The Best Free Web Apps of 2013

If there's one thing most people consider the Web to be, it's free. Not just for speech, but of charge (outside of that mammoth monthly ISP bill). But that doesn't always hold true for Web apps—those online-only applications you access from the Web browser. Most of them have a free
option, but in order to be truly useful, many have a cost associated with them. Typically, this is in the form of a monthly subscription or an annual fee.

We've got a lot of those "freemium" services here amid this collection of 180 useful, Web-only apps because, well, they're too good not to include. In a 'free starter package,' you get usability and a thorough introduction to a product that you might not otherwise ever try—and some of them you may never have to upgrade, as the free tools are good enough. But among the 180, you'll find 72 products marked with a seal to indicate they are utterly and totally free. As in, they have no cost at all. No premium versions, no extras needed. (OK, so you may need to create an account with the company that provides the service, but "free" is a relative term, kids.)

We're talking full office suites, complete image and video editors, small biz collaboration tools, readers of books and RSS feeds, backup services email clients, Internet radio, and more. There are 26 categories of Web apps to choose from in this story.

One thing they have in common, for the most part, is that you don't need to download or install anything. There are a few minor exceptions, and we'll assume you have Flash installed in some cases. Otherwise, with this collection and a Web browser—we like Google Chrome 23 best—you're ready to get as many free and useful tools as anyone with a hard drive full of expensive, installed commercial applications. You may even be more productive. So what are you waiting for? Click away.

Antivirus, Audio & Music, Backup/Storage

ANTIVIRUS

Bitdefender QuickScan
quickscan.bitdefender.com/
You'll need to download a browser extension (Firefox or Chrome only) or Web widget to use this, but once you do, you'll have a system scanner that looks at multiple files simultaneously. It only works for Windows.

Panda ActiveScan
www.pandasecurity.com/activescan/index
Limited to a Firefox extension or IE ActiveX control, Panda's online scanner lets you choose between a quick or full scan.

F-Secure Online Scanner
www.f-secure.com/en/web/labs_global/removal-tools/-/carousel/view/143
Rather than relying on extensions, F-Secure tosses a small, Java-based app on your computer to run a quick, full, or file/folder-specific scan.

Jotti
virusscan.jotti.org/en
Jotti won't win any website design awards, but it makes up for that by doing one thing incredibly well: checking a single file on your computer with multiple antivirus programs. Files can be checked against Avast, AVG, BitDefender, ClamAV, ESET, F-Secure, Sophos, Kaspersky, Panda, and more.
• Totally Free!

AUDIO & MUSIC

JAM with Chrome
www.jamwithchrome.com
This is an experiment from within Google that only works in the Google Chrome Web browser, but if you've got friends with musical inclinations, you can try to get the band started here. Pick from the 19 instruments (guitars, bass, drums, drum machines, keyboards, among others), invite a friend to visit the site, and start jamming.
• Totally Free!

Last.fm
www.last.fm
One of the better Pandora competitors, Last.fm doesn't create playlists or save songs, but it does make great online radio stations based on your suggestions. You get unlimited song skips and a slideshow montage of the artist to go with every song. There are mobile versions and you can listen to it on your Xbox 360 and other living room devices, as well.
• Read PCMag's review of Last.fm.

Grooveshark
grooveshark.com
Does Grooveshark have every song ever recorded? Not quite, but the embattled music search and streaming site—it's had some legal problems—does a great job of finding tunes and letting you add them to playlists. The "Grooveshark Radio" recommendations play like other sites in this category, giving you more music that's similar to what you like.
• Read PCMag's review of Grooveshark.

Pandora
www.pandora.com
Pandora gives the power of the Music Genome Project to the people in the form of Internet radio that you can program to your tastes (but like radio, you can't save it). Pandora offers free music listening per month up to 320 hours, with advertisements, but, thankfully, the ads aren't worse than regular radio. You can also find it on more than 200 devices, not just on the browser.
• Read PCMag's review of Pandora.

Radionomy
www.radionomy.com
Radionomy launched just last year in the U.S. With a look like Bing, the site makes it easy to start listening to music by picking from a categories listed or from the top 25 existing "stations," or by creating your own. You program all the songs that will play so you can share it with others. Radionomy never charges you, but you can actually make money if you get enough listeners.
• Totally Free!

Slacker Radio
www.slacker.com
PCMag's Editors' Choice for Internet-based music listening has a great interface, great sound quality, and all you could ask for free listening. Paid users can even get music and albums on demand.
• Read PCMag's review of Slacker Radio (2012).

Songza
www.songza.com
Another PCMag Editor's Choice for music listening, Songza has plenty of pre-defined playlists for anyone to choose from, and unlike Pandora, where you can just give songs on stations a thumbs-up, you can build an actual playlist of up to 10 tunes (as long as there are six artists on the list). It's also ad-free, though skips are limited.
• Read PCMag's review of Songza.
• Totally Free!

Turntable

Want to listen to music with friends and act as the real-time DJ? Turntable does that. You set up a listening room, invite friends or strangers to drop in, and start playing anything in the big catalog the site offers. You can also upload your own beats. Likewise, you can wander into new listen rooms to hear what others are spinning. The interaction around the tunes is where the real music happens. Check out the iPhone app to stay mobile while listening.
• Totally Free!

BACKUP/STORAGE

Box
www.box.net
Ostensibly revamped into a file-syncing service like Dropbox, Box seems to be most at home with the small business market. Still, the Personal version is free for users to store files up to 250MB in size within a 5GB storage limit, with all the prerequisite ability to share files, access them while mobile, and edit them in the cloud.
• Read PCMag's review of Box (Personal).

FileLocker
http://filelocker.com
FileLocker touts its security of your files stored in the cloud. For 5GB of free online storage for five users, you get great file version control, safety behind a password, and the ability to sync those files to your desktop if you make an extra download.
• Read PCMag's review of FileLocker.

Fruux
https://fruux.com
iCloud, Apple's backup service for users of MacOS or iOS, is great, but what about the rest of us? Fruux wants to fill that gap providing backup of contacts, events, and tasks for free to just about any OS. Make a change or set up a new event or contact on one device or service, and it's pushed to the rest. The free version works with up the three devices.

SecureSafe
https://www.securesafe.com
Make all your online data inheritable by those you'd leave behind with SecureSafe. It's a site where you can enter in all the access codes and passwords to your online accounts and a few documents. SecureSafe will then print out codes you can provide to a beneficiary who'll use them to get access to accounts if you get sick (or worse). For free, you can store 50 passwords and line up one beneficiary.

ThisLife
http://www.thislife.com
ThisLife will store 1,000 of your most precious memories—also known as photos—online for free. It's not just storage you can access from any device, but also an organizer, image enhancer, and sharer. It'll start to cost you when you add more images.

