Free Software That Got Quietly Worse
Most "best free software" articles tell you what to install. They almost never tell you what to uninstall, even when the software you've been using for years has been quietly enshittified to the point where it's actively bad for you.
I'm writing this in early 2026, looking back at the last year of free software watching. 2025 was rough. Several tools that have been default recommendations for over a decade either got acquired, broke their privacy promises, started shoving AI features nobody asked for into their interfaces, or quietly added telemetry and ads while hoping nobody would notice.
This is the article I wish someone had sent me at the start of 2025. It would have saved me from defending some of these tools to friends who were right to be skeptical.
Let's go through them honestly. What got worse, why it got worse, and what to use instead.
CCleaner: The Original Cautionary Tale, Still Getting Worse
CCleaner used to be the universal recommendation for cleaning up a Windows PC. It was on every "must-have free software" list for over a decade. Then Avast bought it in 2017, the brand got dragged through a supply-chain malware incident, and the slow decline began.
What happened in 2025:
The free version now nags you constantly to upgrade. It includes a real-time monitoring component that runs in the background by default. It "phones home" with usage data. The interface keeps getting bloated with features you didn't ask for.
The real kicker: Windows' built-in cleanup tools have gotten genuinely good. Storage Sense, Disk Cleanup, and the optimization tools that ship with Windows 11 handle 95% of what CCleaner was useful for.
What to use instead:
Windows built-in tools. Storage Sense in Settings. Free, no install, no data collection.
BleachBit if you want a real third-party cleaner. Open source, no telemetry, originally made for whistleblowers and now general-purpose.
PrivaZer is a less-known free Windows cleaner that's still genuinely good.
CCleaner had a 20-year run. It's time to let it go.
Audacity: The Trust Hasn't Fully Recovered
Audacity was acquired by Muse Group in 2021. They announced telemetry plans that caused a massive community backlash. They walked some of those plans back. The software is still being developed and is still functional.
But here's what 2025 looked like for Audacity:
The Recent Files menu now logs more than just file paths. Crash reporting sends data Google Analytics-style. Sentry was added as a telemetry partner. The privacy policy is now 4,000 words of legalese for a free audio editor.
Audacity itself still works fine. The audio editing capabilities are unchanged. The concern is the direction of travel and the question of what gets added next.
What to use instead:
Tenacity, the fork created during the original 2021 telemetry controversy. Same Audacity functionality, no telemetry, community-maintained.
Ocenaudio for single-file editing, lighter and cleaner.
Reaper if you can spend €60 once. Best paid alternative for any serious audio work.
If you only edit audio occasionally, Audacity is fine. If you care about your privacy or you're an open source purist, Tenacity is the cleaner choice in 2026.
Skype: Officially Dead
Microsoft killed Skype in May 2025 after years of letting it rot. The shutdown wasn't a surprise but it still left millions of users scrambling.
The lesson isn't really about Skype itself. It's about what happens when free software depends on a corporate parent who decides it's not strategic anymore. Skype was free. Microsoft bought it. Microsoft let it stagnate for a decade while developing Teams. Then they killed it.
The same pattern is playing out with other Microsoft properties. The classic Outlook desktop client is being pushed out in favor of the new Outlook, which is worse in basically every way that matters.
What to use instead of Skype:
Jitsi Meet for free video calls. No account, no install, runs in browser.
Signal for personal video and messaging. Encrypted, free, not run by a company that might kill it next quarter.
Element (Matrix) for community group communication.
The wider lesson: be suspicious of free software owned by giant corporations who got it through acquisition. The acquirer's interests rarely align with yours.
WinRAR: Still Wants Your Money After 30 Years
I'm including WinRAR not because it got worse in 2025, but because it's the running joke of free software and the answer for what to use instead has never been clearer.
WinRAR has been "free trial" software since 1995. The trial never ends. Most users have been pretending to use it legitimately for decades while ignoring the nag screen.
In 2025, several Windows-default file managers (including Windows 11 itself) added native support for RAR, 7z, TAR, and other archive formats. The reason to install WinRAR has shrunk to nearly nothing.
What to use instead:
Windows 11 built-in archive support for most users. Right-click and extract. Done.
7-Zip if you need a dedicated tool with more features. Free, open source, handles everything.
NanaZip is a modern fork of 7-Zip with a more polished Windows 11 interface.
