30 best free applications you should have on your computer

read

Installing windows is the first step to being able to enjoy the wonderful world of computers, however it is not enough by itself, since beyond the operating system it does not provide us with much flexibility and choice in programs. 

So we are forced to install third-party programs to increase the efficiency of our computer. 

In today's article we have selected 30 of the best free programs that we believe will make your life easier. However, since the list is long, we will be adding more very soon.  

1

Windows Repair Toolbox

Download and run "on-the-fly" the best free portable software for diagnosing and solving various kinds of Windows problems. The tools included in the program are categorized by their function, and the program will automatically download the correct version of the programs you want to run for your version of Windows. 

When you're done, just close the app and all your downloaded apps will be automatically removed. The programs include various security programs as well as programs that allow you to display information about your computer such as the temperature of your processor, the amount of RAM in your system, how much memory you have left, the free space on your hard drives, and finally gives you one-click access to some useful Windows tools.

 

2

FreeAlarmClock

Free, fully featured and user-friendly alarm clock allows you to set as many alarms as you want. You can set one-time alarms or recurring alarms - they only activate from Monday to Friday and give you a chance to sleep in on the weekends. 

You can create different alarms to indicate the activities you need to do with the alarm sound. After setting the time and sound for each alarm, you can use a text field to write a note to yourself as a reminder about the purpose of the alarm. It plays MP3 music files, so you can choose the sound you want to wake up to. 

The app comes with tons of sounds and offers full access to your music library. Finally, it can wake your computer from sleep mode. The computer will ``wake up'' and a wake-up sound will be heard. 

 However, this feature may not work on some computers. It is also necessary to disable the password prompt for logging into the system.

 

3

Lazesoft Recover My Password

Do you want to log in to your computer but you find that you have forgotten your Windows Login password or you can not log in to your Profile either because you forgot your password or because it is corrupted for some reason? 

 The format solution especially in the second case seems ideal but is it? This may be a solution but you should be very desperate or unaware of the existence of this program to choose it. 

There are several ways for someone to bypass the password protection on our computer, but most of the time some techniques are followed that are not so simple especially for a novice user. 

Lazesoft Recover My Password Home Edition is the application that makes the difference and will give us a solution in such a simple way that you cannot imagine.

 

4

Hitomi Downloader

Free program that can download photos and videos. It can download all images from one link, compress and resize them, and save videos from many websites, such as Facebook, Twitch, Flickr, Instagram and others, in the highest possible resolution. 

The program is portable, meaning no installation is required. Simply, after extracting the file to be downloaded, run the executable file and paste the links you want to download from. 

If you are looking for scripts that will enhance its functionality, you can download them from here: github.com/KurtBestor. To add them, select from the application menu Tools> Import Script. In conclusion, be it videos or photos I think the app has you covered to a great extent.

 

5

8GadgetPack

The whole history of Windows Desktop Gadgets takes us back a bit in time. Windows Graphics Tools (Windows Sidebar in Windows Vista) is a discontinued widget engine for Microsoft Gadgets. It was first introduced with Windows Vista, in which it has a sidebar on the right side of the desktop. 

The widgets that make it up can perform various tasks, such as displaying the time and date and displaying CPU usage. In Windows 7, the Windows sidebar was renamed to Windows Desktop Gadgets, and the sidebar itself is not included in Windows 7. 

Windows Desktop Gadgets were included in all beta versions of Windows 8 but ultimately Microsoft did not include it in the final version. Instead, on July 10, 2012 (which is in the past between the last version of Windows 8 and its final release), Microsoft issued a security advisory to disable Sidebar and Desktop Gadgets in Windows Vista and 7, due to the security vulnerability run code. 

Windows Desktop Gadgets were finally abandoned in Windows 8. beta versions of Windows 8 but finally microsoft did not in the final version. The included gadgets are really useful when working with the computer. Unlike Metro-Apps gadgets can access useful system information. 

The built-in Clipboard-Manager gadget for example will greatly improve your productivity. With the Sidebar gadget, you can make gadgets visible while working with maximized windows, monitor network traffic, adjust volume with one click, and many more conveniences. Fully compatible with Windows 10 and 11.