SkyDrive
skydrive.live.com
If you have a free Window Live account, Microsoft will give you 25GB of free online storage for any kind of file you'd like to upload. You can share the documents with others via email, and even with a whole group of other SkyDrive users. If the files are for Microsoft Office, any Windows or Mac users can view them. And with Office Web Apps (see the Office section), you can also edit them, but SkyDrive has some limited editing capabilities of its own.
• Read PCMag's review of SkyDrive.

Billing & Finance, Blogging/Webpages

BILLING & FINANCE

1DayLater
1daylater.com
Freelancers, if you use the simple interface at 1DayLater to track all your time, mileage, and expenses for later billing, you'll never forget what you need to hand in with an invoice.

Buxfer
www.buxfer.com
Manage not only your own expenses, but a group's (like your slacker roommates) when you sync Buxfer with your bank or import statements or financial data files. You'll be able to generate reports on who owes what; there's even an IOU view. Pay for the Plus or Pro accounts to get access to unlimited accounts, make unlimited budgets, and create all the bill reminders your checking account can stomach.

Doxo
www.doxo.com
Dubbed "your digital filing cabinet," Doxo isn't just a secure place to stuff digital docs (even though you can). You can connect to utilities and financial providers for a paper-free way to manage (and eventually pay) bills.
• Read PCMag's coverage of Doxo.
• Totally Free!

FreshBooks
www.freshbooks.com
Our perennial Editors' Choice for online billing/invoicing—what they call "cloud accounting"—lets one person manage up to three clients for free, which could be perfect for the small, sole proprietor getting started. Everything you need for fast follow-up, payment via PayPal and other gateways, and adding expenses is built in.
• Read PCMag's review of FreshBooks.

Mint.com
www.mint.com
Intuit's Mint.com replaced Quicken.com for good reason. The site gathers your banking information from all of your accounts, credit cards, and loans and then reports back on how your finances fare, with advice on how to budget for improvement. It remains our Editors' Choice for personal finance tools.
• Totally Free!
• Read PCMag's review of Mint.com.

PocketSmith
pocketsmith.com
This site is a mash-up of a financial management app with calendaring, so your money can be tracked in a way that shows you how it was spent, and your cashflow projection for how it will be spent in the future. The free version lets you see three months previous, and six months ahead.

ProfitBooks
http://profitbooks.net
Another accounting and payroll solution for small offices, ProfitBooks takes on Freshbooks with a free single-user account that includes basic accounting and financial reports.

Slice
www.slice.com
If you're prepared to let Slice take a look into your inbox to get started, this little Web app might come back with a report on your recent purchases that will help you save money. It may also be your single-stop to make returns and track packages in the future, no matter where you bought that latest something.
• Totally Free!

BLOGGING/WEBPAGES

About.me
about.me
Need to create a quick and easy landing page for yourself online? About.me is one of the best ways to do that. One nice thing is that it's always adding new features. The latest: add an RSS feed, your location, and a connect button for people to get in touch with you.
• Read PCMag's review of About.me.
• Totally Free!

Blogger
www.blogger.com
Blogger has been around a long, long time (in blog years, at least), but Google's made some major improvements to the blogging and hosting service, including adding a rich text editor and enabling mobile versions of posts. Naturally, it now ties in pretty heavily with Google+.
• Totally Free!
• Read PCMag's review of Blogger.

dooid
dooid.me/home
A free account at dooid will get you all the core features—a site where you control the content and style—plus a limited mobile version of your new website and up to ten links out to all your social networking sites.

Feathers
feathe.rs
Still in invite-only beta , Feathers looks like a promising mix of distraction-free writing come-to bloggers. You'll be greeted with a sample entry that you can erase and write over, and once you're done, you've blogged. The trick to getting it out to the world is sharing it on Facebook or Twitter.
• Totally Free!

Flavors
flavors.me
A current PCMag Editors' Choice, Flavors makes building a personal webpage about as easy as possible by providing you with an easy-to-customize home. Extras like a domain name will cost you.
• Read PCMag's review of Flavors.

Jux
Jux.com
Unlike a lot of landing page sites, Jux concentrates on the graphics, providing an almost perfect hybrid of a personal page and Web-based graphics portfolio.
• Read PCMag's review of Jux.
• Totally Free!

Muzy
muzy.com/app/photobox
A blog tool just for the creative person, Muzy is all about uploading and sharing images via the site's drag-and-drop Photoboxes, where there's a new layout awaiting each set of pics, or a collage where you create the layout. Upload photos from the desktop, or grab them from your Facebook account or Google Image Search.

Pen.io
pen.io
This site may be right when it says it's the "fastest way" to make a blog. You don't even have to register with Pen.io; just go into the interface, pick a style, drag in some images, and write something. Put in your Twitter handle as "author," a URL to act as prefix to "pen.io," and click publish. It's that fast.
• Totally Free!

Sidengo
sidengo.com
Sidengo provides an easy-to-build, no-coding-necessary website that's especially good for sole-proprietors or small businesses. In fact, you can build unlimited sites with unlimited traffic bandwidth and use of all Sidengo's templates for free, but you must use its domain name in the URL.
• Read PCMag's review of Sidengo.

Tackk
tackk.com
If you're afraid of a blank page when it comes time to create a poster or flyer online, try a new Tackk. The tool gives you an instant template in which you can adjust your copy and image. You can then add other elements, and even a video.
• Totally Free!

Vizify
www.vizify.com
Provide a full visual representation of yourself to the world with Vizify. It quantifies your bio down to a clickable, animated flow-chart that visitors can use to hone in on information. It's a serious contender for one of the best personal webpage builders.
• Read PCMag's review of Vizify.
• Totally Free!

Striking.ly
www.striking.ly
It's strikingly fast to sign up at Striking.ly and launch a page profiling your business, project, portfolio, or just yourself. The themes on the site look great. The free version gives you one site at the Striking.ly domain with 500MB of bandwidth for monthly traffic.

Tumblr
www.tumblr.com
This is your best bet for a visual blog, where the video and images take precedence over the text. It's perfect for beginning micro-bloggers.
• Read PCMag's review of Tumblr.
• Totally Free!

Weebly
www.weebly.com/aboutus.php
Weebly makes it easy to set up a website, and even nicer, makes it easy to share in revenue generated from that site. Every drag-and-drop created page works well on a smartphone, not just a desktop, and there are over 100 themes to pick from. Start blogging or showing off your media immediately.

WordPress.com
wordpress.com
There's a bit of a learning curve up front, but the popularity of this blogging and hosting platform speaks for itself. The polished interface that is the best in the business and you get over 100 themes to pick from for your site. It's PCMag's Editors' Choice for hosting blogging.
• Read PCMag's review of WordPress.com.

Calendars, eBooks/Reading, Email

CALENDARS

30 Boxes
30boxes.com
Want an online calendar that really looks like a calendar? Well, 30 Boxes plays the part, no matter how many days of the month there are. It also adds in a to-do list and ability to share calendar entries with your fellow 30 Boxes buddies.
• Totally Free!

