Eighth Survey · Twenty-Fifth of October, 2026

The Free Tools Atlas

A complete cartography of 14 zero-rupee web territories — AI image suites, a browser music studio, AI companions with memory, an autonomous app-builder, link-in-bio ports and a fortress for your 2FA codes. Every territory walked, every road surveyed, every toll marked before this map was inked.

14 TERRITORIES7 REGIONS90+ FREE TOOLSTOTAL TOLL: ₹0
Vintage world map illustration with compass rose — the cover plate of the Free Tools Atlas 2026
Fig. 1 — The surveyed world, plate I. All territories lie in the Free Tier Ocean.
14Tools charted
0Installs required
100%Browser-first
1Cartographer: Naman Soni
§ 1

The Cartographer’s Briefing

This atlas is a survey of fourteen free web tools, all built by one indie developer — Naman Soni — and all reachable from a browser tab. It exists because “free” is a word the software map has abused for years: free trials that expire, free plans that watermark your work, free tools that quietly ship your photos to a server farm. The territories charted here take a different route, and this document records what was actually found at each one — features counted, pages walked, tolls read off the signpost.

The survey method is deliberately old-fashioned. On 25 October 2026 every territory listed in the Master Map was visited directly: home pages were read, sitemap.xml files were unrolled to count real routes (LND AI’s sitemap alone lists 89 URLs; Onyx lists 43), machine-readable llms.txt manifestos were parsed for pricing and feature claims, and GitHub repositories were checked for signs of maintenance. Nothing on this map was inked from hearsay. Where a territory could not be entered, the map says so plainly — the Khata ledger app has been offline for six consecutive survey days and is charted as a closed border, not painted over.

Readers should treat the atlas the way a traveller treats any honest map: as a snapshot of terrain at a date, not a promise of eternal geography. Free tools evolve; credits get metered; ports close. Each territory entry therefore carries a field hazards note — the honest small print most directories bury. The eighth line of the survey series continues below with the Master Map; earlier expeditions (a cookbook, a review journal, a starter pack and more) are catalogued in Past Surveys.

§ 2

The Master Map — Fourteen Territories

The whole chart at a glance: fourteen territories in seven regions. Each row links straight to the territory itself; the plates that follow describe the terrain in detail. Not one territory charges a subscription. Two run small optional paid extras (₹28-level, not ₹2,800-level), one meter-free zone refreshes its own credits nightly, and one is currently closed for repairs.

Table 1 — Index of charted territories, 8th survey, 25 October 2026
#TerritoryRegionWhat you’ll mine hereToll
ILND AIImage Archipelago30+ AI tools & 20+ utilities — image gen, TTS, translation, OCR, upscaler, background removerCREDITS
IIOnyx Image EditorImage ArchipelagoFull photo editor — crop, mask, filters, text, convert; 43-page sitemap₹0
III3DfyImage ArchipelagoInfinite AI 3D worlds, a 3D studio and a name-physics playground₹0
IVMonyx StudioSound CoastAI vocal remover, karaoke, multitrack DAW, instruments, video maker₹0
VGaana BananaSound CoastPersonalised AI songs with vocals — ₹28 per full song credit
VIDance Cat 3DSound CoastAudio-reactive dancing 3D cat — FFT, BPM detect, beat-synced₹0
VIITalk AI CompanionCompanion Meridian11 AI companions with 4-tier memory, voice calls, 5 interactive storiesCREDITS
VIIINewEra AI AgentBuilder RangeAutonomous agent: writes, builds on GitHub Actions, deploys real apps₹0
IXPi Browser AgentBuilder RangeThe Pi coding agent fully in your browser via WebAssembly₹0*
XLinksGated HarbourLink-in-bio pages + embeddable SVG widgets, no ads, no trackers₹0
XI2FA AuthenticatorGated HarbourTOTP/HOTP code generator — codes stay on your device₹0
XIIChess — Human vs BotOld CountryClassic chess against a bot, straight in the browser₹0
XIIIKhataOld CountryHinglish digital khata ledger (offline at survey time)CLOSED
XIVGitHub ArchiveThe Archive14 public repos — source code for the whole map₹0

* Pi Browser Agent costs no money, but you spend your own Pollen on the Pollinations models it drives — the toll is usage-based on your account, not on Naman’s servers. Tolls re-checked 25 Oct 2026; verify at each territory before setting out.

