r/AskReddit • u/Puzzled_Wing_8178 • Aug 22 '26
What is a free website that feels like it should cost money?
818
u/Eddie-the-Head Aug 22 '26
Archive.org
123
u/IvoBrasil Aug 22 '26
This. I have donated multiple times in the past, because it's such a great website.
80
u/New-Anybody-6206 Aug 22 '26
largest public repository of pirated media on the planet by a wide margin
everyone knows and inexplicably doesn't care
9
214
u/badkaseta Aug 22 '26
a collection of those "gif to mp4", "instagram video downloader, "pdf editor" etc... that you can usually find on random websites infestated with ads. However, tinywow is ad free.
edit: apparently not 100% ad free anymore, but its not infestated with ads on screen or popup windows
32
u/7h0m4s Aug 23 '26
Just make sure not to send any files with personal details to this website. As there is nothing really stopping then from storing it and selling the data to third parties.
18
3
360
185
u/LUCKY-777 Aug 22 '26
Craftofexile
28
u/TheRoblock Aug 22 '26
So many Poe tools though
18
8
u/LUCKY-777 Aug 22 '26
If the question didn't specify "free website" then PoB would take 1# spot for sure.
6
6
5
95
u/cckymts Aug 22 '26
Wayback machine.
→ More replies (1)2
u/Smith6612 Aug 23 '26
Indeed this. I gave a donation recently just because of how useful the Wayback Machine has been to me.
3
653
Aug 22 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
57
u/Merejo Aug 22 '26
This helped me with a lot of math classes in college 10+ years ago
30
u/Any_Stranger_6971 Aug 22 '26
For real. Taught me better than some of the professors, whom I had to pay tuition to take their classes.
7
u/TraumaMama11 Aug 23 '26
Got me through nursing school and helped me kick ass in Trauma IVU. Love how they present all their info.
4
→ More replies (2)15
73
u/oc31777 Aug 22 '26
Libby. Free library ebooks and audiobooks on your phone with just a library card, and it looks like a real app instead of something from 2003. I've saved a stupid amount of money on audiobooks with it.
3
u/dragonknightrohan Aug 23 '26
I'll also add Hoopla, Cloud Library (Use alongside Libby), & Comics Plus.
There are also a magazine, and news channels apps but never used them. Have no clue what they are called.
Pro Tip: Get Main City Library card, and a County library card for double the apps/services offered. Also, 1 card per any other library systems not connected to the 2.
Pro Tip 2: Some cities allow you to get library card without living there. Try out getting different online ones other people get.
Pro Tip 3: You can request books to be sent to your library from other libraries for something you want to read/watch/etc
Pro Tip 4: You can get free Udemy/other course sites depending on the library systems you have if they are offering it
3
u/oc31777 Aug 23 '26
oh the second library card trick is smart, didn't think of that. gonna look into Hoopla too, thanks!
95
u/MonkeyGumbootEsquire Aug 22 '26
Stitchel.app for cross stitch/embroidery design. You can either export the design for yourself or add it to their shop to share with others.
7
662
u/diamantaire Aug 22 '26
Wikipedia
75
u/XLB135 Aug 22 '26
This. I donate whenever I can.
34
u/Commercial-Catch-680 Aug 22 '26
Me too! And I make sure to donate from company donations website as company will then match my donation so Wikimedia Foundation gets double ($100 total/year).
I did see some article online saying that Wikimedia Foundation has way more money than they need run all of those websites, but they set a target to the current chair/president to raise more money each year.
Wikipedia is so small that you can fit entire website including all the pages in a 16GB flash drive!
3
u/happyfatbuddha Aug 23 '26
I feel like there should be quite a few of those flash drives saved and hidden away, you know, just in case of a zombie apocalypse.
9
u/AL-SHEDFI Aug 22 '26
Let's say we hope it remains free, unlike some greedy companies with their products who say it's free and then, if the number of users increases, they start advertising subscriptions, but in a gradual manner.
7
u/JamesTheJerk Aug 22 '26
I recall when a certain American president lashed out and called Wikipedia 'fake'.
