This page explains how Free AI For That ("FAFT", "we") organizes the tools it lists. Every listed tool has:
- one category: what kind of tool it is;
- one to three tasks: the jobs it does;
- one kind of free: how its free offer works;
- how to get it free: what you need and the steps;
- optionally, places in stacks: sets of tools for a goal.
Each of these comes from the maker's own pages and is applied under the same written rules for every tool, never from keywords or by guessing.
1. Categories
Our categories keep growing. We add new ones as new uses of AI appear and as people look for them, so the list below is where we are today, not a final list.
A tool goes in the category of its main job, as its maker presents it. When two categories fit, it goes where most people would look for it first. A tool listed only for its AI features goes in the category of those features.
| Category | Belongs here | Goes elsewhere |
|---|---|---|
| Vibe Coding | Builds whole apps or websites from a plain-language description | Helping developers in their own editor (AI Coding Assistants) |
| AI Coding Assistants | Helps developers write, complete, explain, review or fix code | Building whole apps from a prompt (Vibe Coding); hosting and APIs (Dev Infrastructure) |
| AI Agents & Automation | Carries out multi-step tasks on its own, or lets you build agents and automated workflows | Assistants you only chat with (Chatbots & LLMs) |
| Chatbots & LLMs | General-purpose AI assistants you chat with, and the language models behind them | Chatbots for one job, such as customer support (Sales & Support) |
| AI Writing | Drafts, edits, rewrites, translates or checks text | Campaigns and SEO (Marketing); slides (Presentations) |
| AI Marketing | Plans and produces marketing: ads, campaigns, SEO, email marketing, landing pages | Posting and scheduling on social platforms (Social Media) |
| AI Social Media | Creates, schedules and analyses posts and short videos for social platforms | General video editing (Video) |
| AI Design | Designs interfaces, graphics, logos, brand assets and layouts | Making images from a prompt as the main job (Image Generation) |
| AI Image Generation | Creates or edits images from text or other images | Interface and brand design (Design) |
| AI Video | Generates, edits, captions, dubs or clips video, including AI avatars | Social scheduling (Social Media) |
| AI Audio & Voice | Speech, voice, music and sound: text to speech, transcription, voice cloning, music, audio clean-up | Meeting assistants (Productivity) |
| AI Presentations | Makes slide decks and presentations | Documents and notes (Productivity) |
| AI Productivity | Notes, tasks, calendars, meetings, documents and personal knowledge | Finding and reading sources (Research) |
| AI Research | Finds, reads and summarizes sources, such as papers, the web and documents, with references | General chat (Chatbots & LLMs) |
| Game Dev & 3D AI | Games, 3D models, textures, animation and game worlds | Flat images (Image Generation) |
| Data & Analytics AI | Analyses data in spreadsheets and databases, and builds charts and dashboards in plain language | Research sources (Research) |
| Dev Infrastructure & AI APIs | Exists to build or run AI: model APIs, inference and hosting, vector databases, AI gateways, evaluation and monitoring | General hosting or databases without AI (not listed) |
| Sales & Support AI | Sales outreach, finding leads, and customer support chat and help desks | General chat (Chatbots & LLMs) |
2. Tasks
- A tool gets one to three tasks: jobs it does as a main feature, not side features.
- Tasks come from our published list. When a good tool does a job we have no task for, we propose a new task instead of forcing a poor fit.
- New tasks and categories are added when there is evidence that people want them (searches, visits or a clear trend) and at least three qualifying tools for them. A member of our team approves each one.
3. Kinds of free
Each tool has exactly one kind of free, decided by our software from the facts we confirmed on the maker's pages (see What free means here).
Free to keep:
- Completely free: no paid plan at all, as the maker's own pages confirm.
- Free plan: a free tier of a paid product, with no end date and set limits.
- Refilling credits: free credits or tokens that top up every day, week, month or year.
- Open source: free to run yourself, on your own computer or hosting.
- Your own API key: the app is free; you pay an AI company for what you use.
Free for a while:
- Free trials: a trial of the paid version for at least 30 days.
- Paid plans, free for now: a paid plan given free for at least 30 days by the maker, with the end date shown.
- One-time credits: free credits that don't renew, usable for at least 30 days. Credits whose maker states no expiry count; credits that expire in under 30 days don't.
- Free in beta: free during early access; it may end or change.
- Free for students: free while you're a student, as the maker's own pages say.
When more than one fits:
- If the only free offer is for students, it's Free for students.
- Kinds that end come first, but only when they *are* the free access: an optional trial beside a free plan doesn't change the kind.
- Between open source, a hosted free plan and your own API key, the kind follows the option the maker leads with on its pricing page.
- "Refilling credits" is only for allowances counted in credits or tokens. Limits on actions (tasks, messages, minutes) make it a free plan.
- "Completely free" and "Paid plans, free for now" need the maker's own words, not marketing such as "100% free".
- If the facts support no kind, the tool shows no kind and can't be picked until we check it again.
4. How to get it free
For each tool we record, from the maker's own pages:
- whether you need an account, or can use it without one;
- what the signup asks for (email, Google, Apple, Microsoft, GitHub, phone, card);
- the page where you start free, and the steps;
- catches a free user should know (a one-time grant, a daily cap, a watermark);
- limits by country, where the maker states them.
Each detail needs its own quote. "No signup required" needs the maker's words or our own test. "No card needed" is stated as fact only after our own signup test; until then it's shown as the maker's claim.
5. Stacks
A stack is a set of listed tools for one goal, such as "Launch a startup", with one tool for each step. A slot holds a tool that does that step on its free offer. When a tool leaves our lists, its slot is filled from the same task. Stacks are reviewed monthly.
6. Changes
Moving a tool to another category, changing its tasks, or adding a category or task is proposed with the reason and approved by a member of our team. A change in a tool's kind of free is a change to its free offer, and follows the rules in How we check free offers.
Our other rules: How we find tools · How we check free offers · How we rank · How we pick awards. All five are on How we work.