Brass compass resting on an old nautical chart — how to steer through the Free Tools Atlas
Fig. 2 — Steering by brass and paper: pick a territory in the Master Map, follow one of the three expedition routes, and read the hazards before you land.
R·I

Region I · Plates 01–03The Image Archipelago

Creative Waters

Three islands where pictures are born. LND AI is the capital island — a whole toolkit of image-generation and editing bays; Onyx is the artisan’s island, a complete photo editor that never uploads a pixel; 3Dfy is the volcanic outer isle where entire three-dimensional worlds condense out of a text prompt. Sail between them without spending a rupee.

I

LND AI — the 89-URL capital island

Chart ref A-1 · namansoni.in · surveyed 25 Oct 2026

The largest single territory on the map. LND AI bundles an AI image suite and thirty-plus browser utilities into one web app: text-to-image generation with twelve art styles and batch support, an image upscaler, a pixel-precise background remover, background replacement with automatic relighting, image uncropping, image analysis, OCR, a web scraper, text-to-speech across 22 Indian languages, speech-to-text, and translation at up to 10,000 characters a request. Its sitemap lists 89 URLs — 43 of them written guides.

  • Access model: free to start with daily credits that refresh automatically at midnight IST; a free account enlarges the refresh; the 20+ utilities in More Tools are always free and never touch the meter.
  • Privacy stance: tools run in the browser where possible; uploads are processed for the requested operation and not shared with third parties.
  • Every tool is mobile-responsive — the whole island works from a phone.
Best route inLand on the homepage, pick a tool from the grid, and work immediately — no install, no watermark on output. Heavy users: claim the free account for the larger nightly refresh.
Field hazardsCredits are a meter, not a moat — generation-heavy days can hit the ceiling; the always-free utilities drawer is the workaround. Optional packs live at /pricing but nothing in the core loop demands them.
II

Onyx Image Editor

Chart ref A-2 · onyx.namansoni.in

A privacy-first photo editor that runs entirely in the browser — images never leave your device. The tool list reads like a desktop app: crop, resize, filters, blur, grayscale, flip, rotate, freehand draw, shapes, masking with circles and stars, and text overlays with 40+ Google Fonts. The sitemap’s 43 pages include ten one-click resize presets — Instagram story and post, YouTube thumbnail, Twitter header, Facebook cover, LinkedIn banner, passport photo — and eight format converters from PNG→JPG to HEIC.

Best route inOpen the editor, drop a photo, work. No signup, no watermark, no upload — the island is the device.
Field hazardsLocal processing means big files take RAM, not bandwidth; on very old phones, heavy layers can stutter. The trade is deliberate: privacy over cloud horsepower.
III

3Dfy — worlds from words

Chart ref A-3 · 3dfy.namansoni.in
Abstract 3D geometric render — standing in for 3Dfy's AI-generated 3D worlds

The outer volcanic isle. 3Dfy explores infinite AI-generated 3D worlds and renders them into film; the /3dfy route is the world-explorer, /make3d is the full 3D studio where you build anything and import AI shapes, and the name playground turns your own name into living 3D physics — all in the browser, all free at the core.

Best route inStart at the name playground for the five-minute wow, then graduate to /make3d when you want authorship.
Field hazardsGPU-less phones render worlds at walking pace; the infinite explorer is a rabbit hole with no floor. Pack a lunch.
R·II

Region II · Plates 04–06The Sound Coast

Music Waters

A shoreline where audio becomes product. Monyx Studio strips, remixes and records without ever shipping your audio off-device; Gaana Banana mints full personalised songs with AI vocals for the price of a samosa; Dance Cat 3D turns whatever you play into a beat-synced spectacle. The only paid toll on this coast is the song credit — everything else is open beach.

IV

Monyx Studio

Chart ref B-1 · monyx.namansoni.in
Music studio mixing console in warm light — Monyx Studio's browser DAW in spirit

A browser music workstation with a privacy doctrine: audio is processed on-device and never leaves your machine. The headline bay is the AI vocal remover built on MDX-Net — upload any track and receive separated vocals and instrumental stems. Next door: real-time karaoke with acoustic echo cancellation so your mic stays clean over the backing track, a multitrack DAW, playable piano, guitar and drums, and a video bay for making music videos.

