On this page, I am going to compile a huge list of different types of free software. This is my ultimate free software list. This is a list of what I consider to be the best free software out there, but it does not necessarily have any music applications. Much of this free software is known as open-source software. This is a term denoting software for which the original source code is made freely available and may be redistributed and modified. Typically, when you have a large community working on a software application you can address bugs faster and there are safeguards that you normally don’t find in the software you pay for.
There are a few different types of licenses associated with this type of free software. For the most part, you are free to download and distribute it. In some cases, you are free to change it, but in many cases, you are not allowed to charge money for any changes or sell it. That would be a violation of the software license. Believe it or not, some of the best software available today is open-source free software. You will be amazed at what your computer can do.
In many cases you can find a free software program that will replace something you pay big money to use. For example, there are great alternatives to Microsoft products and Adobe products. These types of free software applications can do things like video editing, audio editing, screen capture, office applications, photo editing, virtual computing, recording music, multimedia players, and a whole lot more! All downloads come from the Vender that produced the software. None of the software listed is stored on this site. In most cases, the links just take you to the main page provided by the vender.
The Official Free Software List
Virtual Computers
You can create a virtual computer environment on any computer and install different types of operating systems. The main operating system would be considered your host operating system. Other operating systems through Virtual platforms would be your virtual environments. You can do this with computers running Apple, Windows, Linux, Unix, and Solaris operating systems as your host. There are a few software applications that do this but the best one is an application by Oracle called Virtual Box. When you download this application be sure to get the extension package that comes with it. This is a separate download.
Once you download and install this program you can build a virtual computer. After that, you will need an operating system to install on your newly built virtual computer. If you own an older version of windows you can install that. I would suggest that you download and install a Linux operating system and experiment with it. There are many different versions to choose from, but here are some of the more popular versions.
Ubuntu is probably the most popular version of Linux. The GUI (graphic users interface) is intuitive and there is a Linux store that allows you to download and install more applications. Just about all of them are open source.
Mint is another great Linux operating system. The purpose of Linux Mint is to produce a modern, elegant and comfortable operating system which is both powerful and easy to use. Linux Mint is one of the most popular desktop Linux distributions and used by millions of people. The Gui has a look and feel of a Windows machine. It even has a start button.
Fedora is another popular Linux operating system. It works sort of like Red Hat. It is like a free version of Red Hat.
Elementary OS is a Linux-based operating system that has a GUI similar to Apple computers. So if you are used to the OS X operating system give this one a try.
Android OS, yes you can also download a version of the android operating system and install it in a virtual environment as well. turn your laptop into a google computer.
You now have 5 operating systems that you can download and install in your virtual machines. Gnome is built into that most of these Linux systems. What is Gnome? Check out the most current version of Gnome. Here is the extensive list of Gnome Applications. you can also find versions of OS-X for PC. However, Turning your P.C. computer into an Apple is against the license agreement. Apple’s OS can only be installed on Apple hardware. So if you do this don’t expect to get support from Apple. Do simple Google searches to find other operating systems. When I was testing Virtual Box I had as many as 7 operating systems open on my computer at one time without any issues. Keep in mind that all your system resources are shared by the number of operating systems you have open.
Multimedia Players
Today’s software multimedia players have evolved to play a number of different media types. These software applications will play CDs, DVDs, and Blue-ray disks. They will display your photos and play your personal videos. Multimedia players can even stream live TV and radio. over the internet. They can stream movies over the internet and they will stream TV on demand. They will play all the music and digital copies of movies you have on your hard drive, Some multimedia platforms will even display the weather forecast and play older video games. This is just the beginning of what these media players can do.
Kodi: is my all-time favorite multimedia player. It is the most versatile player I have ever used and it does so much. When Kodi is installed on your computer it is completely empty. You scan your library into Kody and it will automatically download all the artwork for all the media you own. Kodi also has an impressive list of add ons that can be downloaded that will expand the capabilities of the program. These addons will stream movies and TV from different locations.
Kodi was formally known as XBMC or Xbox Media Center. The media center software found in Xbox was reworked and renamed Kodi.
Media Portal: is another popular media player. It does many of the things that Kodi does
VideoLAN or VLC: is yet another popular media player. It plays many types of media and if you’re looking for a good DVD player this is it.
NextPVR: is a personal video recorder application for Microsoft Windows, NextPVR makes it easy to watch or record live TV, and provides great features like series recordings, web scheduling, playing music, video and image files, iPhone/iPad client application, Kodi/Emby integration, and much more.
MediaMonkey: is yet another popular music player with many features. It supports many types of media file formats and it is known for organizing your media library.
Winamp: is a classic media player from the 1990s’ It became popular and provided innovations to media players like plugins and visualizations. It also provided Shoutcast Radio. It is in the process of being redone but the current version is still really good. Winamp also plays video. Back in the day, this media player set the standard for others to follow. Famous plugin visualizations like milk drop were developed on Winamp. Winamp also had plugins for audio that improved the mix.