There's no reason to install WinRAR in 2026. There hasn't been for a few years. Drop it.
Avast and AVG Free: The Telemetry Problem Hasn't Gone Away
Avast and AVG (now the same company) got caught in 2020 selling detailed user browsing data through a subsidiary called Jumpshot. They shut down Jumpshot, apologized, promised to change, paid fines.
In 2025, the company is still bundling browser extensions that "protect" you while monitoring your activity. The free antivirus still nags constantly to upgrade. The interface is increasingly advertising-laden.
What to use instead:
Microsoft Defender is built into Windows 10/11 and is genuinely competitive with paid antivirus in independent tests.
Bitdefender Free for a lightweight third option without the Avast baggage.
ClamAV if you specifically want open source antivirus.
Don't install Avast or AVG in 2026. The data sale concerns weren't a one-time event. They were a window into how the company makes money on "free" users.
Adobe Reader: It Was Already Bad, Now It's Worse
Adobe Reader has been bloated, slow, and pushy for years. In 2025 it doubled down on AI features nobody asked for, started requiring Adobe accounts for basic functionality, and added even more telemetry.
For the simple task of reading a PDF, Adobe Reader is now actively user-hostile.
What to use instead:
SumatraPDF for fast, minimal PDF reading. Opens in milliseconds, uses 5MB of disk space.
PDF-XChange Editor (free version) if you need to annotate, sign, or do light editing.
Your browser. Both Firefox and Chrome handle PDFs natively now and do most things you need.
There is no reason to install Adobe Reader in 2026.
µTorrent: The Slow-Motion Disaster
µTorrent (uTorrent) was the universal torrent client for years. It was light, fast, and free. Then BitTorrent Inc. went corporate, started bundling crapware, added cryptocurrency miners (yes, really, in 2018), and the free version became unusable.
2025 made it worse. The current µTorrent installer is one of the most aggressive bundleware experiences in mainstream software. The interface is plastered with ads.
What to use instead:
qBittorrent is the open source replacement and has been the right answer for years. Clean interface, no ads, no bundleware, built-in search.
Transmission for Mac and Linux users (also available on Windows). Minimalist and reliable.
Deluge if you want plugin extensibility.
Anyone still using µTorrent is doing themselves a disservice. qBittorrent is faster, lighter, and free of nonsense.
OpenOffice: The Zombie That Should Be Dead
OpenOffice technically still exists. It's hosted by Apache. Updates trickle out occasionally. Search results still point people to it.
Here's the honest truth: OpenOffice has been effectively abandoned for over a decade. LibreOffice forked from it in 2010 and has had nearly all the active development since. OpenOffice releases major updates every few years with mostly security patches. The feature gap with LibreOffice is now enormous.
People still install OpenOffice in 2026 because they remember the name. They shouldn't.
What to use instead:
LibreOffice is what OpenOffice should have become. Active development, full feature parity with modern Office formats, regular releases.
OnlyOffice for a more Microsoft Office-style interface.
If you've installed OpenOffice on a new computer in the last five years, uninstall it and install LibreOffice. They open each other's files. The migration is painless. Don't keep using software that's been abandoned by its own developers.
TeamViewer Free: Increasingly Hostile
TeamViewer used to be the universal remote access tool. Free for personal use. Just worked.
In 2025, the free version got more aggressive at flagging users as "commercial use" based on vague heuristics. Connections get cut off arbitrarily. The "you've been detected using TeamViewer commercially" message appears for legitimate personal users helping family members. The pressure to upgrade to paid is constant.
What to use instead:
AnyDesk Free is the obvious alternative, similar functionality, less aggressive about personal-use restrictions.
RustDesk is open source and self-hostable, the privacy-respecting choice.
Chrome Remote Desktop is free and works through your Google account.
Microsoft Quick Assist is built into Windows for helping family.
The remote access market is healthier than it was a few years ago. TeamViewer isn't the only option, and it's no longer the best free option.
Tools That Got AI-Slopped (The 2025 Phenomenon)
A pattern emerged in 2025: previously useful free software added AI features as a marketing exercise. Most of these features made the software worse, not better.
Examples:
Microsoft Notepad added an AI rewriting feature. The classic minimalist text editor now phones home to Microsoft for AI suggestions you didn't ask for.