 

6

f.lux

We know that night exposure to blue light affects the circadian rhythm. The science that explains this has made tremendous progress in the last 20 years, with the discovery of a new photo-pigment substance in the eye, called Melanopsin. A wide range of colors seems to be able to stimulate the circadian rhythm in humans, and so, while referring to "blue light" to distinguish it from the light seen by our visual system, it also includes lights that appear as green, blue, cyan , even orange.

Computer screens, tablets and mobile phones emit full-spectrum light around the clock, just like the sun. Exposure to blue light at the wrong time of day can keep you awake and affect your sleep quality. f.lux tries to help you by removing blue and green light and help you relax at night. 

It may take a few days to get used to the new colors at night, so we recommend that you adjust the night colors in the app to what suits your eyes best. After a few days of use with f.lux, and after experimenting a bit with the settings, find which color suits you best. The default setting of 3400K in Windows removes about 3/4 of the blue and about half of the green light. 

You can remove even more notification light by selecting Color Range Expansion to unlock other colors as well. Also, set your location. f.lux works much better if it knows when the sun rises and sets in your area, so setting it up is very important for understanding the circadian rhythm. 

So adjust the color settings by moving the large adjustment knob. Of course you can adjust the lighting of your computer screen at any time of the day, especially if you sit for long hours in front of your computer screen.

 

7

My PC patch

Patch My PC is a free, easy-to-use program that keeps over 300 applications on your PC up to date. It's an easy way to update or install a large list of programs on your computer.

A key to staying safe online is to always keep your computer up to date. Outdated software often contains security vulnerabilities, bugs, and other issues that are often fixed in the latest version.

8

Winstep Nexus

Add appearance and functionality to your computer by bringing your Desktop to life. Free your desktop from the many icons and make your own taskbar. 

This is probably the best free tool for this task. Choose from dozens of free display templates and see your bar in real time. The menu of the program is completely customizable, which means that there are too many settings for the aesthetic effect and the functionality of your bar, however, the configuration of the menu is structured in such a way that it is impossible to get lost, even a beginner to be. To have a better view and not to hesitate to install it.

9

quick cpu

In the past, most computers were desktops and there was no real need for technologies such as SpeedStep, Turbo Boost, etc. Nowadays, however, energy consumption sometimes takes precedence over efficiency. Taking into account the significant changes in new technology and hardware expectations, CPUs have acquired many new features, such as TurboBoost, SpeedStep, Hyper-Threading and single core modes that help reduce energy and heat consumption.

While these are all positive changes, sometimes a situation arises where the user does not get top performance when required (delayed performance boost). This can be caused by many unforeseen factors such as system status, availability, CPU status, heat and more.

This application was created to help control such factors and to reduce the effect of performance degradation whenever possible. Quick CPU is a program designed to customize and monitor important CPU and system parameters such as CPU temperature, CPU performance, power, voltage, current, kernel parking, frequency scaling, system memory, Turbo boost and other settings.

The functionality of the application allows you to control the number of CPU cores (CPU Core parking) to be enabled or disabled (you can enable all cores at any time, based on your personal requirements, ) and by looking at the graph of CPU to see if specific cores are enabled or disabled.

This information is also available on the CPU Performance tab in the "Enabled Cores" and "Parked Cores" section. All information is real-time, so you do not need to click the "Refresh" button to find out the current status.

CPU frequency scaling is a feature that allows the operating system to scale the CPU frequency up or down to try to match the supply of energy according to demand, providing CPU performance when needed or saving energy when possible.

Using a technique similar to that of Core Parking, it tries to scale the CPU frequency dynamically based on the system load. The performance index. is an operating system feature that allows the end user to determine how much the processor should favor in terms of energy savings over maximum performance. This feature has been introduced in Windows 10 and will not be available in previous versions.

Therefore, by accessing all these settings, you have the ability to fully configure the power management of your computer, so that you have the best performance when you need it and the lowest power consumption on your computer when it is not needed.