Cozi
www.cozi.com
Designed with families in mind, Cozi includes a shared calendar, shopping and to-do lists, and a journal for keeping track of everything you have to do. Use the Cozi smartphone apps to manage things even when you're not home.

Google Calendar
www.google.com/calendar
Whether you want to see your schedule by day, week, month, or just in one big list, Google Calendar has a view for you, plus an almost foolproof Quick Add function that recognizes dates and times without needing to explicitly spell them out. Share or import calendars to your heart's desire, color code your events and appointments, and sync the data with offline calendars.
• Totally Free!

Yahoo Calendar
calendar.yahoo.com
Yahoo's online calendar is once again a force to be reckoned with. Originally, it sported an address book, to-do lists, and a notepad. Now the interface features drag-and-type event entry, color coding, calendar sharing, subscription, and a lot of what's found in the competition.
• Totally Free!

EBOOKS/READING

Ibis Reader
ibisreader.com
While it's also available on smartphones and even on iPad, Ibis Reader makes for a beauty of a Web-based ereader for any book in ePub format. The site has instant links to books already in the public domain (even Les Misérables), so you can start flipping pages immediately.

Instapaper
www.instapaper.com
If you're a voracious reader but don't always have time to read everything that you find interesting online, Instapaper will help. Tag what you discover online and then read it later in the Web interface (or on the various Instapaper mobile apps).

Kindle Cloud Reader
www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html?ie=UTF8&docId=1000579091
You don't need a Kindle to read Kindle-based ebooks. The Kindle Cloud Reader lets you sign on with your Amazon account to do some reading on your desktop or laptop browser. You can even enable offline access if you use Google Chrome browser.
• Read PCMag's review of Kindle Cloud Reader.
• Totally Free!

MagicScroll
www.magicscroll.net
MagicScroll is exactly that. Drag an ePub file to the site and it instantly becomes a readable ebook you can "scroll" through (or go page-by-page with arrows, like on most readers).
• Totally Free!

Nook for Web
www.barnesandnoble.com/u/nook-for-web/379003594
The Web-based reader for Barnes and Noble's Nook lets you sample books before you buy them, and when you do, you can read them right in the browser. Access it by signing in to BN.com, looking at your list of books for the Nook, and clicking "Read Instantly."

Scribd
www.scribd.com
Think of Scribd as the YouTube of documents. Anyone can upload documentation, fan fiction, original compositions, books, and manuals to this site for sharing with a few million people. You can "readcast" what you like to social networks.
• Read PCMag's review of Scribd.

EMAIL

Alto by Aol
altomail.com
Remember hearing "You've got mail!" when you logged into America Online? Well, it could happen again. The new Alto by Aol is a Web-based email client that accesses not just your Aol email account, but also Gmail, Yahoo Mail, or iCloud. It's currently in beta, so you'll need to sign up to get an invite.
• Totally Free!

Bubbles
bubbleideas.com
Every few years someone tries to re-invent email with the hope of making it more creative. Bubbles is the latest attempt, and because it's Web-based, it might actually succeed. You can still type letters, but you can also hand-write them (which is especially good on a tablet) or add images and photos. Forward the message to someone's email address and the creative missive shows up as a PDF anyone can read.

Gmail
mail.google.com
Google's Web-based email is bare bones and thus also the fastest you'll find. Anyone with a Google account can (and should) take advantage of this free service. It comes complete with regular innovation from the Gmail Labs experiments, secure connections, Google Contacts, and one of the best spam filters ever built.
• Read PCMag's review of Gmail.
• Totally Free!

Outlook.com
www.outlook.com
What once was Hotmail (and a few other names) is now Outlook.com, complete with Windows 8-esque interface. Interesting features include Sweeps, so you can, for example, delete all messages from one sender at once, and built-in chat (even Skype video chat). It's an amazing improvement over previous versions and one that made Outlook.com our PCMag Editors' Choice for Web-based email this year.
• Read PCMag's review of Outlook.com.
• Totally Free!

Yahoo Mail
overview.mail.yahoo.com
The new YahooMail update makes it faster and sleeker. Unlimited storage for attachments also means never having to worry (or having to delete old messages). And there are new smartphone apps.
• Read PCMag's review of Yahoo Mail.
• Totally Free!

File Conversion/Transfer, Fun/Home

FILE CONVERSION/TRANSFER

DropSend
www.dropsend.com
A lot of the file-sending sites out there are gummed up with confusing ads and unprofessional layouts. At DropSend, sending a single gigantic file—up to 2GB—is a breeze. Enter your email and a recipient's email, upload a file, and you're done (once you navigate some ads). You can only do it five times a month for free.

Droplr
droplr.com/hello
You can drag and drop any file from your computer up to 25MB in size to the Droplr home page and you'll instantly get a short URL to share with anyone you want to download it. On the free account, files stay online for seven days. There are separate Mac, Windows, and iOS apps.

Ge.tt
ge.tt
Select a file to upload to Ge.tt and you'll be taken to a page with a preview of the file and a little box where you can enter an email for sharing (or a link to copy and share that very page). You can add multiple files to a page before you share it. Files are available for 30 days and you get 2GB storage for all the files if you stick with the free account.

Jumpshare
jumpshare.com
Like Droplr, you drag and drop files to the Jumpshare page. They're available for two weeks for free, and you can always add more to the set in that time. File size is limited to 100MB and you can store up to 2GB. That's all good, but Jumpshare also supports previews of 150 file types, so recipients may not even have to download what you share.
• Totally Free!

Kicksend
www.kicksend.com
Kicksend lets you share photos, and do so privately, without gumming up your email. It works best when the recipient is also on Kicksend, though that's not necessary. File size is unlimited, but that may only be with the downloadable apps.
• Totally Free!

net2ftp
www.net2ftp.com
Want to avoid using an FTP client just to transfer one file? Net2ftp can handle the transfer via its Web interface. You just need to know the server, username, and password.

PixelPipe
pi.pe
Picasa, Flickr, Instagram, Facebook, Shutterfly, and many more services will store your pictures. But what if you want to move a bunch of them from one service to another? Log in with PixelPipe, pick all the media you want to move, choose a destination, and start the transfer over the pipeline. Organizing them is on you.
• Totally Free!

Zamzar
www.zamzar.com
So you've got a file that you wish was in a different format. It doesn't matter if it's a document, audio, photo, video, archive, or an ebook, Zamzar can take it and change it into what you need, as long as it's under 100MB. (Bigger files will cost you a subscription fee.). Then it will email you a link to download it. Use it to download Internet videos, like those on YouTube.
• Totally Free!

FUN/HOME

BucketListly
www.bucketlistly.com
Everyone knows what a bucket list is—that magical list of everything you want to accomplish before you can't. Bucketlistly is the place to create your goals, share them with others, and revel in the accomplishment. It's all about socializing the bucket list, so you can even ask others how they were successful.
• Totally Free!