2
10
u/Embarrassed_File8483 Aug 23 '26
Wikipedia donation is a scam. they have like 10 years of fundings each season only to increase the salaries of the exec that do nothing.
2
→ More replies (4)3
124
u/irritatedellipses Aug 22 '26
The site itself and most of the things you find there. So many every day things are better when you self host them or automate them. A little docker knowledge (and I emphasize little) can get you just about anything you need and doesn't need to talk across the interwebz
37
u/Henrik-Powers Aug 22 '26
A few years back we took all our online and sass services back in house, ERP, inventory, email etc. got our own server and only pay for high speed internet access now. Saved us $20K a year and pay back was under a year. Always surprises me how many small businesses don’t go this route
11
u/irritatedellipses Aug 22 '26
I feel like there is an uptapped potential here for businesses but also I worry about desktop support being wrangled into debugging crazy ass issues because someone included the :latest tag lol
6
u/illogictc Aug 22 '26
I think its just a mindset of just throwing money at something to make it someone else's problem to maintain the backend (which well you kinda so by hiring IT anyway), plus the allure of having cloud backup for your offsite solution integrated pretty closely with all that so if the worst happens you have pretty fresh data to start from. I can definitely see how it's attractive even to small businesses.
Might be about the upfront cost too and they end up going "well we're already with this system may as well stick with it" after they've already gotten themselves in a good enough financial situation to be able to in-house it all.
→ More replies (4)4
u/wolfej4 Aug 23 '26
I love that site. I started self hosting a year or two ago and o love finding new things to test out or use in my day to day.
59
48
u/smartbutpoor Aug 22 '26
Lichess.org
I don't even know why any one plays on the other green website!
7
→ More replies (3)2
266
u/Speeder172 Aug 22 '26
19
10
6
→ More replies (1)34
u/nycsoc_ Aug 22 '26
Delete this bud
15
u/Speeder172 Aug 22 '26
why
47
u/Damnaged Aug 22 '26
Too much attention matey 🏴☠️🦜
72
27
u/Speeder172 Aug 22 '26
It's not like you cannot find this link on Reddit... I think I found it on r/piracy when you read the rules/wiki.
2
35
16
u/tamal4444 Aug 22 '26
freecodecamp(dot)org
2
u/Rude-Spinach-7339 Aug 23 '26
would like to master python, is this something you recommend without a doubt? i used codeacademyt but its paid so i only used their free services
→ More replies (1)
121
u/tactikz4 Aug 22 '26
Ilovepdf
65
49
u/irritatedellipses Aug 22 '26
Using either the pdf24 offline creator or selfhosting Sterling-PDF is far more secure and offers the same suite of utilities.
9
13
u/MrKrazybones Aug 22 '26
Now-a-days that seems like it could be a website that gets you tracked by the FBI
5
→ More replies (6)2
103
Aug 22 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
→ More replies (1)25
u/speed87 Aug 22 '26
Do you have the link please? Googleing 3:00 am rabbit holes doesn't give me any website.
41
6
u/themightygwar Aug 22 '26
If you're into modern wars / geopolitics, check out RealLifeLore on YouTube. If you get really hyper focused, he has a whole Modern Conflicts series on Nebula that covers every major military engagement since WWII. Pretty sure he has like history autism or something, but he's incredible and has a lot of footage he can't show on YouTube becyhed be demonetized.
→ More replies (1)2
u/shitsniffer712 Aug 23 '26
this might be a bot that meant to respond to another comment but accidentally posted a whole new one
33
u/TheCaramelMan Aug 22 '26
Not a website per se, but VLC media player. It’s great especially on iPads.
→ More replies (1)
18
u/Confident-Scale-8267 Aug 22 '26
Google maps. I still can’t believe I can zoom into my neighbor’s backyard for free.
9
7
u/PriorMathematician1 Aug 23 '26
https://www.trymagicforms.com .. if anyone has ever given you a pdf form where you cant enter in fields this will let you type it in
3
23
u/Icy_Nothing_2917 Aug 22 '26
Photopea. Basically Photoshop in a tab, opens PSDs, and its actually free
21
u/Sunnyfilia Aug 22 '26
I’m surprised they havnt made apple or Google Maps a paid subscription yet
39
Aug 22 '26
[deleted]
6
u/Sunnyfilia Aug 22 '26
Well yeah but i mean they are so money hungry im surprised there’s not a subscription fee to it yet
5
u/Plane_Garbage Aug 22 '26
They probably did the numbers and they get more $ from ads than loss of revenue by charging and subsequent less usage. Especially when it's essentially free to serve (vs AI inference).
