11 tools a job seeker can use today at no cost, each with an honest note on where the free tier stops — plus the seven AI directories that list Standout, the link or badge each one asked us to carry, and the one link we refused to place.
Checked 2026-10-11 · No affiliate links · No paid placements
Three groups, in the order a job search actually runs: find the openings, get the vocabulary and the salary numbers right, then practise and keep track. Every card says what is free — and what isn’t.
The boards. All four are free to search and free to apply through — none of them charges a job seeker to be seen.
LinkedIn's own job search — and the only board that shows you who you already know at a company before you apply.
Free: Free to search, save and apply. Job search is not a Premium feature.
Where it stops: Applicant counts and “how you compare” are Premium-only, and Easy Apply means hundreds of applicants per posting — a tailored profile is what separates you there, not a faster click.
The largest general job aggregator, with a free résumé you can attach to applications.
Free: Free to search, apply, and upload a résumé.
Where it stops: Sponsored posts sit at the top of results, and its salary estimates are its own model — check the posting itself. Job alerts quietly stop if you never re-open the emails.
Every open United States federal job in one place, with a free résumé builder and saved searches.
Free: Free; no account needed to search.
Where it stops: US federal résumés follow their own rules (hours per week, grade levels, no tidy one-page limit), so a standard résumé screens out. US-only.
A remote-first board where most postings carry a stated salary band.
Free: Free to browse and apply; no account needed to read listings.
Where it stops: Most listings come from employers who pay to post, so the same companies recur. It is a slice of the remote market, not the whole of it.
Researching a profile is the same job as researching a job posting: find the vocabulary the role is actually described in, then use it. These four are the free sources.
The US Department of Labor's occupation database: for any job title, the tasks, skills and technologies that role is described by. The closest thing there is to an official keyword list for a job.
Free: Free, no account, no limits.
Where it stops: US-centric and written in government prose — mine it for terms, never paste it. It describes the occupation, not you.
O*NET's plain-language front door: browse by interest or industry and see the skills and tools each job uses.
Free: Free, no account.
Where it stops: The same underlying data as O*NET — use it for browsing, not as a second opinion.
Crowd-sourced pay by company and level — the number that turns “Senior Engineer” into a salary conversation.
Free: Free to read the pay data.
Where it stops: Self-reported and weighted towards large US tech employers. Treat it as a range to sanity-check an offer, not as your own market rate.
The US Labor Department's free career centre: a salary finder by metro area, a free résumé guide, local training and hiring events.
Free: Free, government-run, no account needed to browse.
Where it stops: US-only, and organised by government programme rather than by role.
The last mile: saying the answers out loud, getting a second opinion on the writing, and not losing track of twenty applications.
Google's free practice tool: answer real interview questions out loud and it shows you the words you leaned on, what you skipped, and how much you said.
Free: Free, no account, nothing recorded.
Where it stops: A fixed set of question banks (mostly tech and general roles) and no export — it is practice, not feedback from a person.
A free automated score for your résumé and LinkedIn profile — useful as a second opinion on ours.
Free: The résumé and LinkedIn profile checks can both be run free.
Where it stops: The free check is capped and the line-by-line rewrite suggestions are paid. Its rubric is not ours: a different score is not a contradiction, it is a different set of rules.
A job-application tracker: save postings from any board, see every application on one board, and build a résumé from the same data.
Free: Free tracking and résumé building for individual job seekers.
Where it stops: The free tier caps saved jobs and tailored résumés; team features are paid.
Seven AI-tool directories list Standout for free, and six of them list it on one condition: that our own site carries a link or badge back. That is the trade, it is disclosed on every card below, and the links are live in the site footer on every page. Nothing here was paid for, and no directory paid us to appear here.
Each card states the requirement in the directory’s own words wherever they print it, so you can check the claim rather than take it from us.
Badge or text link required · live 2026-10-11
A general AI-tool directory. It verifies the backlink itself at submit time, so the badge below is what holds the listing open.
What they asked for: Their submit page: “Free submission requires a public doforai backlink badge or direct doforai.tools link… Place this badge on your homepage, footer, or a public link page” — and the check runs automatically when you submit.
The listing: Free listing, reviewed within 72 hours. A paid route exists if you would rather not link out.
Badge required · live 2026-10-11
An AI-tool discovery directory with free browsing and no login. Its badge page publishes light and dark variants, but only as client-rendered markup — hence the locally drawn badge below, linked back to them.
What they asked for: Their submit page: “Yes — for free listings we ask you to. Your listing is published at no cost, and in return we ask you to add the badge (a link back to AInexfinder) to your site… we re-check periodically that it stays live — if the badge is removed, your listing may be removed too.” The badge is also a required step in their form: “Add Your Badge, Then Verify — Required to Submit”.
The listing: Free listing, reviewed in 24–48 hours, in exchange for the badge.
Footer link required · live 2026-10-11
“All the best AI tools in one place” — a curated AI-tool directory.
What they asked for: Free submission asks for a reciprocal link to AI Hustle on your own site (the submission form is embedded from Tally). We carry it in the site footer, on every page.
The listing: Free submission; approval is manual.
Site link required before submitting · live 2026-10-11
A curated AI-tool directory. It advertises a DR 63 do-follow backlink to listed tools — which is why the free tier asks for the link the other way.
What they asked for: Their submit page states the trade plainly: “Free with backlink, or $25 paid listing with no backlink required” — the free listing is gated on the site already carrying a link to aitoolzdir.com before you submit.
The listing: Free listing with a backlink in place; $25 one-off if you would rather not link out.
Footer link required · live 2026-10-11
An AI-tool directory with a submit-and-review queue.
What they asked for: Their submit page prints one required string — “Add the code to your footer” — and warns that it has to stay there: “To get a free dofollow link, you need to add and keep a backlink to aitoolcenter.com on your website.” The site footer carries that exact anchor.
The listing: Free dofollow link, published after review. A paid submit pack skips the backlink.
The exact markup we carry
<a href="https://aitoolcenter.com/" title="AI Tool Center">AI Tool Center</a>
Badge or text link required · live 2026-10-11
A curated directory of directories — it lists where a tool can be submitted, and publishes a target only after testing it. The paid plans are a done-for-you submission service.
What they asked for: The free tier is AI tools only and is gated on either their badge or a text link to aidirectori.es on the site's homepage or footer — plus a minimum site authority (an Ahrefs Domain Rating of 10, so a brand-new domain cannot use the free tier at all). Their paid plans drop both conditions.
The listing: Free tier: badge or homepage/footer text link, plus DR 10. Paid: $49 once, or $9.99 a month.
No link placed — we could not verify this one
Was an AI-for-job-search directory. The domain now serves a parking page, so a visitor clicking through would land on a domain-sale form instead of job-search tools.
Why there is no link: Checked twice on 2026-10-11 — a direct fetch and a second network path, both with a browser user-agent: aiforjobs.net serves a Spaceship “domain for sale” page (listed at $898), not a directory, and the Wayback Machine holds no snapshot of it ever having been one. The required homepage link is therefore NOT placed: sending a job seeker to a parked domain to protect a listing that may already be gone is a worse trade than losing the listing. If the directory comes back — or moves to another domain — its record goes back in the list above and the homepage link goes in with it.
For completeness: what we publish here, including the writing guide this URL used to be. All of it free to read.
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