You know that feeling. You're staring at a spreadsheet for three hours, or maybe you’re trying to figure out how to isolate a vocal track from a 1970s cassette recording, and you think to yourself that there has to be a better way. There usually is. Specifically, there's an ai for that.
It started as a simple aggregator. Back in the early days of the generative boom, Andrei Terentiev launched a site that was essentially a directory. It was a library of links. But it became the "App Store" of the machine learning era before the big players even realized they needed one.
The sheer scale of the directory
People underestimate the volume. We aren't talking about a few dozen chatbots anymore. As of now, the platform tracks over 12,000 different tools across thousands of categories. It’s overwhelming. It’s messy. It’s exactly how the internet used to feel before everything got siloed into three or four "super apps."
Most users land on the site looking for a quick fix. They want a logo. They want a legal contract summarized. But the real value lies in the obscure stuff. Take "TattoosAI" or niche forensic tools used by actual investigators. The site has become a living fossil record of the "Gold Rush" era of 2023 and 2024, showing which companies actually survived and which were just wrappers for GPT-4 that ran out of venture capital.
Honestly, the search bar is where the magic happens. You type in a specific pain point—"remove background noise from wind"—and you don't just get one result. You get ten. You get to see the pricing models, whether it’s a "freemium" tool or a subscription-only enterprise beast. This transparency is why it stayed relevant even as Google tried to bake AI results directly into the search engine. Sometimes you don't want an answer; you want a tool.
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Navigating the hype cycle
Let’s be real for a second. Half the tools on these lists are probably defunct by the time you click them. That’s the nature of the beast. The barrier to entry for building an AI application dropped so low that for a while, every developer with a weekend to spare was launching a "new" writing assistant.
The genius of "There’s An AI For That" was the timeline feature. It’s a chronological feed. You can literally watch the evolution of technology by scrolling back. In early 2022, it was all text-to-image. By 2024, it shifted to video generation and autonomous agents. Now, in 2026, we’re seeing a massive influx of "edge AI"—tools that run locally on your hardware instead of the cloud.
Why curation beats algorithms
Algorithms try to guess what you want based on your past behavior. That's fine for Netflix. It's terrible for productivity. When you have a specific technical problem, you need a curated database that allows for serendipity.
I remember looking for a way to automate my grocery list based on caloric density and macro-nutrients. I didn't want a "top 10" list from a tech blog that was clearly paid for by sponsors. I wanted a list of every single developer who had tried to solve that specific problem. The directory provides that. It’s democratic. A tool built by a student in Indonesia has the same listing space as a product from a billion-dollar startup in San Francisco.
The "Wrapper" Controversy
There’s a lot of talk about "GPT wrappers." Critics say these tools are useless because they just sit on top of OpenAI or Anthropic’s models. They aren’t "real" AI.
That's a narrow way to look at it.
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If a tool makes a complex prompt accessible to a plumber or a teacher who doesn't know what a "temperature setting" or a "system message" is, that tool has value. User experience is a feature. The platform doesn't discriminate; it lists them all and lets the users decide who wins. It’s survival of the fittest in its purest digital form.
How to actually use it without wasting time
Don't just browse. You'll lose four hours and come out with nothing but a headache.
First, define your workflow. Are you trying to save time (efficiency) or do something you literally cannot do yourself (capability)? If you're a writer, you don't need another LLM. You might, however, need an AI that specializes in "semantic search" for your own past notes.
Second, look at the "Save" counts. The community on the site acts as a giant filter. If a tool has 10,000 saves, it’s likely because it actually works. If it has three, you’re the guinea pig.
Third, check the "Alternative To" section. This is the killer feature. If you think Adobe Premiere is too expensive or too hard to learn, you can find the AI-first alternative that specifically mimics that workflow but automates the tedious cutting.
The impact on the job market
We keep hearing that AI will take jobs. It’s more likely that people who know how to navigate these directories will take the jobs of those who don't. Knowing that there's an ai for that is a skill in itself. It's "tool fluency."
Imagine two accountants. One does everything manually. The other uses a specialized tool found on a directory to categorize 5,000 transactions in thirty seconds. Who is more valuable? The answer is obvious, but the path to getting there requires staying updated with the sheer velocity of these releases.
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The future of the platform
As we move deeper into 2026, the directory is changing. It's becoming less about "apps" and more about "agents." We are seeing tools that don't just help you do a task—they do the task for you while you sleep.
The site now features sections for "AI Agents" that can browse the web, handle your email, and even manage your calendar without a human in the loop. This is a massive shift. The database is no longer just a list of hammers; it’s a list of workers.
Actionable insights for the modern professional
Stop Googling "best AI for X." You'll just get SEO-optimized listicles that are six months out of date. Instead, go directly to the source.
- Search by Task, Not Category: Use specific verbs. "Transcribe," "Upscale," "Synthesize."
- Verify the Privacy: Before uploading sensitive company data to a random tool you found, check if it's "SOC2 compliant" or if it stores data. Many niche tools are built by individuals, not corporations.
- Compare Costs: The site often lists "Free," "Freemium," and "Paid." Always check the "Free" versions first; the "wrapper" economy means many tools provide the same base functionality for vastly different prices.
- Use the Timeline: If you need the most cutting-edge tech, look at what was released in the last 48 hours. The pace hasn't slowed down; it has actually accelerated.
The reality is that "There's An AI For That" isn't just a catchy name anymore. It's a fundamental truth of the modern economy. Whether you're a creator, a developer, or just someone trying to get through a Friday afternoon, the solution to your bottleneck is likely already sitting in that database, waiting for you to find it.
Navigate to the site and filter by "Most Saved" for the current month. This gives you an immediate pulse on what the global community of early adopters actually finds useful right now. Compare the top-rated tool in your specific field against your current workflow to identify at least one manual task you can automate before the end of the week.