If this, Then That
ifttt.com
IFTTT, as it's called (rhymes with "gift"), is for the tech-savvy type who wants to mash up the abilities of a couple of Web services that might not otherwise work together. Want all your tweets to show up on Facebook? Want weather reports sent to your phone? Want your photos on Facebook to go to Flickr or Instagram? Want Craigslist posts sent to email, RSS, or Evernote? You can do all that and lots of other things by creating "recipes" combining use of the 57 "channels" that IFTTT supports.
• Totally Free!

MyHeritage
www.myheritage.com
There are a few million people using the family-tree builder at MyHeritage, which makes it all the easier to eventually find where all your roots meet. The free plan lets you create a tree with up to 250 family members.

Packagetrackr
www.packagetrackr.com
Do you like to order packages, but hate not knowing when those boxes are going to arrive? Don't go to the online retailer or the shipping company Web site to track them individually--Packagetrackr gives you one place to put in tracking numbers. The site will find your box whether shipped by the big carriers (UPS and Fedex), express mail, or even regional carriers in other countries, plus show you how it's traveling (plane, train, or truck) on a Google Map.
• Totally Free!

PeoplePlotr
www.peopleplotr.com
PeoplePlotr does more than just create family trees. It also makes the flowchart of who's who (and who's in charge) in an organization, and you can plot out other families or organizations for projects (like royalty, governments, or celebs). The free version limits you to one plot with 15 people per plot.

The ShowOff Visualizer
www.showoff.com/apps/default.aspx
To use this app, you just need to upload a picture of the home that you want to visualize. Then you can use it to figure out exactly where you'll be planting this year or how to move furniture around without breaking your back.

100,000 Stars
workshop.chromeexperiments.com/stars
Take a gander at the entire Milky Way in a splendid 3D display. You can move around with your cursor, zooming in and out from our Sun to the entire solar system to Oort cloud and the billions of stars beyond that. Click the named ones for extra info. Earth isn't the center of the universe, but it's the center of this excellent representation.
• Totally Free!

Graphics

GRAPHICS

DeviantArt Muro
muro.deviantart.com
DeviantArt is already a great place to go enjoy galleries by thousands of artists. The site also offers a free-to-use Web-based drawing app, complete with layers support that works with Wacom tablets, if you've got one. Files are saved on Sta.Sh and you can easily submit them to your DeviantArt account from there, or share on other social media.
• Totally Free!

Easel.ly
www.easel.ly
We live in a world that needs easily digested facts, and nothing says "eat this factoid" better than a good infographic. Easel.ly exists with the one goal of sharing visual ideas online, meaning it's all about creating infographics. Pre-created themes make it easy for anyone to make a page of info, as long as you've got the facts.
• Totally Free!

enThread
enthread.com
You get the basics with enThread. Drag a picture from your desktop to the webpage and it opens for instant editing of color, brightness, and saturation. Filters are limited. It's not going to replace Photoshop, but an online image edit doesn't come quicker.
• Totally Free!

Fatpaint
www.fatpaint.com
If you want more than just image creation and editing (you want sales!), then check out Fatpaint. It incorporates Café Press-like retail options for your images to sell on apparel and other merchandise.
• Read PCMag's review of Fatpaint.

FotoFlexer
fotoflexer.com
If you've got photos on Flickr, Facebook, Picasa, Photobucket, or even Myspace, open them on Flash-based FotoFlexer to apply some basic editing, or move up to special effects and animations.
• Read PCMag's review of FotoFlexer.
• Totally Free!

Fotor
www.fotor.com
With Fotor, you don't even have to register to begin editing uploaded pictures. The interface couldn't be simpler, and exporting to social media or email is a breeze.
• Totally Free!

LunaPic
www.lunapic.com/editor
Overlook the interface and embrace LunaPic's effects. You'll find lots you can do to animate and spice up an image at this free site. With no sign-up required, it's a good place for a quick stop to edit a picture.
• Read PCMag's review of LunaPic.
• Totally Free!

Photoshop Express Editor
www.photoshop.com/tools
Visit the tools section of Photoshop.com and you'll find the Express Editor, Adobe's online app. It includes the Express Editor for doing the quick edits or filters (the kind of thing the full version of Photoshop is known for), plus a style match tool for photos, an image organizer, slideshow creator, and a drag-and-drop upload tool. Considering it's made by Adobe and in Flash, it's no surprise that it works fast.
• Read PCMag's review of Photoshop Express.

PicMonkey
www.picmonkey.com
There's no doubt that PicMonkey is probably the best replacement for those who miss Picnik. PicMonkey has a basic interface and great tools, and you don't need to sign up to use it. Those who want extras can sign up for $4.99 a month.

Pixlr
pixlr.com
Autodesk's Pixlr is like three tools on one site. There's the Editor which is, like you'd expect, the photo editing tool akin to Photoshop.. Pixlr-O-Matic gives you a quick-and-easy way to play with uploaded images or those captured by webcam, and the Express tools cover the ground in between. If you like Pixlr, grab the mobile version for your smartphone.
• Totally Free!

Slidely
slide.ly
Let Slidely look at the images you have stored on Facebook, Picasa, Flickr, and other sites and start building beautiful slideshows you can share with others. A slideshow can have up to 90 images, plus background music, which you can pick from sites like SoundCloud or YouTube, or use your own MP3s (keep it legal, kids). Share the slides back to social networks when you're done, or on the Pinterest-esque public spot on Slide.ly itself.
• Totally Free!

Snippic
www.snippic.com
Snippic does for everyone what PhotoBooth does for those on the Mac; it lets you put that webcam to use. Give a name to an album and use the cam to take a series of shots. You don't get a lot of extras, but you can turn the series of images into a video, and share the whole album or video on Facebook.
• Totally Free!

Sketchpad
mugtug.com/sketchpad
At Sketchpad, you are instantly provided with a workspace to start drawing a masterpiece (no sign in required). Paint with "paint" or "light" as you see fit. Click Save and a PNG of your art is instantly available for download.
• Totally Free!

Splashup
www.splashup.com
If you're comfortable using Photoshop, you'll like Splashup, which has a very similar interface (even more than Adobe's own Photoshop Express Editor). You can save images to social networks, and also pull images from them to edit, which will require registering for a Splashup account.
• Totally Free!

Sumopaint
www.sumopaint.com/home
Upgrades have made Sumopaint even more Photoshop-like in appearance, performance, and filter effects. Manipulate your existing images or draw your own. Social networking is not built in, but Sumo is all about the art. The free version has the basics, but a lifetime license of $9 gives you plenty more filters and tools.

SVG-edit
code.google.com/p/svg-edit
While the vast majority of these Web app image editors do all their work with bitmaps, sometimes you gotta go vector. In that case, turn to SVG-edit, an open-source, HTML-5/Javascript-based editor for SVG-based vector images. You can view them as wireframes and even edit the source code.
• Totally Free!

Thumba
www.thumba.net
One of the few online image editors that does drag-and-drop image opening, Thumba speedily runs with Microsoft Silverlight installed. While it won't win any interface design awards, it's a perfect image editor for low-power PCs on the road.