All in all, it is by far the best freeware available for this purpose to date (at least as far as I know) and should not be missing from any computer.

10

WinfrGUI

When you empty the recycle bin that contains deleted files or when you use the shortcut Shift + Delete to delete files, windows marks the files as deleted and deletes all the markers on them, so these files are invisible to the user. Also, the space used by the deleted files will be highlighted as free space. 

So, technically, the deleted files will still be on your computer until windows replaces them with new data. WinfrGUI is a free Windows data recovery software supported and approved by Microsoft. 

Fully integrates with Windows File Recovery (Microsoft Command Prompt) functionality and finally provides a graphical user interface that allows all for all user skill levels to recover deleted files from their computer in the easiest way.

This way you can recover your lost files including JPEG / PDF / DOCX / MP3 / EXCEL / ZIP etc. from storage, SSD / HDD / USB / memory card in Windows 11/10, with NTFS / FAT / exFAT / ReFS partition configuration.

The whole process is completed in just three steps, after choosing a partition to scan and a location to save, then choose the scanning method (quick or deep) and finally click the start recovery button. You will be surprised by the results.

11

OnionShare

Unique application that allows you to anonymously and securely share files of any size and communicate with each other by exchanging messages. It works by starting a web server, through Tor, and creating a unique URL to access and download the files.

It doesn't require you to create a server on the internet and it doesn't use any third-party file-sharing service. You can host the file on your computer and use a Tor service to make it temporarily accessible over the internet. Now, just add your files or folders and click the "Start Sharing" button.

However, (and this is OnionShare's strong point), it provides a URL that you'll need to give the person you want to download your file to download the file directly to your computer. By default, the program disables the service once the files have been downloaded once.

So even if someone else intercepts the URL later, it simply means that it will no longer be available, so no one can intercept the files you have made available for download.

Run OnionShare and drag the file you want to share into the application box and press the Start Sharing button. As you can see, a URL is automatically created. Now copy the URL and give it to whoever you want to receive the file. From there, he just needs to paste the URL into the Tor Browser. (You must have Tor Browser installed to download the file. Anyone else after the first download cannot access it even if they have the URL unless you choose not to.

12

windy

Free program created to create a bootable USB for ISO files. With ventoy, you don't need to format the disc again and again, you just need to copy the ISO file to the USB drive. You can copy multiple ISO files at once and ventoy will give you a boot menu to select them. Both legacy BIOS and UEFI are supported in the same way. It has been tested and works with over 200 ISO files. Simple to use, fast (limited only by iso copying speed) and with support for files larger than 4GB with Legacy and UEFI boot menu styles

13

Simple IPTV Player

Free IPTV client for computers running windows 10 and 11 through which you can watch TV channels from Greece and all over the world on your computer. It is very simple to use and one of its best features is that it does not consume a lot of resources, which results in seamless channel watching even if you are doing other tasks on your computer at the same time. Its operation mode is very simple, load m3u, m3u8 playlists and watch the channels you want. To watch TV channels from Greece and Cyprus, use the free M3U lists we found on free-greek-iptv. For channels from around the world use the free M3U lists we found at https://github.com/iptv-org/iptv.

14

CustomFolder

Sorting folders on your computer is a difficult task especially if you have many folders with different contents. However if there was a way to change that, things would be much simpler.

CustomFolder is the software that will help us with this. This is a really simple, amazing, free application that will allow us to customize folders on the computer. It includes 4 preset icons for coloring, of which 3 of them can be rotated, however you can also create your own personal icons.

Also, you can download more than 60 ready-made icons, and add unlimited icons from your own collection, choose the background color of the icon preview and the color of the window.

For your convenience you can find some ready-made icons and add them to your application from here and here. (If you face any problem adding icons from the app gallery just convert them from .ico format to png with any graphics editor). For best results prefer the installer

15

FXSound

If you want a volume booster, bass booster, better sound quality or a handy Windows EQ, you're covered. Especially if you are using laptop speakers or other low sound quality hardware, FxSound is the best software to boost volume, bass and sound quality. No free EQ for Windows is easier to use than this one.

