powered presentations from prompts or pasted content
Customize outlines, tone, and layout before generation
Use built-in themes and AI-generated or web-sourced images
Edit and refine slides using AI commands
And if you want to take things further, Gamma integrates with Zapier, so you can automatically generate presentations from documents, spreadsheets, or meeting notes across thousands of apps.
What you get on Gamma's free plan: Up to 10 cards per prompt, basic features, importing from PDF and PPTX, and exporting to PDF, PPTX, PNG, and Google Slides
Read more: The best AI presentation makersÂ
Best free AI app for social media management
Publer
Publer pros:
Can search for top topics by country or category
Text-to-image AI generation
Publer cons:
Limited integrations beyond social mediaÂ
Whether you're posting across major platforms like Facebook and Instagram or adding updates on sites like Pinterest and WordPress, Publer connects with them all in one convenient place so you can streamline your content strategy.
One of Publer's best features is its AI-powered content generation. Just type a prompt, and Publer's AI can create engaging post text (complete with perfectly chosen emojis) and even suggest relevant hashtags. Publer also includes an AI image generator, which makes it easy to whip up visuals directly on the platform. Need some cute pet images or stylized artwork? Publer's image generation engine gives you multiple options to add a visual spark to your posts with just a few clicks.
Another neat feature is the Content tab, where you can check out trending headlines by country or category. This makes it a cinch to find inspiration and keep your posts timely and relevant. This feature is perfect for honing your content strategy and keeping up with popular topics that can give your social media presence a boost. Â
What you get on Publer's free plan: 3 social media accounts and 10 scheduled posts per month.
Read more: The best AI tools for social media management
Best free AI CRM
HubSpot CRM
HubSpot CRM pros:
Robust documentation and community
Intuitive user experience and smooth onboarding
Extensive integrations
HubSpot CRM cons:
Confusing pricing structure
Limited AI customization
HubSpot started life as a marketing automation tool, but it's grown into a full-fledged CRM that can support your entire RevOps team on a single, approachable platform.
HubSpot's main draw is how easy it is to use. Advanced CRM features and AI usually come with a steep learning curve, but HubSpot manages to make them feel accessible to everyday users. Its AI toolkit, called Breeze AI, is woven directly into the workflows you're already using, which makes adoption far less painful than with more complex CRMs like Salesforce.
Breeze AI is a collection of tools that show up exactly where you need them:
Breeze Copilot acts as an in-app assistant, helping you build workflows, summarize records, write content, and support sales and marketing outreach.
Breeze agents are AI-powered specialists designed to automate specific parts of your work:
Social Agent writes social posts in your brand voice.
Content Agent helps create blog posts, landing pages, and other marketing assets.
Prospecting Agent researches leads and automates outreach.
Customer Agent handles support questions using your existing knowledge base.
What I love about Breeze AI is how seamlessly it's embedded. It doesn't feel like a separate tool you have to remember to use. When you're building an email campaign, for example, the AI is already there in the editor—suggesting subject lines, tightening up copy, and even predicting who's most likely to open—without pulling you out of your flow.
HubSpot does give you some control over how its AI works. You can configure things like lead scoring by choosing which behaviors or contact properties matter most to your business. That said, it doesn't let you build fully custom AI models, and many advanced features—like conversation intelligence or more sophisticated scoring—are reserved for higher-tier plans.
To extend HubSpot beyond what it does natively, you can connect it to the rest of your tools with Zapier's HubSpot integrations. For example, you can automatically log new Google Ads leads in HubSpot, notify your sales team in Slack, and kick off follow-up workflows without manual data entry. Combined with HubSpot's built-in AI, Zapier becomes the orchestration layer that ties everything together. Learn more about how to automate HubSpot, or start with a pre-made workflow.