IM/Chat, Maps, Networking, Notes/Writing

IM/CHAT

imo
imo.im
A slick interface is the first thing you'll like about imo, which lets you access MSN, Skype, Yahoo, Gtalk, Facebook, AIM, ICQ, Jabber, and Myspace as you want. It's not just for typing; it supports video chat, as well. Sign in to one, and then you can add others to the overall list of friends. Like with TinyChat (below), you can use the 'imo now' feature to send anyone a URL that was created on the fly for an instant video chatroom, or send a short voice message rather than type. Check out the Android and iOS apps if you need to chat via smartphone.
• Read PCMag's preview of imo Network.
• Totally Free!

KoolIM
www.koolim.com
KoolIM is one of many fast ways to access individual instant message accounts without installing software, even for obscure/overseas services. Plus, you can sign up for a full account to manage all those individual accounts.

Trillian for Web
www.trillian.im/chat
More famed for its downloadable, multi-protocol, IM client, Trillian offers online-only access via a full Trillian account that aggregates all your other IMs. You can also individually sign in to AIM, Facebook, Windows Live, Yahoo, Google Talk, ICQ, Jabber, and MySpaceIM.

TinyChat
tinychat.com
What was originally just a way to create a quick, disposable chatroom online (visit tinychat.com/[insert your name] to make one) has evolved. Now it's perfect for video chat as well, with the capability of adding up to 12 simultaneous broadcasts to a room. Hollywood likes it; stars like Ashton Kutcher and Sean Combs are investors, while artists like Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars use it to communicate with fans. Sign in with your Twitter or Facebook credentials to reserve your private room today.

MAPS

Bing Maps
www.bing.com/maps
Not to be outdone by Google, Microsoft's Bing Maps features directions (for walking and transit as well as driving), traffic views with CCTV cameras, and extra apps galore, such as a distance calculator and ways to figure out taxi fare before you take a ride. That's just scratching the topographical surface of what your inner cartographer could discover here.
• Read PCMag's Hands On with Bing Maps.
• Totally Free!

Google Maps
maps.google.com
Navigate the highways of America and beyond with Google's famed satellite map/GPS mash-up. The service frequently adds amazing new features like geo-modeled 3D images of buildings, exhaustive street views, and the ability to create a personalized "My Places" list of important locations.
• Read PCMag's review of Google Maps.
• Totally Free!

Mapquest
www.mapquest.com
Remember Mapquest? The somewhat venerable online map site is still kicking, and with improvements, now kicking some butt. It's got live traffic info, local info, gas pricing info, and many more features that let it run with the big names above.
• Totally Free!

NETWORKING

Meraki WiFi Stumbler
tools.meraki.com/stumbler
This Java applet on your Wi-Fi-enabled laptop does what dedicated, expensive tools used to do: it finds all the nearby wireless access points/routers and makes it a little easier for even non-pros to troubleshoot network problems.
• Read PCMag's review of Meraki WiFi Stumbler .
• Totally Free!

NOTES/WRITING

Brilliant.li
www.brilliant.li
You don't need to sign in to start creating online lists at Brilliant.li. but you must sign up to save lists, though it's always free.
• Totally Free!

Evernote
www.evernote.com
While it has many methods of use beyond the Web—including desktop downloads and mobile apps—at heart, Evernote is all about storing whatever you see worth keeping online in your own depository. You can then access and organize the stored info at your leisure, either with those apps or right on the site. Your "notes" can be anything from text to images, audio, and video. It's PCMag's Editors' Choice for note-taking apps.
• Read PCMag's review of Evernote (Web).

Exobrain
https://www.exobrain.co
Mind-mapping is a way of using software to brainstorm big, connected ideas. Exobrain gets you started by providing an easy-to-use interface to connect (or disconnect) the "nodes" in the map. For free, you get three maps . Additional maps cost $3 per month.

KustomNote
kustomnote.com
KustomNote connects to Evernote, letting you create template forms for the exact kind of notes you want to save on that service. There's a library of templates for you to choose from if you prefer.
• Totally Free!

Loccit
www.loccit.com
Loccit is like an online journaling site that pulls from all of your social media networks. After that, Loccit pulls in everything you do socially, and displays it for you on a "log-book" interface. Of course, you can contribute posts directly to Loccit yourself. And when you are ready to make it truly timeless, Loccit will print it all out and bind it for you (for a price). Loccit only promises to be free until the service reaches its first million users.

Penzu
www.penzu.com
Most people who write online are looking for an audience. Private thoughts are often kept elsewhere. If you prefer the PC and the Web, but still want privacy, Penzu promises to be your personal journal that will never be shared. And you can't lose the key. Of course, since it's digital, you can do more, including insert photos and search previous entries. And if you really do need to share, there's an option for that. The $19/year Pro version has even more features.

OhLifev
ohlife.com
Keep a journal using the easiest possible interface—email. Sign up and OhLife will email you at whatever time of day (or week) you think is best to ask how your day went. You send a reply (include a photo if you want) and whatever you send is stored in your private OhLife account for your to access (and edit) later.
• Totally Free!

Simplenote
simplenoteapp.com
Judging by the name, you may think this site is a simple way to take notes and you'd be correct. There are no photos or multimedia, just notes. They can be tagged, easily reorganized, and moved around as needed, with a version history easily available after you make changes. The free version comes with ads, but does a great job syncing up with the Simplenote smartphone apps.

Spaaze
www.spaaze.com/home
Dubbed the "infinite virtual cork board," Spaaze indeed takes on that look with a cork background (which you can customize), and the ability to add as many digital post-its or index cards as you want. Add buttons to jump to new areas of the board so the infinite canvas keeps growing.

Quabel
quabel.com
Distraction-free writing software abounds, but Quabel is one of the few Web-based distraction-free writing spaces. You don't even need to sign up to try it. It's not completely void of buttons, but it certainly has a lot less than Google Drive. You get five documents to edit for free.

QuietWrite
www.quietwrite.com
Another distraction-free writing tool, QuietWrite's editor saves as you go (if you're signed up) and will export what you write to a post on WordPress or make it public on QuietWrite for other writers to read.
• Totally Free!

Scribble
www.tryscribble.com
Scribble makes it possible to start building your own wiki almost instantly. It uses markdown syntax for editing pages, so you can type and type without distraction. Adding collaborators is simple, and you can insert all you like. With the free version, you're limited to five wikis.

SpiderScribe
www.spiderscribe.net
This mind-mapper/brainstormer looks so good because it's Flash-based. It's free for starters when you only need three private maps for a single user. Unlike some other mind-maps, SpiderScribe lets you embed outside info, from images to video to maps.

Springpad
springpad.com
Springpad's strength leans toward images, almost like Pinterest, but with note-taking abilities and less social interaction. Organize "Springs" by tag or by category—text, images, to-do tasks, Web links, files, events, and more. Use the apps on your handheld or iPad to access your collections on the go.
• Read PCMag's review of Springpad.
• Totally Free!

