The 12 best free writing software in 2026

At any given moment, I have a different writing app open for every task I’m actively procrastinating on: my Notes app for collaborating with my partner on a never-ending list of to-dos, Notion for trip planning, Google Docs for the article I’m supposed to be writing right now, and a rotating cast of other free writing tools I’ve convinced myself are essential to the process. This is to say nothing about the AI writing generators I use to help me create content or edit at scale—that’s a differe