My AI Stack After 12 Months: What I Actually Keep (And Why)
The best AI tools in 2025 are the ones you actually use. After 12 months of real-world testing across different professional scenarios, here are the tools that made it into my permanent workflow — and why.
My Current AI Stack (Tested and Proven)
Claude Pro — Primary Writing Tool ($20/month)
What I use it for: Long-form articles, document analysis, complex writing tasks, coding assistance
Why it stayed: The writing quality is genuinely better than alternatives for my primary use case. The 200K context window is not a marketing claim — I regularly paste 50,000-word documents and get coherent analysis.
What I stopped doing because of it: Drafting from scratch. I now always start with a Claude draft.
Perplexity Pro — Research Tool ($20/month)
What I use it for: Any question requiring current information, fact-checking, competitor research
Why it stayed: The source citations changed how I research. Instead of opening 10 tabs, I get a synthesized answer with links to verify. My research time dropped by 60%.
Grammarly Premium — Final Polish ($12/month)
What I use it for: Editing AI-generated drafts before publication, catching tone issues in client communications
Why it stayed: Even Claude’s writing has subtle issues that Grammarly catches. The clarity score and engagement analysis are genuinely useful editing signals.
Total Stack: $52/month
These three tools collectively save me 15+ hours per week. At any meaningful billing rate, the ROI is clear. What I cut: Jasper (replaced by Claude at lower cost), Copy.ai (redundant with Claude), several task-specific writing tools.
Find the Perfect AI Tool for Your Needs
Compare pricing, features, and reviews of 50+ AI tools
Browse All AI Tools →Get Weekly AI Tool Updates
Join 1,000+ professionals. Free AI tools cheatsheet included.