ThoughtBoxes
thoughtbox.es
Ready to give some mind-mapping a try? ThoughtBoxes gives you three 'trains of thought' for free and off you go with organizing your ideas. The site provides examples of what you can do with these thoughts, specifically building tasks around them. Add a new box when you get a new thought to deal with, and color-code it as needed.

Office, Résumés, RSS Feed Readers

OFFICE

Google Drive
docs.google.com
Frequently evolving, Google's online-only office suite (formerly called Docs) doesn't format things quite like Microsoft Office Web Apps, or have the sheer number of tools found at Zoho, but it makes up for that in speed, simplicity, and efficiency. Store any kind of document with the service, and edit word docs, spreadsheets, presentations, and drawings. Even use a form to make a Web-capable survey. To share a document, just send access via email.
• Read PCMag's review of Google Docs (Summer 2011).

Microsoft Office Web Apps
skydrive.live.com
Got Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or OneNote documents stored online with Windows Live SkyDrive? Edit them without even owning the full Microsoft Office suite via Office Web Apps. They mimic many of the features of the full app—more than enough to compete with Google Drive—right in the browser. Multiple users can edit and collaborate on the same document at the same time.
• Read PCMag's review of Office Web Apps.
• Totally Free!

PaperRater
paperrater.com
Afraid you might have clung a little too closely to your source text? PaperRater will not only check grammar, spelling, and word choice, it looks for plagiarized passages. Remember kids: paraphrase!
• Totally Free!

PDFZen
pdfzen.com
Viewing PDFs online is easy (try Google Drive). But what about editing them—or at least annotating and scribbling on them? For that, sign into the free PDFzen site. It'll also edit DOC, XLS, ODT, and RTF files, all of which you can drag right to the site to open, without even creating an account. Sign up and you can even use the site to send a virtual fax to someone.
• Totally Free!

Prezi.com
prezi.com
Does Prezi's unique, single-canvas zooming make you pay more attention to the technology being used rather than the content of a presentation? Maybe, but it's so damn cool. Put all the elements of your presentation in one space, set up the jumps you want from item to item, and Prezi animates them for you in a final output created in Adobe Flash, so you can take it with you. A free account means your presentations, up to 100MB worth, are shared by default. You have to pay $59 a year to go private.
• Read PCMag's review of Prezi.com.

Present.me
present.me
Another online option to replace PowerPoint for presentations, Present.me lacks the Prezi bells and whistles, but makes up for it with simplicity and share-ability. For free, you can create three 15-minute presentations a month.

PrintWhatYouLike.com
www.printwhatyoulike.com
Want to print part of a webpage, but not the entire thing? Load that page through PrintWhatYouLike.com. You'll get to drag and select just the important parts, and you can even change the font, font size, and background colors. Then send it to your printer, so you print what you like. Add the bookmarklet for easy access from a browser toolbar.
• Totally Free!

SlideRocket
www.sliderocket.com
Our Editors' Choice for online-based presentation building was recently purchased by VMware, and hopefully it won't change much. The free plan for "lite" users still gives you the same elegant interface that made our reviewer a believer in making presentations in the cloud. Get started by importing existing PPT files and Google Drive presentations.
• Read PCMag's review of SlideRocket.

Sync.in
sync.in
The various office-style Web apps excel at online collaboration, and that's what Sync.in is all about. It's a Web-based word processor at its simplest, but it's really meant to be used by multiple users in real-time, with instant updates, comments, chat, versioning, and even a "time slider," so you can see previous comments and iterations if you come in late.

Zoho Docs
docs.zoho.com
The free edition of Zoho Docs only provides 1GB of space for free (really just a taste to get started). But if you don't need much, you'll find excellent integration of the usual word processor, spreadsheets, and presentations to work on securely-stored files.
• Read PCMag's review of Zoho Docs.

RÉSUMÉS

Enthuse.me
www.enthuse.me
Use your Facebook or LinkedIn profile to get started building a site at Enthuse.me that's a little more personal than professional. In fact, connect it to even more services and you'll be building out a page that creates a pretty good portrait of you and your areas of expertise.

Kinzaa
kinzaa.com
Do you like the look of the infographics that litter the Web, making sure data is as delicious as ice cream? Of course you do, and your potential boss likes them even more. Make your résumé as infographical as you can using Kinzaa. The Web-based résumé is attractive and easy to share, but you can also print it out as a PDF for potential employers.
• Totally Free!

Resume.io
resume.io
If you need an old-school text résumé built fast, Resume.io is the place to stop. The final design is classic and hassle-free to build. It's not the place to go for those who want a lot of design control; it's for rushing a résumé from brain to page.
• Totally Free!

Re.vu
re.vu
PCMag's Editors' Choice for online résumé builder does not make a typical résumé. It's more of a personalized, graphical webpage to show prospective employers. It's built with data imported from the one source that should be true—your own LinkedIn account. Then you can tweak it to make a perfect reflection of your experience and abilities.
• Read PCMag's review of Re.vu.
• Totally Free!

Zerply
www.zerply.com
Zerply creates a personal Web résumé for you to show the new boss. Themes are limited on the freemium version. There are plenty of social-networking extras built in—Zerply is practically its own social network—to get you talking to your fellow unemployed people.
• Read PCMag's review of Zerply.

RSS FEED READERS

Feedly
www.feedly.com
Feedly is easily the most gorgeous front-end site for access your Google Reader. Feedly makes those RSS feeds look like magazine content, so reading online becomes a pure pleasure again. The smartphone and tablet apps (also free) mimic the look perfectly.
• Totally Free!

Google Reader
www.google.com/reader
Google's RSS reader is now the premiere product of its type, both online and off (most downloadable RSS readers sync with your settings at Google). It's quick, easy to navigate, and easy to manage. It also makes it simple to share your favorite posts from the blogosphere and beyond.
• Read PCMag's review of Google Reader.
• Totally Free!

Netvibes
www.netvibes.com
Netvibes lets you view your RSS feeds and more in a sleek view. Of course, if you still love movable Widgets full of data, such as those for email, search, weather, and shopping, they remain a viewing option.

Good Noows
goodnoows.com
Considered by some to be the best alternative there is to Google Reader, Good Noows (Get it? Me neither.) also gives you control over the layout of the page, giving each topic section a view like "front page," "Guttenberg letters," "tweet stream," and others. It's nowhere near as speedy as the competition, but it sure is pretty.
• Totally Free!

Small Business

SMALL BUSINESS

AceProject
www.aceproject.com
Unlimited users on two projects for free? That's a good deal, especially with the 250MB of free space and free time-tracking AceProject throws your way.
• Read PCMag's review of AceProject.

AnyMeeting
anymeeting.com
Set up a free account and you could soon be having Web conferences with anywhere from two to 200 people (ads pay for it). AnyMeeting offers email invites and video broadcasting, and it can display your presentations to others via screen sharing. The audio portion can go VoIP over the Web or via a conference call number AnyMeeting provides. You can also record everything for posterity (or blackmail).
• Read PCMag's coverage of AnyMeeting.

