How We Choose and Check Resources

• Productivity tools, apps, websites, AI tools, courses, books and other resources that help people work, learn or build better.
• YouTube videos only when they are about self-improvement, AI, technology, learning or online business.
• Every listing links straight to the original website, never through a redirect chain.
• Every listing has both pros and cons, and most also say who it suits and who may not need it, so you can judge it for yourself rather than read a sales page.
• Anyone can suggest a resource. See how to submit a resource. Suggestions go through the same review as everything else.

• Low-effort listicles, dead links, paywalled demos and anything spammy.
• Duplicates. Each resource appears once: an automated test fails if two listings share a name, a page address or the same website, and it runs with every update.
• Claims we cannot back up. The daily legal review looks for unverifiable "#1" or "guaranteed" wording, and money-related pages carry a disclaimer instead of income promises.

Every listing uses one of four pricing labels: Free, Freemium, Paid but Affordable, Expensive. The label has to match the product's own website, not reviews or other directories.

• New and changed listings are checked against the official site in a daily legal review of everything that changed on the site.
• Every week, a sample of 40 listings (the newest plus a random selection) is rechecked against the live site, and wrong labels are corrected.
• Where a page has a pricing section, it names the plans, links to the official pricing page and shows the date it was checked. Exact prices are not quoted, because they change often and differ by region. Always confirm on the official site before you buy.

"Open Source" is a licence claim, so a listing only carries the tag when the project uses a licence approved by the Open Source Initiative (for example MIT, Apache 2.0 or GPL). For GitHub projects this is checked against the licence GitHub shows for the repository.

• Source-available, Business Source License, noncommercial and custom licences do not count, and neither does a repository with no licence. Those listings can still appear, just without the tag.
• An automated test blocks the tag on any listing whose cons say the licence is missing or non-standard.

An automated link check visits each listing's website and records the last date it answered with a working page. That is the "Link last checked" date shown on every resource page. The check runs with the site's daily upkeep and revisits each link once its last check is six days old, so dates are normally less than a week old.

• A link only counts as checked when it really works. If a site is down, gone or blocks automated checks, the date is not updated and the link is flagged for review.
• The weekly sample check also looks for domains that have moved or been parked. A moved resource gets its new address, and a dead one is flagged for removal.

Every resource page has a "Report an issue" link. It opens the contact page with the resource name and page address already filled into the email subject, so you only need to say what is wrong. Nothing is stored on this site when you use it.

• Each report is checked against the official site, and the listing is corrected if it is wrong.
• Makers can ask for factual fixes, but an accurate limitation or criticism is not removed on request.
• Every factual fix is logged with its date on the Corrections page.

Some listings carry a "Used by Shushant" mark. It means Shushant Lakhyani, who runs this site, uses the tool himself in his own work, not just that it was reviewed.

• Many of these tools have affiliate links, which are labelled on their pages. Using a tool and earning from it are disclosed separately.
• The mark never changes rankings, comparison results or the monthly awards.

The site earns money from sponsored slots, some affiliate links and its own products. None of that decides what is listed or what a listing says.

• Money never buys a place in the directory, a better description, rating or comparison outcome, or the removal of an accurate criticism.
• The Best Productivity Resources monthly awards are picked by a published rubric that reads only listing data. Nobody can pay or vote to win, and listings with affiliate links cannot win.
• Affiliate links are labelled "Affiliate" next to the link, sponsored slots are labelled as sponsored, and paid links are marked rel="sponsored" for search engines.
• The full details are in the Affiliate Disclosure and the Sponsorship & Advertising Policy.