RealPlayer: is another classic player that has brought innovation to the world. Their plugin allows you to download videos from the internet. Different types of media formats were developed by RealPlayer. To this day it is still a great media player. Check it out.
QuickTime: was developed by apple. It is another great media player and many software apps relied on QuickTime to play video for their software programs in the 1990s’. It is no longer developed for Windows but many of its features can be found in the iTunes software.
Windows Media Center: was loved by many users. Microsoft decided to abandon Windows Media Center in later versions of its operating system. Windows 10 just comes with Windows Media Player and Grove Music. The current media players found in Windows are nowhere near as good as Windows Media Center, but the classic player will not work in Windows 10. This is one reason why Kodi became so popular. Kodi is a great substitute for this classic player. However, I do miss the old Windows Media Center, but Kodi is much better. If you want to tinker with Windows Media Center while using windows 10 then click the link below.
Video Editing
DaVinci Resolve: is probably the best free video editing software you can find. The free version is incredible. This software combines professional 8K editing, color correction, visual effects, and audio post-production all in one software tool! You can instantly move between editing, color, effects, and audio with a single click.
HitFilm Express: gives you access to an incredible free video-editor with great video production capabilities. There is a community of 3.9 million filmmakers that use this software.
Lightworks: is another video editing application that works well. Many of these video editing software apps have a free version or you can upgrade and get a paid version. Lightworks has an awesome free version and it covers the basic functions of video editing.
VideoPad Video Editor: is another free video editing tool that works well. Check it out and see what it can do.
Kdenlive: is an open-source video editor. It is a great choice if you are using the Linux operating system. there is aversion for just about every version of Linux. there is also a version for Windows and Mac
Shotcut: is yet another awesome video editor. It is available on all platforms and it does 4k editing too. It is open-source with way too many features to list. Check it out
Screen capturing
Open Broadcast Software: aka OBS is a free open source program. It will record video from your webcam. You can also capture your computer screen and turn it into a video. It will create video formats of your computer screen in mp4 and a RealPlayer format is known as flv. In addition to this, it is a broadcast center for those who like to broadcast on Facebook live and YouTube live. This is really incredible software. Check it out.
Flashback Express: is another good program for capturing your video cam and your computer screen. This software includes an editor and the free version does not add watermarks. Check it out
Debut Video Capture Software: offers a free version for non-commercial use only. If you will be using Debut at home you can download the free version.
CamStudio: is another free video screen capture software. there are some bugs that are being addressed in the next update, but overall, this software is pretty good.
FreeCam: will easily create screencasts, edit recorded videos, and upload to YouTube. No watermark or time limits. Free Cam provides a full set of features for creating professional video lessons and e-Learning presentations.
Office Software
LibreOffice: is a great alternative to Microsoft Office. It can open Microsoft documents and it can even save files using Microsoft formats. In most cases, it can do the basic functions of Microsoft Office. It was forked from OpenOffice.org in 2010, which was an open-sourced version of the earlier StarOffice. It is the most up to date free office software available today.
Notepad++: is a free source code editor and Notepad replacement that supports several languages. Running in the MS Windows environment, its use is governed by GPL License.
Scribus: has evolved into one of the premier Open Source desktop applications today. Scribus has many unexpected touches, such as powerful vector drawing tools, support for a huge number of file types via import/export filters, emulation of color blindness or the rendering of markup languages like LaTeX or Lilypond.
GIMP: is a cross-platform image editor available for GNU/Linux, OS X, Windows, and more operating systems. Whether you are a graphic designer, photographer, illustrator, or scientist, GIMP provides you with sophisticated tools to get your job done. You can further enhance your productivity with GIMP thanks to many customization options and 3rd party plugins. It serves as a replacement for Adobe Photoshop.
Inkscape: is professional quality vector graphics software that runs on Windows, Mac OS X and GNU/Linux. It is used by design professionals and hobbyists worldwide, for creating a wide variety of graphics such as illustrations, icons, logos, diagrams, maps and web graphics.
Dia: is a GTK+ based diagram creation program for GNU/Linux, MacOS X, Unix, and Windows, and is released under the GPL license. Dia is roughly inspired by the commercial Windows program ‘Visio,’ though more geared towards informal diagrams for casual use. It can be used to draw many different kinds of diagrams. It currently has special objects to help draw entity relationship diagrams, UML diagrams, flowcharts, network diagrams, and many other diagrams. It is also possible to add support for new shapes by writing simple XML files, using a subset of SVG to draw the shape.
BRL-CAD: is a powerful cross-platform Open Source combinatorial Constructive Solid Geometry (CSG) solid modeling system that includes interactive 3D solid geometry editing, high-performance ray-tracing support for rendering and geometric analysis, network-distributed framebuffer support, image and signal-processing tools, path-tracing and photon mapping support for realistic image synthesis, a system performance analysis benchmark suite, an embedded scripting interface, and libraries for robust high-performance geometric representation and analysis.