Simple stereo systems and computers are built with a compromise, affordable hardware in terms of sound quality. However, this application compensates for low-quality material by targeting and processing the timbre, loudness, balance and dynamics of the sound.

This means for the user, clearer, stronger, deeper and more balanced sound that corrects the limitations of relatively low quality performance, especially in laptops. In conclusion, this is a valuable software that is even available, absolutely free.

16

Redo Rescue

Redo Rescue Backup and Recovery is a completely free software that can backup and restore an entire computer system within minutes, from a very simple menu. It supports saving and restoring from local drives or shared network drives. Selectively restore partitions and map them to different locations on the destination drive. Additional tools for partition editing, web browsing, and more are included. Runs from live CD/USB and requires no installation.

17

Ashampoo Music Studio 2022

Ashampoo Music Studio is a music software that edits, compresses, organizes and records music and sounds. You can even design covers, create playlists compatible with your device, or turn your songs into mixtapes.

Create mixtapes with just a few clicks. Set the mood with custom transitions and fades, choose a file format and audio quality, and you're good to go. Ashampoo Music Studio 2022 also comes with a versatile cover designer. Choose from multiple templates, use smart automatic features like the mosaic effect to create the right cover for any project in no time.

Playlists allow you to play your songs in any order on almost any device. With support for multiple audio formats (M3U, PLS, WPL, XSPF, etc.), the generated playlists are compatible with almost any device.

Converting music and audiobooks to a space-saving format is a quick process with this program. Thanks to the giant database, your tracks will be automatically named and given the correct cover before being saved in a format of your choice.

Incomplete or inconsistent file names can destroy your song collection. It also includes intelligent auto-naming based on customizable file names. Sort individual tracks or entire folders at the touch of a button and save time and effort with this cool feature!

It also quickly extracts audio tracks from videos so you can listen to soundtracks from your favorite movie or convert sounds into ringtones. It comes with many useful tools, such as editing metadata, normalizing songs or analyzing audio files your. It really has everything you need from an easy-to-use music program.

The built-in editor not only trims or cuts files into individual segments, but also supports volume adjustments, including muting entire segments. Edit your tracks and create the songs you've always wanted!Finally, it also supports recording your own audio files to your computer. Just select the sound and click the "Record" button. Then use the built-in tools to edit your audio.

To activate its free version you need to create a new user account on the manufacturer's website (or log into an existing account) - in order to get a free license key.

18

MyPublicWiF

Absolutely free easy-to-use software that turns your computer into a wireless Wi-Fi access point or multi-functional Hotspot. Anyone nearby can surf the web through your sharing. This is also an ideal solution for creating a temporary access point in a hotel room, meeting room, home or similar.

By enabling user authentication, customers will be redirected to your login page to authenticate with a password or accept the Terms of Use before accessing the web.

It can be used to restrict user access to specific servers. You can also prevent the use of certain online services (eg file sharing programs) or block the use of social media networks (eg Facebook). MyPublicWiFi turns your PC into an Adblock router.

Ad blocker is an effective way to save your internet bandwidth and protect your user privacy. Bandwidth management helps you control the download and upload rate for your hotspot clients. and allows you to record and track all the url pages you have visited on the virtual WiFi-Hotspot.

Finally, it allows you to set up port forwarding, is available in 12 languages ​​and can also be used with an offline option, supports "Hosted Network" and "WiFi Direct for Windows 10".

19

Lossless Cut

LosslessCut is a completely free, excellent solution for trimming video segments. It is a very easy-to-use application that will not trouble you, given its simplicity and ease of use. And its mode of operation is simple. First of all, we should point out that the application is portable, this means that we will not install anything on our computer.

After running the application, select the desired video, drag the file you want to trim to the application menu, or alternatively select File-Open and find the path of the file you wish to edit.

Now, drag the white vertical line on the left with your mouse to the point where you want the video to start, (alternatively, of course, you can specify it in time if you know exactly at what point in time you want the cut to start) and double-click the icon with the little hand.