Asana
asana.com
Individuals will find Asana to be a strong to-do list organizer; teams of up to 30 people will see it as a full project management app (you'll pay $100/month for over 30). Thoughtful design, fluid interface elements, and room for plenty of users make it a powerful tool.

• Read PCMag's review of Asana.

Bitrix24
www.bitrix24.com
Ready to get your small business on the cloud? A 12-user team gets 5GB of online storage for the cost of nothing at Bitrix24. It's like a small-biz social network with an activity stream page for all that's happening within the company. It allows employees to collaborate and share information, manage tasks, message or chat in real-time, and schedule things on a shared calendar.
• Read PCMag's coverage of Bitrix24 (Beta).

CanvasDropr
www.canvasdropr.com
This site allows collaboration among a team on just about anything. You create a "meeting room table" by dragging files of almost any time to the interface, which you can then move around and zoom in and out on. Team members (a max of five with the free version) can draw or write notes on the items on the table. You get three projects with 2GB of total storage for free.

Doodle
www.doodle.com
If you need a service just to schedule a meeting, visit Doodle. It will send out the invite with your suggested meeting times and then let others get back to you with a mutually agreeable spot on the calendar.
• Read PCMag's review of Doodle.

Expensify
www.expensify.com
Expensify lets you track all your spending and receipts via a mobile app. The Web interface syncs with all the entries from the handheld and creates the reports you need to get paid back.

Groopt
www.groopt.com
Think of Groopt as project management for the non-business. With a Facebook-like interface for collaboration, it's perfect for small groups of any kind, from families to neighbors to students. It has a special emphasis on fraternities and sororities. It supports full file sharing, tracking of what the group has done, communication tools, a group calendar, and even the ability to set up a Web storefront, though setting up a custom site will cost you.

LiveMinutes
liveminutes.com
Most of us want to forget meetings; LiveMinutes wants to make them
memorable. It's for meeting and working on things simultaneously, in real-time, with up to 20 people. The excellent interface makes it easy to share documents or videos, and annotate them; everything you do is recorded (even the audio) for a report that goes to everyone who attended.
• Totally Free!

Meetings.io
meetings.io
If you can't get people to sign up for Google+ Hangouts and they won't install Skype, how can you video chat for a meeting? Flash-based Meetings.io doesn't require an account (but it helps). Set up a meeting and mail out the invite to up to five attendees with your unique meeting URL. You can even embed a Meeting.io room on your webpage. Once inside, sharing documents and taking notes is part of the interface.
• Totally Free!

Scribblar
www.scribblar.com
With Scribblar, you can jump into quick whiteboarding with multiple users. Sign up, create a "room," send invites, and you're off and running. Make it public or private. The board itself has all the usual tools for making objects or text boxes and you can change the properties of all of them after they're drawn, even if they were drawn by someone else in the room.

Vyew
vyew.com
Vyew lets you create online meeting spaces (up to 20) that are always active for sharing and annotating content. You can video chat with up to 10 people and ads cover your cost.

Wedoist
wedoist.com
The makers of the Todoist online task manager for individuals built Wedoist for team projects. Sign up is fast. So is inviting others to work on projects you create. (You can have a team of three for free.) You share updates in an interface like a Facebook wall, but with the option to upload attachments, add tasks for the group, assign tasks to individuals on the team, and chat with those who are online. It keeps a full, searchable history of what you have accomplished as you go.

WeWorked
weworked.com
Need free online timesheets with up to 25 users accounts for an unlimited number of projects? That's what WeWorked provides (with some premium extras). For no cost, you can track balances and get approvals and reminders. Plus, it's all kept secure online for access anywhere.

Wiggio
wiggio.com
Wiggio was born out of a frustration with online collaboration. It offers the full litany of features that are useful for any group: virtual meetings, file sharing and storage, meeting scheduling, task lists, polls, events, and mass-messaging (even SMS) between members.
• Totally Free!

Zoho Projects
www.zoho.com/projects
The free version of Zoho Projects only lets you manage one project and gives your team only 10MB of space. If you can work within those restrictions, you'll find a vast set of features for communication and collaboration.
• Read PCMag's review of Zoho Project.

Social Networks, Surveys/Forms, Tasks

SOCIAL NETWORKS

Buffer
bufferapp.com
Want to schedule a Twitter, LinkedIn, or Facebook status update to appear later? Get a Buffer account and you can do that easily, even from within apps like Flipboard or Zite, via email, or using browser extensions.

Everyme
everyme.com
Create a private social network for group messaging with only your family or friends or co-workers; not everything you say has to be part of the bigger social scene. Everyme has mobile apps for iPhone and Android.
• Totally Free!

FamilyLeaf
familyleaf.com
Another private social network for sharing photos, video, status, and having conversations, this one specifically targets families that have far-flung members.
• Totally Free!

HootSuite
hootsuite.com
Not only can you read, post, and manage all aspects of your social networking in HootSuite, you can also use it to track statistics. The free version monitors up to five social profiles and a couple of RSS feeds. It shows ads to keep costs down, but all the social analytics, such as click stats and retweet reports, are free. It will also schedule the status updates you want to send.
• Read PCMag's review of HootSuite.

Jolicloud
my.jolicloud.com/welcome
Jolicloud has a new way to get access to everything you've stored in the social networks and beyond—your very own personal cloud. Connect this service to all the online sites you use and it makes it easier than ever to browse the contents and media. You can view it on the webpage or a handheld or using its own JoliOS operating system.

Kippt
kippt.com
The train of Web apps that aggregate all your social feeds never stops. Kippt is the latest, handling your Twitter, Github, Pocket, Readability, Buffer, Instapaper, Facebook, Tumbler, and App.net posts as one big searchable cloud.

Mingly
ming.ly
Mingly aggregates information from all the contacts across all your social media profiles, and creates one big address book for you. It also generates a feed of info on important things to keep track of, like changes in employment, relationship, or age, so you can follow up with people when it's most important.

RebelMouse
www.rebelmouse.com
RebelMouse wants to be your social front page. Sign up with your accounts at Facebook, Google+, Twitter, and Instagram. Give your RebelMouse site a name (using a domain name of your choice will eventually be $3 a month). The site builds you a Pinterest-like front page to access all your social media, and you can make posts from the page; use the bookmarklet to share things you see online instantly.

TweetDeck by Twitter
www.tweetdeck.com
Twitter's power-user tool for accessing tweets provides multiple, searchable columns of newsfeeds for your timeline, your lists, and even Facebook, if you want. It can also post a scheduled status update to Twitter and/or Facebook with pictures attached.

Viralheat
www.viralheat.com
For free, Viralheat can manage up to seven social media profiles, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+. It handles the things any aggregator tool should, including account filtering, previews of posts, URL shortening, scheduled posts, and a full publishing history.

