Five Free Apps Alternative to Paid Apps
Five Free Apps Alternative to Paid Apps
Are you paying for an ad blocker, folder automation, notes & PKM and image editing ? You don't have to.
- wBlock - a next-generation ad/content blocker for Safari: 750,000 rule capacity across 5 Safari content-blocking extensions (150k each), ~40MB idle RAM by running Safari's native content-blocking API out-of-process, Protocol Buffers + LZ4 filter storage, HTTP conditional-request updates, and iCloud sync of filter selections/custom lists/userscripts/whitelist. It bundles an Element Zapper, "Tube Cleaner & Player Cleaner" userscripts that restore native Picture-in-Picture/background playback on media sites, a full Greasemonkey-API userscript engine, UserCSS support, custom AdGuard-syntax filter-list import, per-site controls, a blocked-request logger, and regional filters. Open source on GitHub
- Wick - Wick brings timers, stopwatches, and alarms to the Mac with menu bar and Lock Screen access, a fully custom Liquid Glass material on macOS 26+, and -- its standout claim -- the first app to integrate with Alcove. Positioned as the polished Clock app Apple never finished
- Forel - An open-source (GPLv3) folder-automation app for macOS, pitched explicitly as a free Hazel alternative: watch folders, match files by name, extension, kind, size, date, tags, or Finder color label, then move, rename, tag, or run a script automatically.
- Nodes - A local-first markdown note-taking and PKM (personal knowledge management) app: plain markdown files kept directly on-device (open the folder in Finder, nothing is locked in), double-bracket links with rename-safe link following, tag-based organization instead of folders, semantic + keyword search, a force-directed graph view, a growth timeline, and PDFs/images embedded as notes alongside writing. Its most distinctive claim is "the quiet part": tag/description/reminder suggestions from a local LLM that runs entirely on-device -- the developer states it works with Wi-Fi off.
- ImageFuel is a lightweight Mac app for browsing images and videos without importing them into a library -- point it at any folder and get an instant scrollable grid, with filename/path search (Cmd+F), image/video/all filtering, sort by date or name, a fullscreen lightbox, in-app crop, metadata stripping, and move-to-trash from the grid.
Previous Collections
- A Curated Collection of Free Apps
- Another Curated Collection of Free Software
- AppAddict Free App List Number 3
- Free App List Number 4 | AppAddict