Do the same on the other side and finally press the scissor icon to save the video. Your video is now ready and you will find it in the corresponding folder where your main video is saved.

So in conclusion, this is perhaps one of the best programs of its kind, which will delight you not only for its simplicity, but also for the speed of cutting your video.

20

Icecream Video Converter

Meet Icecream Video Converter, a brand new 100% free video converter for Windows that will help you convert your videos. You can add multiple files to the conversion queue, change the format of your videos in bulk with just one click, and apply output settings to all files if required.

Of course one-to-one video conversion is still available. The application supports all the most popular video formats such as: MP4, AVI, MKV, 3GP, WMV, MOV, M4V, MPG, M2TS, MTS and more.

Also, if you need to trim any point in your video and save it as a new video, you don't need to install any additional video editing software as you can do it directly from the app's menu by pressing the button to select which part of the video you want to convert.

It also lets you convert video to audio by extracting a soundtrack or audio from your video as an MP3 audio file. Finally, you can easily add a custom watermark to your output videos, using an image or text as a watermark, set the size, transparency, angle and more.

21

MyPhoneExplorer

Connect your phone via cable, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or infrared and you will be surprised how easily and efficiently you can manage your phone. MyPhoneExplorer has evolved and is now considered as one of the most popular mobile phone freeware tool that is constantly expanding with new features.

To connect your mobile phone to the computer via wi-fi, download the MyPhoneExplorer Client application from the Google Play Store, run it on your mobile phone, then run the application from windows, select file settings and connect to wi-fi, close it window and press connect.

On the screen of the application, among other things, you can get information about your mobile phone and see the current status of your battery, memory and notifications from your mobile phone.

22

Voicemeter Banana

Advanced free Audio Mixer application with a built-in virtual audio device to mix and manage any audio sources from or to any audio devices or applications and redefines the way we can manage audio in Windows.

It is now possible to connect and mix any audio source with any audio application in an easy way with unparalleled control over the sound quality. Players like DVD, USB Mic, ASIO board, Video Game, iTunes and Audio Pro Daw can connect to Voicemeeter and provide incredible audio experiences!

With 8 channels, full parametric EQ and built-in application that can record or play any audio sources or audio files with a single mouse click (WAV, AIFF, BWF, MP3 + MP4, M4A, MOV, AVI, WMA, WMV. ), I think it is an application that is definitely worth trying.

23

Snapdrop for Android

Absolutely free application for Android devices to transfer files between mobile phones and between PC and mobile. Thanks to its perfect Android integration, files are sent even faster, directly from other applications.

To send files between two mobiles install the app on both, click on the device you want to send the files to and select the file from your device which can be anything, videos photos, music etc.

Your file has been sent to its destination. Now to send files from your computer or send files from your mobile to computer click on snapdrop.net.

If you have the application open on your mobile you will see the devices appear. From there, transfer the files you want in the same way. The web application will work just as well for windows, mac, linux

24

Kodi

Kodi is a free, open source media player developed by the Kodi Foundation, a non-profit technology consortium. It is available for multiple operating systems and hardware platforms, for use with TVs and remote controls.

It allows users to play and view videos, music, podcasts, and other digital media files from local storage, storage on your network, and the Internet.

It plays almost any type of media and you might find it ideal for watching TV, movies and your favorite shows, It's the best way to share your photos on the biggest screen in the house with a personal slideshow.

It works with a number of popular backends including MediaPortal, MythTV, NextPVR, Tvheadend and more. However, you can also play games too, just choose from a large number of emulators the one you want, or even play a standalone game.

25

Hiren's BootCD PE

This is the best Boot CD that contains a multitude of tools (freeware) with the help of which we can do diagnostic tests and checks that will help us restore our PC in case of failure. Hiren's BootCD PE (Preinstallation Environment) is a revamped version of Hiren's BootCD based on Windows 10 PE x64. It includes the best and updated free tools used in Hiren's BootCD.