What you get on HubSpot CRM's free plan: 1 personal meeting link, 3 email templates, segment analytics, intent criteria, Google PMax ads integration
Read more: The best AI CRM tools
Best free AI app for salesÂ
Lavender
Lavender pros:
Combines generative AI and engagement suggestions into a blank email
Offers coaching insights from monitoring email performance data Â
Lavender cons:
Can be a distracting presence in your inbox
May be a drag on your browser speedÂ
If you're in sales and rely on email to drive results, Lavender could become your go-to AI tool. As a browser extension, Lavender seamlessly integrates with your inbox to offer a range of AI-powered tools designed to make your email game stronger. Even free users can use its built-in ChatGPT bot to quickly compose or refine existing messages. With handy suggestions right within the bot, it's easy to generate a draft and fine-tune it with just a few clicks.
Once your message is in draft, Lavender's Email Coach steps in, offering detailed scoring metrics to help boost your engagement rate. It highlights key personalization elements so your emails feel more human and relevant to each lead. And since many recipients are checking email on their phones, Lavender's mobile preview window ensures your message looks great on any device. It even includes a fun GIF finder to help you add a little visual flair when appropriate.
Lavender's dashboard tracks your email activity and provides insightful metrics on clarity, readability, open rates, and reply rates. This data-driven approach lets you see what's working and what can improve. For teams, it's an excellent coaching tool to track email performance, fine-tune communication skills, and hit KPIs more consistently. Even if you're not in sales, Lavender's features make it a standout AI email companion that's worth a try.
What you get on Lavender's free plan: Integrate with Gmail and Outlook 365 and analyze and personalize 5 emails a month.
Read more: The best AI sales assistant software
Best free AI tool for note taking
Evernote
Evernote pros:
Good fit for anything from short notes to full documents
Plenty of views available for easy navigation and searching
AI that just works
Evernote cons:
Going through a lot of changes—but could this be a pro to you?
When I'm excited about a new idea, my notes would make a doctor's prescription pad look totally legible. Half-finished sentences, typos, and random phrases that make perfect sense in the moment—and none at all later. Evernote's AI note cleanup tool is surprisingly good at smoothing out those brain-dump moments, as long as there's enough context for it to work with.
You use it right inside the editor. Highlight a section of text, open the AI Edit menu, and choose what you want to do. The options are intentionally limited, which I actually appreciate. Instead of dozens of prompts and regeneration buttons, you get a few practical actions: fix typos, summarize long-winded notes, or rewrite something as an email or social post when you're ready to share it elsewhere.
Evernote's other standout AI feature is search. Beyond searching note titles or text, it can also pull information from PDFs, images, and even handwritten notes. Because Evernote supports tasks and events too, you can ask questions across all of it at once and get a single summarized answer. Better yet, Evernote shows you the sources it used, so you can jump straight back to the original notes and double-check the results.
All of this works especially well given Evernote's history. It's one of the original note-taking apps, and the core experience—especially fast note capture on mobile—is still among the best. After a rough few years, Evernote was acquired by Bending Spoons and is now in the middle of a major rebuild focused on infrastructure and user experience. The AI features feel like part of that reset. They're thoughtful and focused on helping you stay organized without changing how you already take notes.
If you want to go a step further, you can connect Evernote to Zapier to automate repetitive note-taking tasks. For example, you can automatically save meeting notes, log ideas from other apps, or keep project notes in sync without manual copy-pasting. You can learn more about how to automate Evernote or get started with a pre-made workflow.
What you get on Evernote's free plan: Up to 1,000 notes, 20 notebooks, 1,000 attachments, and 3 devices
Read more: The best AI notes apps
Best free AI tool for checking grammar and wording
Grammarly
Grammarly pros:
Works in multiple apps and browsers
Recognizes regional English
Grammarly cons:
Stylistic suggestions are often questionable
As a writer, I've been using Grammarly for years. It's a highly accessible, free AI tool for improving grammar and writing clarity. It works across desktop and mobile platforms, web browsers, and popular apps, so it's always there when you need a quick grammar check or wording tweak. One of its standout features is the ability to set specific writing goals—like tone and formality—which helps Grammarly tailor its suggestions to what you're aiming for.