  • Vocal/isolation separation: MDX-Net models running locally, with additional instrument isolation options.
  • Zero-send privacy: nothing is uploaded; the coastline stays inside your browser sandbox.
  • Free end to end — no account wall, no watermark, no export cap.
Best route inDrop an MP3 into the vocal remover and watch the stems appear in seconds — that is the whole onboarding.
Field hazardsOn-device separation is GPU-hungry on older machines; expect queue-free but not instant results on low-end hardware.
V

Gaana Banana

Chart ref B-2 · gaana.namansoni.in

India’s own personalised AI-song forge. Write a name, pick a theme, and Google’s Lyria music model generates a full song with vocals in one to two minutes — romantic, birthday, yaari, wedding, bhakti, funny, motivation, festival themes and more, in Hindi, Hinglish or English. Finished songs download as MP3 and share straight to WhatsApp. The territory’s one honest toll: ₹28 buys one song credit (₹45 for two, ₹175 for ten), paid by UPI and held on a transferable 12-digit key — no account required.

  • Your own lyrics allowed — up to 800 characters, plus an LLM prompt-writer to help you draft them.
  • Refund discipline: a generation that fails is refunded, per the published FAQ.
  • Hinglish-first UX — the whole territory speaks the user’s language.
Best route inRead the gaana-kaise-banaye guide (Hinglish), draft your prompt with the built-in writer, then mint your first ₹28 song.
Field hazardsThis is the only paid-for-output territory on the map — credit prices verified 25 Oct 2026 at /pricing. AI lyrics are best treated as a first draft for your own.
VI

Dance Cat 3D

Chart ref B-3 · dance.namansoni.in

The coast’s lighthouse, and the purest territory on the map: drop any MP3 and a fully procedural 3D cat dances in perfect beat sync. Real-time Web Audio FFT, offline BPM detection and spectral-flux kick analysis run 100% in the browser — the site’s own description is blunt and beautiful: no AI, no uploads, no server. Your music never leaves the tab, and the cat asks nothing in return.

Best route inOpen the page, drop an MP3, full-screen it. That’s the entire manual.
Field hazardsNone commercial; the only real hazard is losing an evening watching a procedural cat vibe to your playlist.
R·III

Region III · Plate 07The Companion Meridian

Night Waters

One long meridian running through the night half of the map. Talk AI Companion is a territory of eleven characters who remember you — a 2 a.m. bestie, a flirting chaos-gremlin, a mentor, a hype man, and interactive story-worlds where you are the protagonist. It is the most inhabited territory on the atlas, and the most honest about its own boundaries.

VII

Talk AI Companion — the territory that remembers

Chart ref C-1 · talkaicompanion.com · 21+ learn guides · 5 story-worlds

The deepest single territory on the map. Eleven AI companions — from Aanya and the 2 a.m.-bestie Noor to the chaos-flirt Gojo Satoru, mentor Kabir and hype-man Rohan — each with a full personality card. What separates this meridian from every chatbot port on the internet is the four-tier memory system: conversation summaries, hard facts about you, an event log, and semantic recall, so a companion you talked to last Tuesday still knows what you said. Voice calls run on Sarvam AI speech with mid-call barge-in, chat works in Hinglish by default with an English mode, and the whole thing runs as a PWA — no OTP, no email, guest-first.

  • Access model: free account gets daily credits (roughly fifty messages); packs from ₹29 and unlimited plans exist for heavy sailors.
  • Five playable story-worlds at /stories — the anime rom-com Kokuhaku Club, the badminton romance Love All, The Anniversary Heist, Last Show, First Row and My First Day in College.
  • Spicy Mode exists and is gated: an 18+ one-time ₹9 unlock, off by default, consent-first — charted plainly because honest maps mark adult districts.
  • Gojo Satoru and anime characters are fan-made and unofficial — the territory says so itself.
Field hazardsAn AI companion is a mirror with excellent recall, not a licensed therapist — the territory’s own learn hub repeats this. The 18+ district is clearly signposted and locked by default. Heavy use beyond the free daily credits wants ₹29-level packs.
Starry night sky over dark hills — the Companion Meridian runs through night waters
Fig. 3 — The night waters of the Companion Meridian, where the 2 a.m. conversations happen.
Best route inStart as a guest, pick a companion whose vibe matches yours, let the memory build for a few days. The learn hub (21 guides) answers everything else.
R·IV

Region IV · Plates 08–09The Builder Range

Expedition Country

The high country, where apps come into existence. NewEra is the mountain proper — describe an app in plain English and an autonomous agent plans it, writes the code, builds it on GitHub Actions and deploys it to a live URL. Pi Browser Agent is the base camp — the same class of coding agent, collapsed to run entirely inside your browser tab.