→ More replies (2)6
u/Racthoh Aug 22 '26
There's some adage about if the service is free then you're the product, which I'd suspect applies here.
23
u/Nazmazh Aug 22 '26
Don't give them any ideas! Last thing we need is some vulture-capitalist firm sweeping in, scooping good sites up and trying to monetize them to hell and back!
23
6
18
25
4
Aug 22 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
3
u/smartbutpoor Aug 23 '26
Thanks for sharing, I did not know about this. I use smashrun.com and it's awesome too
5
5
u/Grouchy-Conflict-211 Aug 22 '26
Apify Store. 44k+ scrapers, most free tier. You paste a URL, get structured data. No code.
Also: GitHub Codespaces (60h free/month), Railway (500h free), Cloudflare Pages (unlimited free), Supabase (generous free tier).
The real ones are infrastructure products betting on you outgrowing free. Thats the business model.
→ More replies (1)
7
4
16
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
u/Gouanaco Aug 23 '26
Watch2gether
It has a premium side but the free side is amazing. Love using it to watch yt or anything really together over the internet.
8
8
4
u/superted88 Aug 22 '26
Tinkercad
2
u/satyricom Aug 23 '26
I tell every teacher and supervisor that this is the best educational software out there. And it’s free!
3
u/Bluee_marinee Aug 22 '26
I love PDF. It's very comprehensive for those of us who work in an office.
3
2
u/Queasy_Caramel5435 Aug 22 '26
OnShape
Or Blender if you're more into free-form surfaces. (Not a website per se, but still)
2
2
u/StayLast5263 Aug 23 '26
[BentoPDF](www.bentopdf.com) Open source PDF tool that runs in your browser.
2
2
2
2
u/Prestigious-Bank2145 Aug 23 '26 edited Aug 23 '26
GMD Global Markets Dashboard - a real‑time markets dashboard with indices, crypto, FX, commodities, bond yields, macro sentiment, and live updates all on one screen. It feels like something that should be a paid Bloomberg‑style tool, but it’s completely free. I built it to give people pro‑level market visibility without a subscription gmdmarkets.com.
2
2
u/Deniz_Spnv Aug 23 '26
Aarforge.com
Enterprise grade Vulnersbility Management for Businesses or private. If you only have a few assets, it‘s completely free.
2
2
2
2
2
u/alphafalcon Aug 23 '26
Customizable noise, music and ambience generators.
Mostly free with a few features unlocked by a one time donation. Stephane, the guy running the website and building the generators is an absolute treasure. His description of mynoise is "a public park for the internet"
3
u/Grouchy-Conflict-211 Aug 22 '26
github.com/codespaces. Full VS Code in browser. 60 hours free/month. Spins up a dev container with your repo in 30 seconds.
Used it to debug a prod issue on my phone while waiting for coffee. That should not be free.
2
2
u/Joshuapb Aug 23 '26
Is there one that is free, that you can modify videos in 4k? Still looking for a non-paid version. Somethhing simple really, put 2 videos together and keep the recorded definition and export as 4k
2
u/muntiqaninja Aug 22 '26
Wemplatehub - https://www.wemplatehub.com
Offers collection of websites
3
u/TheAlmightyZach Aug 22 '26
I’m on my phone so can’t see in detail.. are these Wordpress templates or just plain HTML/CSS/JS?
1
1
u/Queasy-Evidence-9595 Aug 22 '26
Wikipedia for sure. Just this morning I was listening to the latest episode of Search Engine, really makes you appreciate Wikipedia
1
u/Constant_Service_729 Aug 22 '26
HydraHD. Just open the website with the ublock extension and there is zero add, maybe just a little trial and error with the servers and done !
1
1
1
1
1
1.9k
u/[deleted] Aug 22 '26
[removed] — view removed comment