People ask what I use more than anything else, so here is the honest list. Not a sponsored roundup, just the tools that survive in my actual workflow, plus what to use instead when you are just getting going.

Thinking and writing

Claude. My first stop for almost everything: drafting, editing, working through a problem out loud. If you only adopt one AI tool, make it a strong chat assistant and learn it deeply.

Starting out? Any major free chat assistant will take you a long way before you need to pay.

Building

Claude Code. This is how I turn plain instructions into working software without being a full time engineer. It lives in the terminal and does the heavy lifting while I steer.

Starting out? Begin with a no code builder for simple sites and automations, then graduate when you hit the ceiling.

Organizing

Notion. My second brain. Notes, drafts, the newsletter pipeline, project tracking, all in one place so nothing lives in my head.

Starting out? A single plain text file or the notes app on your phone is genuinely fine. Do not over engineer this.

Creating and shipping

Kloey. The all in one creator OS I am building, made to take you from rough idea to published content without juggling ten tabs. I use it because I needed it to exist.

The best stack is the smallest one that gets the job done. Add tools when something hurts, not because they look impressive.

The one rule

Do not buy tools to feel productive. Buy them to remove a specific, repeated pain. If you cannot name the exact problem a tool solves for you this week, you are not ready for it yet, and that is completely fine.

This list stays current. When I swap something in or out, I say why in the newsletter so you are never working from a stale list.