The 45 Best AI Tools for 2026 (Tried and Tested)
It’s 2026, and more than three years have passed since the AI boom was ignited by the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022. AI continues to embed itself in our personal and professional lives, and agentic AI (AI that can autonomously take actions to achieve a goal) is the hot new trend. However, my list of the 45 best AI tools that are actually useful hasn’t changed much. The best AI tools by category AI assistants: ChatGPT , Grok , Claude , Gemini Video generation: Synthesia , Google Veo , OpusClip Image generation: Nano Banana , GPT-4o , Midjourney Meeting assistants: Fathom , Nyota Automation: n8n , Manus Research: Deep Research , NotebookLM Writing: Rytr , Sudowrite Search engines: Google AI Mode , Perplexity , ChatGPT search Graphic design: Canva Magic Studio , Looka App builders & coding tools: Lovable , Cursor Knowledge ma...