It supports booting from UEFI and requires a minimum of 2GB of RAM. With the useful tools inside the ISO, you can solve many problems related to your computer and it includes only free, legal software. After boot it will try to install drivers such as graphics, sound, wireless card and Ethernet card for your hardware. After downloading the program burn it to a CD-DVD and Boot from it, now depending on what you want to do select the corresponding task as well.

To format and install the application on a USB stick you can use the portable BootCD PE-ISO2USB tool, download it from here. It will work on all Windows from Windows 7 and up. Alternatively download the iso and boot the CD via Ventoy

26

Red Button

Red Button is a powerful tool for optimizing and cleaning your Windows PC. It will remove junk files and unnecessary Windows components, free up hard drive space, erase internet activity tracks and your digital fingerprints, protect privacy, clean and optimize registry, enable hundreds of hidden settings of Windows, increasing the overall performance of your computer.

It includes a huge number, (hundreds) of functions, with an incredibly small size. Before pressing the button, click on the Features option and activate the functions you want. In conclusion, this is a very useful application with performance inversely proportional to its size

26

FSL Launcher

Tired of searching every time to find the program you want to run among dozens of icons on your desktop? Solve the problem with FSL Launcher. It is a simple, very useful program, which runs at computer startup and will help you to organize your shortcuts. You can create app titles by category and drop the icons on your computer desktop into the corresponding category. This way you will be able to find the program you want to run very quickly.

27

SSuite Envelope Printer

If you belong to the category of those who usually prepare and like to send greeting cards to your friends or family, then you probably need the right tool to help you manage contacts and print the envelopes or cards.

As the name suggests, SSuite Envelope Printer is a utility that allows you to print letters and cards. When the printer dialog box appears, select the printer properties button on the right side, and set its paper type in the folder.

The friendly interface allows you to select the folder size, set the input power type and write or copy recipient information from the clipboard. You should know that the application allows you to preview to see the label or envelope before printing.

It even includes a handy address book. Since the program's role is to make things easier, it integrates an address book where you can add all the details about friends, colleagues and other useful contacts.

You can simply add the information once so that it is available for printing at a special event or other important dates. The app allows you to include a picture and write notes about your contact, an option that may come in handy in the long run. You can also save your entire address book in XLM or CSV format.

28

Lunacy

Amazing next generation vector graphics software for graphic web design and beyond. It has everything you're used to in other similar apps and goes above and beyond. It was created by designers so that designers can focus on the workflow and minimize distractions.

No more wasting time surfing the web for graphics or switching apps to remove backgrounds or think placeholder texts. Lunacy is an advanced design app for creating menus.

It has everything you're used to using similar apps and more. You no longer have to spend time searching the internet for graphics and switching applications just to remove a background or think about what text to put as a placeholder! Lunacy has it all. Faster than Figma and smarter than Sketch!

29

Bolide Slideshow Creator

Bolide Slideshow Creator is a Slideshows production application and is one of the best free Slideshows solutions for storing a presentation as AVI, MKV FLV, MP4 or WMV. If you want to share your Slideshows with others, you can upload your file to Youtube or Facebook.

The simplicity of the application as you will see for yourself is evident from the first steps. So you don't have to waste your time looking for difficult to understand manuals to find the steps you should follow.

It supports almost every image format, such as MP3, AAC, WMA, M4A, MP4, OGG audio files support for background music, allows you to add dozens of transition effects and save your videos in MKV, WMV, MP4 format video files , FLV.

Depending on the quality of the photos you add and the quality of the video you choose, the output video file can be from 128x160 to 1920x1080 pixels (FullHD). It will run on all windows.

30

VeraCrypt

This is the best free disk creation and encryption software from IDRIX based on TrueCrypt 7.1a. It adds enhanced security to the algorithms used to encrypt systems and partitions, which makes it immune to new attack developments. It also fixes many vulnerability and security issues found in TrueCrypt. This enhanced security adds some delay ONLY to the opening of encrypted partitions with no further impact on application performance in the use phase.

Are there any other apps you want to recommend to us? ;

Follow us on Google News