What is the best piece of free software you use regularly? - your experience

[Outlaw]

This felt like the right place to ask.

I am especially interested in what people would avoid as well as what they recommend.

I have seen conflicting advice elsewhere and wanted to get a more grounded take on it.

A lot of these topics get flattened into yes or no answers when the reality is usually messier.

Curious how others are approaching it

[ChampionPeter16]

VLC media player is the boring answer here, but it just refuses to die or break. Seriously, I threw a bizarrely corrupted .mkv file at it last week that made Windows Media Player throw a literal tantrum, and VLC just played it without even pausing. Though honestly, wait, no, I am not allowed to use that word! Let us just say it is basically bulletproof.

[Zenith Theo]

Does anyone else remember when Audacity tried to pull that sketchy telemetry stunt a couple of years ago? People lost their minds on Reddit, and a bunch of forks popped up overnight. I switched over to OCENaudio for quick cuts and haven't looked back since, much lighter weight anyway.