This is a “your mileage may vary” I do NOT support all of these as useful…but it was on the Internet. List was sent in by a former student

Over 1000 upvotes:

1. Google Maps: Navigation app – https://www.google.com/maps
2. Blender: 3D modeling software – https://www.blender.org/
3. VLC: Video player – https://www.videolan.org/index.html
4. The Windows Snipping Tool: Screen capture tool – https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4027213/windows-open-snipping-tool-and-take-a-screenshot
5. Space Engine: Space exploration simulator – http://spaceengine.org/
6. Wikipedia: Online encyclopedia – https://www.wikipedia.org/
7. MuseScore: Music notation software – https://musescore.org/en
8. Audacity: Audio editing software – https://www.audacityteam.org/
9. Handbrake: video converter – https://handbrake.fr/
10. Zotero: Reference manager – https://www.zotero.org/
11. Desmos.com: Online Calculator – https://www.desmos.com/
12. Calibre: ebook manager – https://calibre-ebook.com/download
13. Notepad++: Text Editor – https://notepad-plus-plus.org/
14. stud.io: Lego simulator – https://studio.bricklink.com/v2/build/studio.page
15. Search Everything: Instant file search software – https://www.voidtools.com/
16. LaTeX: Document software – https://www.latex-project.org/
17. http://archive.org/: Contains music, movies, books, software, games, and webpages – http://archive.org/
18. Linux/Apache/Postgres/Gcc: Various Linux based OS’s, webservers, compilers, etc. – https://www.linux.org/
19. Discord: Chat and Communication software – https://discordapp.com/
20. OBS Studio: Streaming and Recording software – https://obsproject.com/
21. Krita: Digital design – https://krita.org/en/
22. R: Statistics software – https://www.r-project.org/
23. pfSense: Firewall software – https://www.pfsense.org/
24. FreeNAS: File server software – http://www.freenas.org/
25. Gimp: Digital design – https://www.gimp.org/
26. OpenSCAD: 3D Model scripting software – http://www.openscad.org/
27. This list – https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/7x639l/what_free_software_is_so_good_you_cant_believe/
28. Malwarebytes: Malware protection – https://www.malwarebytes.com/
29. Unity: Game design software – https://unity3d.com/
30. https://www.draw.io/: Online diagram software – https://www.draw.io/
31. Paint.NET: Image design – https://www.getpaint.net/
32. Draftsight: Free CAD – https://www.3ds.com/products-services/draftsight-cad-software/free-download/
33. 7Zip: File archiving – http://www.7-zip.org/
34. Plex: Media storage access – https://www.plex.tv/
35. Libre Office: Document editing suite – https://www.libreoffice.org/
36. KeePass: Password manager – https://keepass.info/
37. DaVinci Resolve: Video color correcting/editing – https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/
38. Inkscape: Vector art software – https://inkscape.org/en/
39. Google’s Apps: Google’s document suite (Docs, Sheets, Gmail, etc) – https://www.google.com/
40. Duolingo: Language learning – https://www.duolingo.com/
41. Darktable: Photo workflow a la lightroom – https://www.musicpd.org/ and https://www.darktable.org/
42. MPD/Mopidy: F/OSS music player daemon – https://www.mopidy.com/
43. Doom shareware: A classic game – a 3.5” floppy disk