How do you find free AI tools without wasting hours searching?

There are thousands of AI tools launching every month, but finding a good free one is surprisingly difficult.

If I need an AI tool for SEO, writing, image generation, research, or productivity, I usually end up searching Google, Product Hunt, Reddit, and several “best AI tools” lists before finding something worth trying.

The bigger problem is that many tools look free at first, but the useful features are behind a paywall.

I’m currently building iSEOAI around this problem — a directory focused on making AI tool discovery easier, with tools organized by category.

But I’m curious about how other builders here approach this:

When you need a new AI tool, where do you actually look first?

Google? Product Hunt? Reddit? AI directories? Or do you just ask ChatGPT/Claude?

And what makes you trust that an AI tool is actually worth trying?