For more complex rewrites, Grammarly's built-in generative AI can help adjust tone, make your text more descriptive, or even simplify it as needed. And if you're using the Chrome extension, it's easy to turn Grammarly on or off as you like. For instance, some of my coworkers prefer drafting in Google Docs without constant pop-ups, then pasting full drafts in Grammarly's online editor afterwards for a smoother editing experience.
While Grammarly only supports English, it recognizes regional differences in spelling, grammar, and punctuation, so you'll get accurate suggestions whether you're using American, British, Canadian, Australian, or Indian English.Â
What you get on Grammarly's free plan: Grammar and spell check, tone monitoring, and 100 AI prompts for generative text.
Read more: The best grammar checkers
Best free AI website builder
Wix
Wix pros:
Backed up by Wix's mature site builder ecosystem
Easy to use, even for web design beginners
Wix cons:
Not the most futuristic-feeling AI around
Wix is a great free option if you want to build a website quickly and easily, especially if you appreciate a mix of AI guidance and hands-on control. With Wix's AI site builder, setting up a website starts with a simple chat with the AI, where you answer questions about the kind of site you want. The AI then uses your responses to create a site design tailored to your needs. While you'll still need to replace the stock text and images with your own content, Wix's process is so streamlined that you can go from concept to a functional website in under ten minutes—perfect for a quick portfolio or business page.
One of Wix's strong points is its flexibility. If the AI-generated site isn't quite right, you're never stuck—you can change anything about the design or layout using the drag-and-drop builder. You can let the AI do the heavy lifting and then step in to tweak details, giving you a lot of creative control over the final product.
And because Wix integrates with Zapier, you can automate tasks like adding new contacts or updating spreadsheets. Learn how to automate Wix, or get started with a pre-built template.
What you get on Wix's free plan: Wix branding and domain, with 500MB of cloud storage and 500MB bandwidth.
Read more: The best AI website builders
Best free AI chatbot builder
Zapier Chatbots
Zapier Chatbots pros:Â
Connects chatbot conversation data to thousands of apps
Easy to use
Zapier Chatbots cons:Â
If you aren't interested in automation features, it's a bit more limited than some other options
Building a chatbot itself isn't the hard part anymore. What's actually interesting (and still surprisingly difficult) is connecting that chatbot to your real data and getting it to do something useful.Â
Zapier Chatbots can connect to more than 8,000 apps, which means your chatbot doesn't have to live in isolation. Want to collect leads? Send them straight to your CRM. Gathering customer feedback? Log it in Google Sheets, post it in Slack, or route it wherever your team already works. Instead of building one-off chatbot experiences, you're effectively adding conversational interfaces to the tools you already use.
Under the hood, Zapier Chatbots runs on state-of-the-art OpenAI models. If you want more control, you can also bring your own OpenAI or Anthropic API key. You can connect up to 20 knowledge sources, pull information directly from your website or help docs, and fine-tune how the chatbot behaves. It's also easy to add logic that gathers context throughout the conversation, so you can follow up meaningfully instead of starting from scratch.
Customization is another strong point. You can adjust how your chatbot looks, define its tone, and decide when and how it asks questions. Once it's ready, you can embed it directly on your website or launch it as a pop-up—no complex setup required. It's genuinely possible to spin up a functional lead-gen or customer support chatbot in minutes, then plug it straight into the rest of your stack.
If you want a head start, Zapier offers pre-built chatbot templates you can customize instead of building everything from scratch. Or, learn more about how to use Zapier Chatbots.
Increase lead engagement with a conversational chat experience embedded on your website.
Resolve customer questions and reduce support volume with a customized chatbot.
What you get on Zapier's free plan: Two chatbots with basic features
Read more: The best chatbot builders
Best free AI resume builderÂ
Teal
Teal pros:
Application status tracking
Help tailoring resumes to specific job listings
Teal cons:Â
Doesn't explicitly mention that it optimizes for ATS
Teal does more than just help you create a resume—it's designed to get you moving and keep you on track. During setup, Teal asks about your career goals, preferred positions, target compensation, and timing for your job search. It then keeps these details front and center on your dashboard as a motivating reminder of what you're working toward.