VIII

NewEra — the agent that ships

Chart ref D-1 · newera.namansoni.in

A free online AI agent by Naman Soni. “Build me a quiz app about space” is a complete brief: the agent plans, codes, runs CI on GitHub Actions (4 vCPU / 16 GB runners), and deploys to Cloudflare Pages with an EdgeOne fallback — no login, no credit card, no local setup. Up to four parallel sub-agents can work one project, with up to twelve hours of VM build time for serious jobs. The browser workspace itself runs Python (Pyodide), SQLite (WASM), FFmpeg (WASM) and Git, and every project exports as a single portable .newera file.

  • Consent-first repos: GitHub repositories are created only with your explicit permission, and self-clean repos auto-delete.
  • Research tools on board: web search and library documentation lookup during builds.
Best route inOpen the site, click New project, describe the app in one sentence, watch it get built. Start at the landing + FAQ.
Field hazardsThe agent deploys real software — expect build time, and expect to review code you plan to keep. Twelve-hour builds are the ceiling, not the norm.
IX

Pi Browser Agent

Chart ref D-2 · pi-browser-agent.namansoni.in

The base camp of the range: the real Pi coding agent, running entirely client-side in a WebAssembly sandbox, spending your own Pollen on Pollinations models. You bring the account, pick the model, and let Pi build — your API usage stays yours, the agent’s runtime stays on your machine, and the whole expedition fits in one browser tab.

Best route inBring a Pollinations account, choose a model, hand Pi a task. Read the territory’s own description — it is refreshingly literal about what runs where.
Field hazardsThe toll is your own Pollen spend — zero-rupee entry, usage-based fuel. Bring a task you actually care about; the sandbox makes it easy to forget the meter is yours.
R·V

Region V · Plates 10–11The Gated Harbour

Port & Fortress

Where the fleet docks. Links is the port — one clean page for your entire internet, with embeddable widgets that sail outward to any website. 2FA Authenticator is the fortress on the mole — the six-digit codes that guard your other accounts, generated on your own device and optional encrypted cloud sync if you want the same fortress on every machine.

X

Links — your internet homepage

Chart ref E-1 · links.namansoni.in

A link-in-bio port with a manifesto: free forever, no ads, no trackers, no analytics. Claim a username, drop your links, get a clean page at links.namansoni.in/<username> — Naman’s own dock is the living demo. The harbour’s secret weapon is widgets: self-contained SVG cards that embed on any site via a public /api/embed/<slug> endpoint that clamps width and height between 120 and 4096 pixels — never distorted, CDN-cached, always crisp.

  • Interview protocol: a JSON-import “New with AI” spec lets external sites fetch your page’s data and render it their own way — open-web plumbing, not a walled garden.
  • Zero-cost guarantee: the free-forever promise is written on the territory’s own walls.
Best route inPick a username, paste five links, share the URL. Embed a widget card on your blog the same afternoon.
Field hazardsA links page is a billboard, not a private page — don’t list URLs you don’t want public.
XI

2FA Authenticator

Chart ref E-2 · 2fa.namansoni.in

The fortress guarding the harbour mouth: a free, browser-based two-factor app. Paste your TOTP or HOTP setup keys, get live six-digit codes on desktop or mobile, and choose your garrison: keep everything on-device, or sync to an encrypted account so the fortress follows you between machines. For a world still putting authenticators on phones alone, a browser-native one is quietly radical — your codes sit where you already work.

Best route inOpen the app, add a key, read the code. Create the encrypted account only if you multi-device.
Field hazardsBrowser-storage keys survive on that machine and that profile — treat a sync account as the off-site armoury, and never paste live secret keys into shared computers.
R·VI

Region VI · Plates 12–13The Old Country

Timeless · One Border Closed

The quiet provinces: Chess, where a human meets a bot on sixty-four squares, and Khata, the Hinglish ledger for shopkeepers — the one territory whose border gate has been shut for six survey days running. Old country maps are honest about ruins; so is this one.