Microsoft Photos added AI features that make basic image viewing slower and connected to the cloud.
Various PDF readers added AI summarization that requires sending your documents to third parties.
Several text expansion tools added AI features that hijack what should be local-only functionality.
The pattern: existing useful software gets bloated with cloud-dependent AI features as a way to justify subscriptions or monetization. The original purpose of the software suffers.
What to use instead:
Notepad++ instead of Microsoft Notepad. Still fast, still local, still respects you.
IrfanView instead of Microsoft Photos for image viewing.
SumatraPDF instead of AI-laden PDF readers.
If a piece of software you used to like has been "improved" with AI, check whether the AI is optional, whether it phones home, and whether there's an older version or alternative that's still focused on the original purpose.
The Slow Telemetry Creep
Beyond the specific tools above, the broader trend in 2025 was telemetry creep. Free software that used to respect privacy started adding "anonymous usage statistics" that weren't there before. The narrative was always the same: "this helps us improve the product." The reality is increasingly that this data has commercial value.
Several tools that quietly added telemetry in 2025:
Multiple Windows utilities
Some media players
Various developer tools
A handful of formerly "clean" Android apps
Watching for this means reading release notes, checking privacy policies, and using tools like Wireshark to see what your software is actually sending. Most people don't have time for this, which is why corporate tools rely on the fact that nobody's watching.
General principle: if a tool was originally free with no business model and suddenly has telemetry, ask where the money comes from now.
What This Pattern Tells Us
The common thread across 2025's free software disappointments isn't malicious actors. It's the slow logic of capitalism applied to software:
Free software gets popular because it's good and respects users
Company gets acquired or pivots to monetization
New owner adds telemetry, ads, upsells
Quality slowly degrades to drive paid conversions
Eventually the original audience leaves for alternatives
New alternatives become popular and the cycle starts again
This is why the most reliable free software is open source, community-maintained, and not owned by anyone who could be acquired. Notepad++, qBittorrent, LibreOffice, GIMP, Krita, Inkscape, KeePassXC are all examples of tools that have stayed good for decades because their ownership structure makes enshittification impossible.
When you pick free software in 2026, this matters more than feature lists. Who owns this? How do they make money? What happens if a venture capital firm wanted to acquire them?
Quick Reference: 2025's Best Swaps
Software to drop | Best replacement |
|---|---|
CCleaner | Windows built-in tools or BleachBit |
Audacity (if telemetry concerns) | |
Skype | Jitsi Meet or Signal |
WinRAR | 7-Zip or Windows native |
Avast/AVG Free | Microsoft Defender |
Adobe Reader | |
µTorrent | |
OpenOffice | |
TeamViewer Free | |
AI-slopped classic tools |
What to Watch for in 2026
The patterns to look out for in the coming year:
More acquisitions of beloved free software. Open source projects with corporate backers are vulnerable. Watch for changes in tone, in release cadence, in privacy policies.
More AI features added that nobody asked for. This trend will continue. Some will be useful. Most will be marketing. Check whether they can be turned off and whether they phone home.
The Windows 11 versus Windows 10 split. With Windows 10 hitting end of life in late 2025, more users have moved to Windows 11. Microsoft is using this transition to push more cloud dependency and AI features. Watch for tools that quietly require Microsoft accounts for things that used to be local.
More software shifting to subscription models. Tools that used to be free or one-time purchase are being recast as monthly services. This will keep accelerating.
The Honest Closing Thought
Free software in 2026 is still better than it's ever been, in aggregate. The losses I've listed here are real, but they've been more than balanced by improvements elsewhere. DaVinci Resolve dominates video editing. Krita rivals Photoshop for digital art. The Linux desktop is finally usable. Local AI models are increasingly capable. Open source password managers and privacy tools have matured into excellent products.
The lesson of 2025 isn't "free software is in decline." It's "watch what you install, who owns it, and how it's funded." The good free software is still out there. It's just no longer the default name everyone recognizes.
When you next install something, ask:
Who owns this project?
How do they make money?
Has the privacy policy changed recently?
Are there community forks that have rejected recent changes?
These questions used to be paranoia. In 2026 they're basic hygiene.
The most resilient free software is the kind that can't be sold or acquired. Pick those when you can. And when a tool you love starts showing the warning signs, switch before it gets worse.