Teal's job search productivity features also stand out. The pipeline feature lets you track the status of each application across multiple stages, from "not applied" to "interviewing." This visual organization can reduce the stress of tracking multiple job openings, so you can focus on moving forward instead of scrambling to remember what stage each application is in.
Another one of Teal's highlights is its resume-matching feature. When you add a job listing, Teal can score how well your resume aligns with the job description and even help you fine-tune your bullet points to showcase relevant skills or accomplishments. It doesn't explicitly state that the tool is designed to work well with applicant tracking systems (ATS), but the AI offers insightful suggestions to help you better align your experience with what companies are looking for.Â
What you get on Teal's free plan: Limited AI usage for 5 resume achievements, 2 professional summaries, and 1 cover letter.
Read more: The best AI resume buildersÂ
Best free AI tool for recruiters
Zoho Recruit
Zoho Recruit pros:
All-in-one solution
Chrome extension extracts resumes from most websites
Zoho Recruit cons:
Interface isn't very intuitive
Free plan only offers 256 MB of storage
If you're looking for a budget-friendly but capable AI recruiting tool, Zoho Recruit could fit the bill. As an ATS and CRM rolled into one, it streamlines the hiring process for small businesses, agencies, and even solo recruiters. It integrates with over 75 job boards—including Indeed, LinkedIn, and Facebook—to help you reach a broad audience. And its AI-powered resume parsing means you can skip the time-consuming manual sorting and focus on the top candidates.
Zoho Recruit is also a pro at handling repetitive recruitment tasks like managing emails and scheduling interviews, so you can save time and energy. Its Advanced Recruit Analytics provides data-driven insights into your hiring process, helping you make smarter, more strategic recruitment decisions. This level of automation and analytics is rare to find in a free recruiting tool.
The tool supports 27 languages, so it's accessible to a global recruiting audience, and it's packed with customizable features. Plus, it integrates with Zapier, which means you can set up workflows to sync Zoho Recruit with tools like Google Calendar or your project management platform, further streamlining your process. Learn how to automate Zoho Recruit, or get started with a popular workflow.
What you get on Zoho Recruit's free plan: Basic candidate and email management, with 1 active job posting
Read more: The best AI recruiting tools
Best free tool for AI detectionÂ
Sapling
Sapling pros:
Streamlined interface that's easy to use
Constant updates to keep its AI detection abilities sharp
Sapling cons:
Limited to 2,000 characters per check on the free plan
Sapling isn't flashy, and that's kind of the point. The interface is straightforward and utilitarian, but under the hood, it's one of the most reliable AI content detectors you can use for free—especially as new language models keep rolling out.
The main thing that sets Sapling apart is how consistently it's updated. While many detectors lose accuracy as new models emerge, Sapling actively supports newer systems, which helps its results stay relevant over time. In testing, it performed especially well at identifying fully human-written text, fully AI-generated content, and mixed samples.
To use Sapling, just paste your text into the editor or upload a document (PDF or DOCX), and the analysis starts automatically. Within seconds, you get a clear score showing how likely the content is to be AI-generated.
Even on the free plan, Sapling offers more insight than a single percentage. It highlights specific sentences that are likely AI-generated, which is helpful if you're reviewing or editing mixed content. You can also generate a public results link to share with others, making it easier to provide transparency or "certify" content when needed.
If you need higher limits or more frequent checks, Sapling's Pro plan increases the character cap significantly and adds convenience features like a Chrome extension. But for occasional checks—or validating shorter pieces of content—the free version holds up well.
What you get on Sapling's free plan: AI detection for up to 2,000 characters per check, sentence-level breakdowns, support for pasted text and file uploads, and shareable public links for results
Read more: The best AI content detectors
Free AI tools help you experiment without breaking the bank
No more FOMO while watching others play with fancy new AI tools. Hopefully, you've come away from this roundup with a few ideas for incorporating AI into your work that won't break the bank. What free AI tool will you experiment with first?
Related reading:
This article was originally published in November 2024. The most recent update was in January 2026.
