# Stacks

> A hand-picked directory of 999 tools for design, code, AI, AI skills, video, music, apps, privacy and productivity, each with a one-line description and a price tag (Free, Freemium or Paid). Kept by Kitefold Labs; nobody pays to be listed.

## Connect an agent (MCP)

The catalogue is an MCP server at https://stacksoftools.com/mcp (Streamable HTTP, read-only, no sign-in) with four tools: search_tools, list_categories, get_category and list_collections. Setup for Claude, Claude Code, Cursor and Codex: https://stacksoftools.com/connect/

## Pages

- [Tool finder](https://stacksoftools.com/finder/): every tool, filtered by category, topic and budget
- [All tools](https://stacksoftools.com/tools/)
- [Collections](https://stacksoftools.com/collections/)
- [Open source alternatives](https://stacksoftools.com/open-source/): free swaps for popular software, with official download links
- [Articles](https://stacksoftools.com/articles/)
- [Glossary](https://stacksoftools.com/glossary/): the words used on Stacks, in plain English
- [Newsletter](https://stacksoftools.com/newsletter/) and [RSS](https://stacksoftools.com/feed.xml)

## Categories

- [Design](https://stacksoftools.com/design/): Fonts, colour, icons, mockups, UI kits and the galleries worth learning from.
- [Code & Build](https://stacksoftools.com/code/): Libraries, editors, site builders, hosting and the references you keep open.
- [AI](https://stacksoftools.com/ai/): AI tools for writing, images, voice and design, and the directories that track them.
- [AI Skills](https://stacksoftools.com/skills/): Skills you drop into Claude, Codex and other AI agents to teach them one job well, from design taste to Word files.
- [Video](https://stacksoftools.com/video/): Free footage, templates, plugins and tools for editing.
- [Music & Audio](https://stacksoftools.com/music/): Royalty-free music, samples, AI stem splitters and production tools.
- [Apps](https://stacksoftools.com/apps/): Good software for Mac, Windows, Linux and Android, plus browsers and extensions.
- [Privacy](https://stacksoftools.com/privacy/): Private browsers, mail, storage, operating systems and the guides behind them.
- [Productivity](https://stacksoftools.com/productivity/): Focus spaces, handy web tools and what a small team needs to launch.

## Articles

- [Leaving Adobe: free apps for every job](https://stacksoftools.com/articles/leave-adobe/): What to check before you cancel Creative Cloud, and the open source apps that take over each job, from the steady old hands to this month’s vibe-coded rewrites.
- [Someone vibe-coded Adobe’s apps, and gave them away](https://stacksoftools.com/trending/artcraft/): ArtCraft rebuilt Photoshop, Premiere Pro, Lightroom and ten more with an AI coding agent and open sourced all of them.
- [Design skills that stop AI pages looking AI-made](https://stacksoftools.com/trending/design-skills/): Impeccable, Taste Skill and Hallmark teach Claude Code, Codex and Cursor to skip the purple gradients and generic cards.
- [Clean up your smart TV with an AI agent](https://stacksoftools.com/trending/clean-your-tv/): People are pointing Claude Code at their TVs to switch off ads, tracking and preinstalled apps. The tools, which TVs they work on, and what to watch for.
- [Small Mac apps that make a big difference](https://stacksoftools.com/articles/small-mac-apps/): A launcher, a window manager, a better screenshot and a quieter menu bar: the little apps you stop noticing because they just work.
- [Free photos, footage and music for client work](https://stacksoftools.com/articles/free-media-for-client-work/): Where to find stock media you can actually use in paid projects, and the one habit that keeps you out of trouble.
- [A week of small privacy upgrades](https://stacksoftools.com/articles/a-week-of-privacy/): One change a day, none of them hard: a browser, a search engine, mail and storage, then a check on what’s already out there.
- [Ship a website this weekend](https://stacksoftools.com/articles/ship-a-website-this-weekend/): Saturday to build it, Sunday to put it online and check it. The tools for each step, whether you write code or not.
- [Find a colour palette that works](https://stacksoftools.com/articles/find-a-colour-palette/): Generators for ideas, real layouts to test them on, and scales that hold up in dark mode and for people with low vision.