Artificial Intelligence is no longer a futuristic concept; it’s a practical tool that is reshaping industries, boosting productivity, and unlocking new creative potential. As of late 2025, AI applications have matured from simple curiosities into powerful assistants integrated into our daily workflows.
Whether you’re looking to leverage these tools for professional growth or are simply curious about the technology shaping our future, this guide is your starting point. We’ll explore the top 5 AI apps you can use today and introduce you to 5 outstanding free resources to kickstart your learning journey.
Top 5 AI Apps You Should Be Using Now
These applications represent the best in their class, offering a blend of power, usability, and cutting-edge features.
1. ChatGPT (by OpenAI)
- Function: Advanced Conversational AI & Multimodal Assistant
- Latest Status: As the pioneer in the field, ChatGPT continues to set the standard. Its latest versions have evolved far beyond text, seamlessly integrating real-time web browsing, data analysis with Python, and the ability to understand and generate images. It’s the ultimate digital Swiss Army knife for drafting emails, writing code, brainstorming ideas, summarizing complex documents, and creating custom GPTs for specific tasks.
- Best For: Virtually everyone – from students and professionals to developers and creatives.
2. Midjourney
- Function: State-of-the-Art AI Image Generation
- Latest Status: Operating primarily through Discord, Midjourney remains the leader for creating artistic and hyper-realistic images from text prompts. Its latest models excel at understanding nuanced prompts, generating coherent text within images, and maintaining character consistency across different scenes. The platform’s community-driven approach also makes it a vibrant space for inspiration and learning prompt engineering.
- Best For: Artists, designers, marketers, and content creators who need high-quality, custom visuals.
3. Perplexity AI
- Function: Conversational AI Search & Answer Engine
- Latest Status: Perplexity has carved out a niche as the “answer engine” for researchers and professionals who demand accuracy. Unlike traditional search engines, it provides direct, concise answers to questions and, crucially, cites its sources with clickable links. Its “Pro” search features offer deeper analysis and are invaluable for academic research, market analysis, and fact-checking.
- Best For: Researchers, academics, journalists, and anyone who needs reliable, well-sourced answers.
4. Notion AI
- Function: Integrated Productivity & Workspace Assistant
- Latest Status: Notion AI is a prime example of how AI can enhance an existing productivity ecosystem. Integrated directly into the Notion workspace, it helps users summarize meeting notes, draft documents, check for spelling and grammar, and even populate tables automatically. Its strength lies in its context-awareness; it works with the information you already have stored in Notion, making it a powerful tool for organizing and actioning your work.
- Best For: Students, project managers, and teams who already use Notion for knowledge management and collaboration.
5. ElevenLabs
- Function: Ultra-Realistic AI Voice Generation & Cloning
- Latest Status: ElevenLabs has set the industry benchmark for realistic text-to-speech and voice cloning. Its technology can generate speech that is rich in emotion and intonation, making it almost indistinguishable from human voice actors. With multilingual support and precise control over voice characteristics, it’s the go-to tool for creating audiobooks, video voiceovers, podcasts, and digital avatars.
- Best For: Content creators, podcasters, video producers, and developers needing high-quality voice generation.
5 Best Free Resources to Learn AI
Ready to go from user to creator? These world-class resources offer a structured path to understanding AI, from the basics to advanced concepts, at no cost.
1. Google AI Essentials
- What it is: An official introductory course from Google designed for everyone, regardless of technical background. It covers the fundamental concepts of what AI is, how it works, and its real-world applications.
- Link: Available through platforms like Coursera.
2. Elements of AI
- What it is: A comprehensive and highly-praised free online course from the University of Helsinki. It breaks down complex AI topics into easy-to-understand modules, covering everything from neural networks to the societal implications of AI. No advanced math or programming is required.
- Link:
www.elementsofai.com
3. fast.ai
- What it is: For those who want to get hands-on and learn to code,
fast.aiis one of the most practical courses available. Founded by Jeremy Howard, it takes a top-down, code-first approach, teaching you how to build and train state-of-the-art deep learning models with minimal jargon. - Link:
www.fast.ai
4. DeepLearning.AI (Coursera Audit)
- What it is: Founded by AI pioneer Andrew Ng, DeepLearning.AI offers numerous courses and specializations on Coursera. While the full certificate is paid, you can audit most courses for free, giving you access to all the video lectures and reading materials for foundational topics like Machine Learning and Deep Learning.
- Link: Search for “Machine Learning Specialization” by DeepLearning.AI on Coursera and choose the “Audit” option.
5. Hugging Face Courses
- What it is: Hugging Face is the central hub for the open-source AI community. Their free “NLP Course” (Natural Language Processing) is an essential, hands-on guide for anyone wanting to work with the models that power tools like ChatGPT. It teaches you how to use their libraries to build, train, and share your own models.
- Link:
www.huggingface.co/learn/nlp-course