XII

Chess — Human vs Bot

Chart ref F-1 · chess.namansoni.in

Exactly what the sign says: human versus bot, in the browser, no account and no queue. No premium tier, no puzzle paywall, no ad between moves — the oldest game on earth, presented the oldest way: you sit, you play. The source is public at the chess repo for anyone who wants to read the engine room.

Best route inOpen the page, make your first move within five seconds of arriving.
Field hazardsAt this survey the bot’s strength selection was minimal — bring your own discipline for training, not a curriculum.
XIII

Khata — the closed gate

Chart ref F-2 · khata.namansoni.in · offline
Survey note, 25 Oct 2026: the border has been closed for six consecutive survey days — the URL returns Vercel’s DEPLOYMENT_NOT_FOUND. The source repo was last touched 19 October, so a re-deploy is likely a working day away. Charted as closed, not deleted; the neighbouring LND AI mainland remains fully open.

What lies behind the gate, from earlier surveys: a Hinglish digital khata ledger — udhaar (credit) tracking for small shops, customers and balances written the way Indian shopkeepers actually speak, not translated software-English. The territory earned its place on this map before the gate closed, and its GitHub repo still stands, so the province can be rebuilt the moment the owner re-lights the beacon.

Field hazardsDo not enter ledgers into a closed app; when it returns, verify your data landed before trusting it with a day’s udhaar book.
R·VII

Region VII · Plate 14The Cartographer’s Archive

Open Stacks

Every map needs a records office. Naman Soni’s GitHub — github.com/NamanSoni78 — holds fourteen public repositories that double as the source code and the paper trail for the entire atlas. The stacks are open; read them like surveyor’s field-books.

XIV

github.com/NamanSoni78 — the open stacks

Chart ref G-1 · 14 public repos · verified via GitHub API, 25 Oct 2026

The API listed these stacks at survey time: 2FA, chess, dance (Dance Cat 3D), khata, Links, MONYX studio, ONYX-Image-Editor, 3dfy, pi-browser-agent, pollinations, spot-the-ai — a timed “Real or AI?” browser game — plus early-learning repos (DSA of May 2025, WebDev of April 2025) and the profile’s own README. Recent commits land across October 2026, which is the quiet proof behind this whole atlas: the territories are maintained, not abandoned.

Best route inStar what you use. If a tool matters to your work, its repo is the fastest channel to its real state — faster than any directory, including this one.
Field hazardsRepos show intent, not uptime — the khata repo also looks alive while the site is down. Check both before you commit your workflow.
§ 3

Three Expedition Routes

Maps reward travellers who follow routes, not pins. These three expeditions are complete journeys across the atlas — each one uses only territories charted above, costs nothing (or exactly ₹28), and ends with something real in your hand: a live app, a finished song, a publishable photo. Times assume an ordinary laptop and an ordinary evening.

R·A

Zero to Live URL in One Afternoon

NewEra → Links · ~2–4 hours · ₹0

For the traveller who has never shipped software. You will end the afternoon with a working app on a public URL — no IDE, no terminal, no credit card. The Builder Range carries you.

  1. Write a one-sentence brief. Open NewEra, click New project, and describe the app in plain English — “a quiz app about space with a scoreboard” is a real brief. The agent plans before it codes; watch the plan, not just the output.
  2. Let the agent build. It writes the code, runs CI on GitHub Actions (4 vCPU / 16 GB runners), and deploys to Cloudflare Pages with EdgeOne as fallback. Serious builds get up to four parallel sub-agents and up to twelve hours of VM time; simple apps take minutes-to-hours.
  3. Approve repo creation explicitly. Nothing lands on GitHub without your consent — self-clean repos auto-delete, so nothing lingers by accident.
  4. Export insurance. Download the project as a single .newera file. Your work is now portable regardless of any website’s future.
  5. Build the signpost. Claim a username on Links, add your app’s live URL, and share one clean page instead of a bare domain.

Expedition manifest

₹0 total
R·B

The ₹28 Birthday Ballad

Gaana Banana → Monyx · ~20 minutes · ₹28

For the traveller who wants to give a gift no shop sells: a full song, with vocals, about an actual person. The Sound Coast carries you.