Calibre: is a powerful and easy to use e-book manager. Users say it’s outstanding and a must-have. It’ll allow you to do nearly everything and it takes things a step beyond normal e-book software. It’s also completely free and open source and great for both casual users and computer experts.
PDFCreator: converts every printable document to PDF and many other formats. It converts your documents to PDF, JPG, PNG, TIF and more. You can also merge multiple documents to one file.
E-Sword: is a free bible software program that contains a huge library of commentaries, dictionaries, historical books, concordances, inspirational books, original manuscripts, maps, graphics, and a whole lot more. The library in book form is worth thousands of dollars alone. Now you can have this expensive library for free all on your computer. Everything is in public domain. You can also buy bible versions that are still under copyright. You can get the ESV version (A new Translation ) for free.
Utilities and Miscellaneous Software
7-Zip: is a file archiver with a high compression ratio. Usually, 7-Zip compresses to 7z format 30-70% better than to zip format. And 7-Zip compresses to zip format 2-10% better than most of the other zip compatible programs. It compresses and will unpack files from a variety of formats.
Macrium Reflect: the free version offers Free backup, disk imaging and cloning solution for commercial and personal use. Protect your data, upgrade your hard disk or try new operating systems in the safe knowledge that everything is securely saved in an easily recovered backup file. Macrium Reflect supports backup to local, network and USB drives. A very valuable software app.
The PC Decrapifier: is a free tool that helps remove programs, unnecessary startup items that can slow down your PC. It takes you step by step, giving you recommendations on what to remove, many of which can be removed unattended. It can be used to clean off most of the annoying software that is typically shipped with new PCs.
O&O ShutUp10: means you have full control over which comfort functions under Windows 10 you wish to use, and you decide when the passing on of your data goes too far. Using a very simple interface, you decide how Windows 10 should respect your privacy by deciding which unwanted functions should be deactivated.
Glary Utilities 5: is the number 1 Free, Powerful and All-in-one utility for cleaning your PC. It will boost PC speed and fixes frustrating errors, crashes, and freezes. It features one-click functionality and easy, automated options. There are over 20 tools to maximize your Computer’s performance.
CCleaner: is another great tool for cleaning your PC. It protects your privacy and makes your computer faster and more secure!
Speccy: is the place to start if you need to know what’s inside your PC. See a quick summary, or dive deeper into every aspect of your PCs hardware so you can make informed upgrade and purchasing decisions. This app is big on details.
Recuva: can recover pictures, music, documents, videos, emails or any other file type you’ve lost. And it can recover from any rewritable media you have memory cards, external hard drives, USB sticks and more! Unlike most file recovery tools, Recuva can recover files from damaged or newly formatted drives. Greater flexibility means a greater chance of recovery.
WinDirStat: is a disk usage statistics viewer and cleanup tool for various versions of Microsoft Windows.
Wireshark: is the world’s foremost and widely-used network protocol analyzer. It lets you see what’s happening on your network at a microscopic level and is the standard across many commercial and non-profit enterprises, government agencies, and educational institutions.
Malwarebytes: is comprehensive security that blocks malware and hackers. It protects you from threats that traditional antivirus software isn’t smart enough to stop.
Blender: is the free and open-source 3D creation suite. It supports the entirety of the 3D pipeline modeling, rigging, animation, simulation, rendering, compositing and motion tracking, even video editing and game creation.
HandBrake: is a tool for converting video from nearly any format to a selection of modern, widely supported codecs.
Free Blu-ray Ripper: is the best and most wonderful Free Blu-ray ripping software, which can help users rip Blu-ray movie to videos like MP4, MKV, MOV, AVI, WMV and even the high-definition HD MP4, HD MKV, etc
VSCD: is free video software that will convert video files to different formats. It creates and edits videos of any complexity. It will also convert audio files and grab audio files.
Freemake Video Converter: converts video and movies between 500+ formats and gadgets for free! Convert to MP4, MP3, AVI, WMV, DVD, iPhone, Android. Convert YouTube to any format. Absolutely free! No trials or limitations.
Download Freemake Video Converter
MakeMKV: is your one-click solution to convert video that you own into a free unencumbered format that can be played everywhere. MakeMKV is a format converter, otherwise called “transcoder”. It can read DVD and Blu-ray discs MakeMKV can also read Blu-ray discs protected with latest versions of AACS and BD+
Emulators
You can play your own video games from classic game consoles and play them on your PC. The first thing you will need is a way to interface your game cartridge with the PC. This is done with hardware like Retrode or something similar to it. You can get this hardware through Dragon Box. Once you obtain this hardware you need a small software app that will emulate the game console. There are many out there. Sometimes there are multiple emulators for one game console. To find out which ones I like the best just click on the game console below. You will be taken to a page where you can download the console.
Nintendo Super Nintendo N-64 Game Cube Nintendo Wii
Game Boy, Game Boy Color, Game Boy advanced
Super Nintendo Nintendo DS Nintendo 3DS Nintendo Wii-U
PlayStation Playstation 2 PlayStation 3 PSP
Saga Genesis Sega Saturn Sega Dreamcast
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