SURVEYS/FORMS

JotForm
www.jotform.com
JotForm claims it's the easiest form builder. Test that out for free by building an online survey form with its templates to get up to 100 responses a month (more will cost you $9.95 a month).

SurveyMonkey
www.surveymonkey.com
Big names use SurveyMonkey to gather data, and so can you. For free, you can ask a ten question survey and then record up to 100 responses. Send out invites to surveys via social networks, and you'll get all the responses you need in no time.

Wufoo
wufoo.com
Wufoo gives you a simple interface to create up to three surveys at a time, each with ten fields and 100 responses allowed per month. The built-in HTML form builder makes it a breeze to create and then drop the survey into your own site.

TASKS

Do
www.do.com
Salesforce.com's Do is a productivity power-up, a "social tasks app" for tracking projects and to-do lists on up to 10 deals at a time with a limit of 1,000 contacts for the freemium version. If you have multiple users and need unlimited contacts, fees start at $50 a month for three users.

Producteev
www.producteev.com
Producteev is an entire ecosystem for task management, for you and one other person in the free version. It's not only on the Web, but also available on Mac, Windows, iPhone, and Android, so you can sync to-do lists across all your devices.

TaskUp
www.taskup.com
Sign up for TaskUp with a Google, Facebook, or Windows account, and from there start adding things to the to-dos, organizing them into lists as you see fit. Everything is auto-saved as you go and it's easy to search for tasks.

Todoist
todoist.com
Here your tasks are called projects, but otherwise you're looking at a powerful to-do list at Todoist. Sub-tasks are available from the start (unlike with some of the competition), plus the usual litany of features, like prioritizing tasks, drag-and-drop reordering, and project labels. There are plug-ins for browsers and email clients; views for your handheld; and apps for Windows and Mac that all sync your task data.

Toodledo
www.toodledo.com
Its high customizability makes it a little more complicated, but Toodledo is worth it for the task-heavy user. Use it to see what you're working on the most, view your tasks in a calendar view, organize task by folder, and track your time. You can even make a hotlist of the items that are the most important to complete. Naturally, you can call up the list on your smartphone, too, or print out a little to-do booklet to carry with you.

Remember the Milk
www.rememberthemilk.com
Few Web-based task managers come close to having the depth and breadth of features that Remember the Milk does. Sync it with your main online calendars, handhelds, and social networks, and even with Microsoft Outlook, and you'll never forget to do an important task again.

Sandglaz
www.sandglaz.com
Sandglaz provides you with a set of grids to drop your list of to-dos into, organized how you want so things are prioritized. For free, you get three grids (and can go up to eight with referrals).

Strike
www.strikeapp.com
Strike is simplicity itself and the site doesn't even require you to create an account. You'll get an instant example of a Strike task list to show you how it works, which you can then personalize. Just share the unique URL for the list with someone, and he or she can contribute tasks, too.
• Totally Free!

WorkFlowy
workflowy.com
Make an outline for your life's projects with WorkFlowy. It's an editable plain text page you keep online to access from anywhere (including from free smartphone apps). Change it as often as you like and all that you do is automatically saved. You can zoom into any item on the list to add sub-items, going deeper and deeper.
• Totally Free!

Timelines, Video/Netcasts, Voice

TIMELINES

Preceden
www.preceden.com
Flexible as they come, Preceden will help you make a timeline in no time. You can group similar events as needed. They can be embedded on another site or turned to PDFs to print. For the free version, all timelines are public, but $29/year lets you make them private.

Tiki-Toki
www.tiki-toki.com
Tiki-Toki's timelines are, simply put, beautiful, with an emphasis on design that other apps lack. Using big images for a background and thumbnails for each timeline entry makes all the difference. You get one timeline for free; $5 a month lets you create up to five timelines with group editing privileges.

timetoast
www.timetoast.com
Whether you're using it for fun or for serious work, timetoast has you covered with tools that convert the timeline instantly from linear to grid. Publish yours for all to see—all timelines are shared—and get the embed code to put it in other webpages (à la YouTube videos).
• Totally Free!

WhenInTime
whenintime.com
A business-like timeline builder, WhenInTime features a more detailed linear look at events with big boxes for notes. Timelines are easily embedded at other sites.
• Totally Free!

VIDEO/NETCASTS

Animoto
animoto.com
The lite version of Animoto will have you making 30-second video greetings in no time. For any occasion, upload your still images and video clips, pick out some pre-set music tracks, and Animoto does the rest, making it look professionally spliced. Full-length, downloadable videos bring the price to $30 a year.

Magisto
www.magisto.com
Take a video you've already shot, feed it into Magisto, and pick some music. You are limited to 16 videos of no more than 600MB in total size, and the combined length must be under 15 minutes. The site works with Google Drive, so you can upload video there first. Magisto then cleverly edits things together. What comes out is more artsy than what went in, even if you don't control what goes on the cutting room floor. Downloading a video to store on your own will cost $.99 on up, depending on the quality.
• Totally Free!

Screenr
www.screenr.com
Need to take a screencast on your Mac or PC? This website will, using a Java app. You can record everything on your monitor screen—not just what's in your browser—to publish as an animated, screen-grab movie. It even includes your voice-over audio. Then share it with anyone, even via a social network. Log in with Facebook, Twitter, Google, Yahoo, LinkedIn, or Windows Live IDs, whichever you prefer.

Ustream.tv
www.ustream.tv
The fastest and probably best way to live-stream yourself, your on-screen work, or any other kind of home-grown live programming to the Web is our PCMag Editors' Choice for live video broadcast, Ustream. The free version gives you 10GB of video storage for your broadcasts, and your video stream gets ads.
• Read PCMag's review of Ustream.tv.

WeVideo
www.wevideo.com
If you want to edit down some of the video you've uploaded to Youtube, Facebook, Instagram, Dropbox, Flickr, or Google Drive, WeVideo has launched an online, drag-and-drop capable tool to do so. Add music, titles, themes, and effects as needed and re-share the final production online. WeVideo Lite is free and lets you export up to 15 minutes of video per month.

YouTube Video Editor
www.youtube.com/editor
Perhaps less an app than the platform synonymous with online video, Google's YouTube site also sports an online-only video editor. The features are limited to cutting edges, splicing together clips with a few transitions, and adding some music or titles. It works with your video uploads, or any video with a Creative Commons license for remixing.
• Totally Free!

VOICE

Google Voice
www.google.com/voice
Most voice over IP and messaging services (think Skype) require a download, but not Google Voice. Get a Google Voice number and with it comes a one-stop inbox for voicemail (which it transcribes) and text messages. It will even help you place a call on your own phone. Pair it with your other voice services and you'll have a communication power tool. (It's free, but calling overseas will cost you.)
• Read PCMag's review of Google Voice.
• Totally Free!

CallingVault
callingvault.com
CallingVault lets you take control of calls by providing you with a singular phone number that also supports voicemail and SMS. Make sure it's the only number you give out if you want your real number to be private, and it can be used to block and screen people and to send text messages right from the desktop.