  1. Draft the story first. Two or three real details beat ten adjectives — her nickname, the trip you ruined together, the joke only she laughs at. Gaana’s built-in LLM prompt-writer helps shape it; your own lyrics (up to 800 characters) are allowed and always better.
  2. Pick the theme. Birthday, romantic, yaari, family, wedding, bhakti, funny — twelve themes on the board at gaana.namansoni.in.
  3. Buy one credit. ₹28 via UPI (₹45 for two, ₹175 for ten). The credit rides a transferable 12-digit key, not an account — no sign-up cliff.
  4. Mint the song. Google’s Lyria model generates a full vocal track in one to two minutes; failed generations are refunded per the published FAQ.
  5. Ship it to WhatsApp as MP3 — and if you want the karaoke version for the party, run the MP3 through Monyx Studio’s free on-device vocal remover and keep the instrumental.

Expedition manifest

₹28 total
R·C

Photo to Post in Twenty Minutes

Onyx → LND AI · ~20 minutes · ₹0

For the traveller with a phone full of photos and a feed to feed. Nothing uploads anywhere — the editor runs locally, the AI polish runs on LND’s credits, and the toll is zero.

  1. Drop the photo into Onyx. Onyx runs entirely in the browser — pixels never leave the device. Crop with guides, fix colour with the filter and adjustment bays, add text in 40+ Google Fonts if the post needs a headline.
  2. Resize by destination. One-click presets cover Instagram story and post, YouTube thumbnail, Twitter header, Facebook cover, LinkedIn banner and passport — the exact pixel shapes each platform actually wants, no mental arithmetic.
  3. Polish with LND AI. When the photo itself is the problem — soft, cluttered background, small canvas — take it to LND AI for the upscaler, background remover or background replacement with automatic relighting. Daily credits refresh at midnight IST; the next day’s allowance is on the house.
  4. Convert and ship. Back on Onyx, convert PNG→JPG (or HEIC, WebP and friends) for a lighter upload, then post. Total software cost for the entire darkroom: ₹0.
Person editing a photo at a laptop at night — Route C's zero-cost darkroom
Fig. 4 — Route C at work: local edits, AI polish, ₹0 darkroom.

Expedition manifest

₹0 total
§ 4

The Toll Roads — Free Territory vs Paid Incumbents

Every free territory competes with a paid toll road. This comparison table is the atlas’s reason to exist: for each charted territory, the incumbent most people pay for, its typical published price, and what you actually give up by taking the free road. Read the last column honestly — free is a real price, not a magic one.

Table 2 — Caravan comparison: charted territory vs the paid toll road most travellers already use
TerritoryPaid toll roadTypical toll (incumbent)Our tollWhat you trade on the free road
LND AIMidjourney + individual AI tool subscriptions~$10–30/mo, several tools to cover the same groundCREDITSDaily credit ceiling instead of unlimited generations; browser-grade vs desktop-grade upscaling
OnyxCanva Pro / Photoshop~₹500–4,000/mo₹0No cloud template library, no team folders — you bring the design skill, the app brings the tools
3DfyBlender + 3D asset marketplaces$0 but weeks of learning curve; assets $5–50 each₹0Procedural worlds, not DCC-grade modelling — wonder first, authorship second
Monyx StudioMoises / LALAL.AI stems~₹300–2,000/mo tiers₹0Runs on your hardware — separation quality depends on your machine, not a server farm
Gaana BananaSuno / studio session~$10/mo or ₹5,000+ per studio songPay-per-song instead of subscription; a gift-sized catalog, not a production pipeline
Dance Cat 3DPaid audio-visualizer apps~$20–60 desktop licences₹0One cat, one visualizer — and honestly, no trade at all
Talk AI CompanionReplika / Character.AI+~$7–20/moCREDITSFree tier ≈ 50 messages/day; smaller character roster than the VC-funded empires
NewEraCursor / Replit / dev agencies~$20/mo to ₹1,00,000+ per project₹0Autonomous agent, not a co-pilot — you review code rather than write it; build time is real time
Pi Browser AgentCloud-hosted agents~$10–60/mo + token fees₹0*You spend your own Pollen on Pollinations models — entry is free, fuel is usage-based
LinksLinktree Pro~$5–9/mo₹0No built-in analytics — a privacy choice, not an oversight; the SVG widget API is the power feature
2FA AuthenticatorAuthy / paid authenticator apps$0–3/mo₹0Browser-first: brilliant on desktop, carry your phone habits over on mobile
Chesschess.com premium~₹150–500/mo₹0No ratings ecosystem, lessons or puzzle rush — just a clean board and a bot
KhataKhatabook / OkCredit$0 (VC-funded, ad/data-subsidised)CLOSEDCurrently offline (6th day) — the honest trade is: wait for the re-deploy
GitHub Archive—free for public repos₹0None — public source is public source

Incumbent prices are indicative market prices as commonly published at survey time, not quotes from the incumbents; the atlas’s own tolls were verified on the territories’ live pages on 25 October 2026. Subscriptions quoted per month; ₹1 = one rupee of honest maths.

