20 best free directories to submit your app in 2026
89 of the 192 directories we track are free. These are the twenty worth an afternoon, and what each one actually gives back.
- Written by
- SpacerrApps
- Published
- Reading time
- 4 min read
Free means free here: no paid tier you are nudged toward, no listing fee, no reciprocal link, no "expedited review" upsell. Of the 192 directories in our catalogue, 89 qualify. These are twenty of them.
We are first. It is our list, our DR is 30, and SourceForge below us is 92. The order is ours; the numbers are not. If you only take one thing from this page, take the numbers.
The twenty
| # | Directory | DR | Link | Traffic | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | SpacerrApps | 30 | Followed | Low | A directory of apps, where every approved listing also gets a written review. |
| 2 | SourceForge | 92 | Followed | High | A repository for hosting and distributing open source software. |
| 3 | Hacker News | 91 | Followed | High | Show HN is the launch slot. Not a directory, but the highest-value free post you can make. |
| 4 | G2 | 91 | Followed | High | Users review and compare business software. |
| 5 | Proven Expert | 91 | Followed | High | Businesses collect and display customer reviews and ratings. |
| 6 | Crunchbase | 91 | Followed | High | Business information about private and public companies. |
| 7 | Indiegogo | 90 | Followed | High | Crowdfunding for creative projects and ventures. |
| 8 | DevPost | 88 | Followed | High | Software projects from hackathons and challenges. |
| 9 | Manta | 86 | Followed | High | A business directory of small company profiles. |
| 10 | Good Firms | 86 | Followed | High | Discovering and reviewing B2B service providers. |
| 11 | YourStory | 85 | Followed | High | Startup profiles from India's biggest startup media platform. |
| 12 | Merchantcircle | 84 | Followed | High | A network for local business owners, with listings and marketing tools. |
| 13 | Trustradius | 84 | Followed | High | Verified B2B software reviews. |
| 14 | F6S | 83 | Followed | High | Connects startups with funding, deals and resources. |
| 15 | Smartcustomer | 81 | Followed | Low | Business reviews and ratings. |
| 16 | findly.tools | 80 | Nofollow | Low | A curated directory of AI tools, productivity apps and SaaS. |
| 17 | Turbo0 | 80 | Followed | Low | Products for content creators. |
| 18 | StackShare | 79 | Followed | Medium | Developers share and discover technology stacks. |
| 19 | Brownbook | 79 | Followed | Low | A global business listing database. |
| 20 | SaaSHub | 79 | Followed | High | Software alternatives and startup accelerators. |
Domain Ratings are the source catalogue's, collected on 4 September 2026, and they move. What DR does and does not tell you is in its own guide.
Read the Link column before the DR column
Fifteen of these are rated DR 80 or above, which looks like a great afternoon. It is a good afternoon, not a great one, and the reason is in the fourth column rather than the third.
findly.tools is nofollow. It is still worth doing, because a nofollow link on a directory people actually browse sends real visitors and Google treats nofollow as a hint rather than an instruction now. But it will not move your rankings, and any list presenting it as a DR 80 backlink is selling you something.
The rest are listed as followed. That is the catalogue's claim rather than something we verified on all twenty, so check the one you care about before building a plan on it.
Three of these are not really directories
Hacker News is a community with a launch slot. Posting a Show HN is free and, on a good day, outperforms this entire table combined. It is also the one that punishes a bad post hardest. How to launch on Hacker News covers what a good one looks like.
Indiegogo is a crowdfunding platform. It is on the list because it is DR 90 and free, and it is only relevant if you have something to crowdfund.
Crunchbase is a company database. You are creating a company profile, not a product listing, and it is worth doing once for reasons that have nothing to do with this list.
The order to work through them
- G2, Crunchbase, SourceForge, DevPost. High DR, followed, genuinely browsed. Half a day.
- The B2B review sites if you sell B2B: Trustradius, Good Firms, Proven Expert. Skip entirely if you do not.
- SaaSHub, StackShare, findly.tools. Smaller, but the traffic is developers looking for tools, which is worth more per visitor than a high-DR general directory.
- Hacker News, once, when you actually have something to show.
- The rest of the 89 free ones, in the full list, if you have an afternoon spare.
Write the description once
All twenty ask for roughly the same thing: a name, a URL, a category and 150 to 300 characters. Write those characters properly one time and paste them everywhere. It is the single biggest saving available on this whole exercise, and how to write an app description is the version worth pasting.
And number one
Ours is DR 30, which is the smallest number in the table. What it has instead: listing is free on every tier, for any number of apps, and every approved app gets two followed links rather than one, because the listing comes with a written review of the app on its own page.
Submit it here. It takes about two minutes, and if you would rather your coding agent did it, that works too.