§ 5

The Cartographer’s Oath

What this map promises — and what it refuses to

I. Everything on this map was visited. On 25 October 2026, all fourteen territories were opened directly: sitemaps counted, llms.txt manifests parsed, pricing pages read, repositories checked via the GitHub API. No entry was written from a press release or a memory.

II. Nothing is erased. Khata has been offline for six consecutive survey days and is charted as a closed border. A map that paints over its dead roads is an advertisement, not an atlas.

III. Free is stated with its edges. LND AI and Talk run daily credits (the meter resets at midnight IST, not into a paywall); Gaana’s songs cost ₹28; Talk’s 18+ Spicy Mode exists and is off by default; Pi burns your own Pollen. Every plate carries a field-hazards note — the small print other directories bury, printed here at the top of the map.

IV. No guarantee of geography. Tools evolve; ports close and reopen; credit allowances get tuned. Verify the toll at the territory before committing your workflow — the survey line on every plate tells you exactly how fresh this ink is. And an honest map admits its own limits: it cannot promise search engines will file it, cannot promise pages will stay up, and does not pretend otherwise.

V. The cartographer is named. One indie developer — Naman Soni — built all fourteen territories and maintains them in public. Single-builder software has single-builder risks: a server sleeping at 3 a.m. IST has no pager-duty rotation behind it. It also has single-builder honesty: no growth team deciding your data is now the product. This atlas is drawn by the ecosystem’s own cartography desk; the eighth in a daily survey series whose previous editions are catalogued below.

§ 6

Past Surveys — the Back Catalogue

The Free Tools Atlas is the eighth edition of a daily survey series. Each earlier expedition mapped the same ecosystem from a different angle — as a directory, a set of alternatives, a playbook, a spec-sheet comparison, a starter pack, a review journal and a cookbook. All are still live and still free; together with this atlas they form a nine-volume set.

Vol. 1 · 18 Oct

The Hub

The original index page linking every product — the first chart of the ecosystem.

SURVEY №1 · DIRECTORY
Vol. 2 · 19 Oct

The Mega Directory

14 products, every tool listed, categories indexed — the full inventory survey.

SURVEY №2 · DIRECTORY
Vol. 3 · 20 Oct

Free Alternatives Guide

Every product mapped against the paid incumbent it replaces, with the trade-offs named.

SURVEY №3 · ALTERNATIVES
Vol. 4 · 21 Oct

The Playbook

Field-manual style: step-by-step plays for getting real work out of the free tier.

SURVEY №4 · HOW-TO
Vol. 5 · 22 Oct

The Comparison Guide

Clean spec-sheet tables: feature-by-feature, tool-by-tool, no adjectives spared.

SURVEY №5 · COMPARISON
Vol. 6 · 23 Oct

The Starter Pack

What to install first (answer: nothing — it’s all browser) and the order to try things.

SURVEY №6 · STARTER
Vol. 7 · 24 Oct

The Review Journal

Editorial reviews with verdicts, for and against — the sceptic’s edition.

SURVEY №7 · REVIEWS
Vol. 8 · 24 Oct

The Cookbook

Recipe-style walkthroughs: ingredients, steps, servings — a kitchen for free tools.

SURVEY №8 · RECIPES
Vol. 9 · 25 Oct

The Atlas

You are here — the cartographic survey, plates I–XIV with routes, tolls and hazards.

SURVEY №9 · ATLAS
§ 7

Frequently Asked Questions at the Survey Desk

What exactly is the Free Tools Atlas 2026?

An independent, fully surveyed guide to 14 free web tools built by indie developer Naman Soni — AI image tools (LND AI, Onyx, 3Dfy), audio tools (Monyx Studio, Gaana Banana, Dance Cat 3D), AI companions (Talk), an autonomous app builder (NewEra) and Pi Browser Agent, plus Links, a 2FA authenticator, chess, a khata ledger and the GitHub archive. Every territory was visited and verified on 25 October 2026; this is the eighth edition of a daily survey series (see Past Surveys).

Are all fourteen tools actually free?

Twelve of fourteen cost nothing at the core. LND AI and Talk use daily credits that refresh automatically — at midnight IST — so the free tier renews itself rather than expiring. Gaana Banana charges ₹28 per finished song (₹45/2, ₹175/10). Khata is currently offline and costs nothing while closed. The toll table states every price next to its paid incumbent.

Do I need to install anything to use these tools?

No. Every territory runs in a modern browser — several, like Onyx (image editing), Monyx (audio separation) and Pi Browser Agent (a coding agent in WebAssembly), process your work entirely on-device. NewEra is the one place where “install” is replaced by “deploy” — its output is a live URL you own.

What’s the catch with “free AI tools”?

Three honest catches, stated plainly: (1) meters exist — AI compute costs money, so LND AI and Talk cap daily use with auto-refreshing credits; (2) hardware does some of the work — on-device tools trade server speed for privacy, so old laptops feel it; (3) single-builder software means outages (Khata, day six) have no enterprise SLA behind them. What you get in exchange: no watermarks on output, no data-selling business model, and prices in rupees you can count on one hand.

Which tool replaces Canva or Photoshop for photo work?

Onyx Image Editor covers the daily work — crop, resize presets for every social platform, filters, masking, 40+ font text overlays, format conversion — with images never leaving your device. For AI-grade surgery (upscaling, background removal and replacement, uncropping), layer it with LND AI. The two together cover most of a Canva Pro subscription’s real use.

Which tool replaces Moises or Suno?

Stems and karaoke: Monyx Studio — free, on-device MDX-Net vocal and instrument separation. Personalised songs with vocals: Gaana Banana at ₹28 per song credit on Google’s Lyria model, MP3 download and WhatsApp share included.

Can an AI agent really build and deploy an app for free?

Yes, with expectations set: NewEra plans, codes, runs CI on GitHub Actions (4 vCPU / 16 GB runners) and deploys to Cloudflare Pages — no login or credit card. It is autonomous, not instant: real builds take minutes-to-hours, you should review code you plan to keep, and GitHub repos are only created with explicit consent (with a self-clean mode). Export insurance: every project saves as a portable .newera file.

Is my data private on these tools?

Where privacy is the architecture, the map says so: Onyx and Monyx process locally and never upload your files; Dance Cat’s audio analysis is 100% in-browser; Links runs no trackers, ads or analytics; 2FA codes default to staying on your device with optional encrypted sync. Where work must reach a server (image generation, AI chat, song minting), it is processed for the task — treat that class of tool the way you treat any cloud AI: don’t paste secrets.

What happened to the Khata app?

Its URL returns a Vercel deployment not found error — offline for six consecutive survey days as of 25 October 2026. The GitHub repo was last touched 19 October, so a re-deploy is plausible. The atlas charts it as a closed border rather than deleting it; check the repo or the main hub for the reopening.

Do these tools work on mobile?

Mostly, yes — LND AI is mobile-responsive by design, 2FA explicitly targets desktop and mobile, Talk installs as a PWA and takes voice calls, and Onyx works on modern phone browsers. The honest exceptions: 3Dfy’s worlds and Monyx’s separation want a machine with a real GPU, and Pi Browser Agent’s WebAssembly sandbox is happiest on a laptop.

Are the AI companions safe for teenagers?

The companion territory is guest-first with no OTP, but it includes an 18+ “Spicy Mode” that is off by default, behind an explicit consent gate and a one-time ₹9 unlock — the district is signposted, not hidden. For younger users the safer picks on this map are the non-companion territories (Onyx, Chess, Dance Cat, LND’s utilities). Parents should set the boundaries; the map’s job is to mark the district honestly.

Who builds and maintains all this?

One person: Naman Soni, an indie developer who ships fast and maintains his work in public at github.com/NamanSoni78 — fourteen public repos, commits landing through October 2026. His full ecosystem and tool inventory lives at namansoni.in.

How often is the atlas updated, and where do the editions live?

The survey series is daily: a new edition is charted, deployed and submitted to indexing each day, with all previous volumes kept live and linked — currently nine volumes from the Hub (18 Oct) through this atlas (25 Oct). The full catalogue with dates is in Past Surveys.

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