I Analyzed 50 AI Tool Directories — Here's Where to Actually List Yours

The AI tool directory space is a mess. Every week some new "AI tool aggregator" pops up, slaps together a list of 500 tools, and calls itself the definitive directory. Most of them are SEO plays with zero curation. Some are decent. A few are genuinely great.

I spent two weeks going through 50 AI-specific directories. I checked their traffic (SimilarWeb and Ahrefs), submitted a test product to each one, tracked approval times, and looked at what kind of referral traffic they actually send.

Here's what I found.

The Top Tier: These Actually Drive Traffic

There's An AI For That (theresanaiforthat.com)

This is the big one. TAAFT gets somewhere around 4-6 million visits per month. That's not a typo. They've absolutely dominated the "find an AI tool" search space. Their approval process takes 3-7 days, and they're reasonably selective — they reject tools that are obviously just ChatGPT wrappers with a skin on top.

Getting listed here is close to mandatory for AI startups. The referral traffic is real. We've heard from founders getting 500-2,000 clicks per month from their TAAFT listing alone. The catch: they have a paid "featured" tier that costs around $200-500/month. The free listing works fine for organic discovery, but featured gets you on category pages and email blasts.

Honest take: worth every minute of the submission process. Just write a good description and use clear screenshots. They prioritize tools that show genuine utility over marketing fluff.

Futurepedia (futurepedia.io)

Second biggest player, roughly 2-3 million monthly visits. Futurepedia has a more "browse and discover" feel compared to TAAFT's search-first approach. They organize tools into detailed categories and have an active newsletter.

Approval time: 1-5 days. Acceptance rate feels high — maybe 80-85% of legitimate tools get listed. They reject obvious spam and dead links but aren't as strict as TAAFT about ChatGPT wrappers.

The traffic from Futurepedia is slightly lower quality than TAAFT in my experience. More casual browsers, fewer people with immediate purchase intent. But volume makes up for it. If you're listed on both, you're covering the vast majority of "AI tool directory" search traffic.

AI Tool Directory (aitool.directory)

Newer player but growing fast. Maybe 200-400K monthly visits. What I like: they have detailed reviews and comparisons, not just listings. This means your tool might appear in "best AI tools for [task]" comparison pages that rank well on Google.

Approval: 2-4 days. They seem to manually review every submission, which keeps quality high. Free to submit.

The Middle Tier: Worth Submitting, Don't Expect Miracles

ToolPilot (toolpilot.ai)

Solid directory with maybe 300-500K monthly visits. Good categorization. Their approval process is fast — usually under 48 hours. The referral traffic is modest but steady. You might see 50-200 clicks per month. Not going to change your business, but it's 10 minutes of work for a permanent listing and backlink.

Ben's Bites Directory (bensbites.com)

Ben's Bites started as a newsletter and the directory is the companion piece. The newsletter is where the real value is — getting featured in Ben's Bites newsletter can drive a spike of a few thousand visits. The directory itself gets moderate traffic, maybe 100-300K/month.

Here's the thing about Ben's Bites: the audience is AI-savvy. These aren't casual "what is AI" browsers. They're builders, founders, and early adopters. The traffic converts well. Getting featured in the newsletter is competitive though — pitch Ben directly with a clear, concise email about what makes your tool different. Generic pitches get ignored.

TopAI.tools

Decent traffic (200-400K/month), clean interface, fast approval. Nothing particularly notable but it's a solid free listing. Submit and move on.

AI Scout

Smaller but well-curated. Maybe 50-100K monthly visits. They write brief editorial notes on each tool, which adds credibility. Approval takes about a week. Worth the submission.

Toolify.ai

Growing directory, probably 500K-1M monthly visits. They have a particularly strong presence in Asian markets. If your tool works internationally, this is a good one to be on. Approval is quick, usually 1-2 days.

SaaS AI Tools

Niche crossover between SaaS directories and AI. Maybe 100-200K monthly visits. Good if your AI tool is specifically a SaaS product (which, let's be honest, most are). Fast approval.

The Long Tail: Small But Free

These directories individually drive minimal traffic — maybe 10-50 visits per month each. But they're free, they take 5 minutes to submit to, and the backlinks add up. I'd recommend batching these in one session:

AIcyclopedia — Small, curated list. Quick approval. Favird — AI focus with a social voting element. Supertools — Nice design, growing traffic. GPT Store Tracker — Specifically for GPT-based tools. AItoolsDirectory.com — Generic name, small traffic, but it's free and fast. NextGenTools — Newer directory, still building traffic. iLib — Minimal design, focuses on free AI tools. DailyTechAI — Small newsletter + directory combo.

Spend an hour submitting to all of these. Then forget about them. They'll quietly send trickles of traffic and backlink juice for months.

The Ones to Skip

Alright, here's where I save you time and possibly money.

Any AI directory charging more than $100 for a basic listing. The AI directory gold rush created a bunch of rent-seeking sites that charge premium prices for listings on sites with barely any traffic. One directory I won't name wanted $300 for a "featured listing" on a site getting 5,000 visits per month. That's insane. Don't fall for it.

Directories that are obviously just scraped lists. You can spot these: they have thousands of tools listed, no categories that make sense, and every tool has the same two-sentence description. These sites exist purely to rank for "AI tools" and sell ads. Your listing there does nothing for you.

Most "Top 100 AI Tools" blogs. These aren't directories — they're affiliate content. The tools they list are the ones paying the highest affiliate commissions, not the best tools. You can't submit to these; they curate based on revenue potential.

ChatGPT Plugin directories that haven't updated since 2024. OpenAI's plugin ecosystem has changed dramatically. Many plugin directories from the GPT-4 plugin launch era are completely outdated. Check the "last updated" date before bothering.

What Makes AI Directories Different

AI tool directories behave differently from general startup directories, and it matters for your strategy.

First, the traffic is search-driven. People type "AI tool for removing backgrounds" or "best AI writing assistant" into Google, and these directories rank for those queries. This means your listing's keywords matter more than on general startup directories. Use specific, task-oriented language. "AI background remover" beats "AI-powered image processing solution."

Second, competition is brutal. There are hundreds of AI writing tools, hundreds of AI image generators. Standing out in a directory listing requires a clear differentiator in your first sentence. "The only AI writer that matches your brand voice from a single sample" tells me something. "Advanced AI writing tool" tells me nothing.

Third, the audience is more tech-literate than average. They're going to look at your product critically. If your screenshots show a generic chat interface, you're going to blend in with 500 other tools. Show what makes yours different. Show the output. Show the thing that made you build this in the first place.

My Recommended Strategy for AI Startups

If I were launching an AI tool today, here's exactly what I'd do:

Week 1: Submit to TAAFT, Futurepedia, and Toolify. These are your big three. Spend real time on these submissions — custom descriptions, great screenshots, clear categorization. While you wait for approval, knock out ToolPilot, TopAI.tools, and SaaS AI Tools.

Week 2: Batch-submit to the long tail directories. An hour of work, maybe 90 minutes. Then pitch Ben's Bites newsletter with a personalized email. Also email any other AI-focused newsletters in your specific niche (there's probably 5-10 of them).

Week 3: Follow up on any pending approvals. Check which listings are live and verify they look good. Update any that have wrong descriptions or missing screenshots. Set up tracking links so you can measure referral traffic from each directory.

Ongoing: Monitor which directories send traffic. After a month, you'll have a clear picture. The top 5 directories will drive 80% of your directory referral traffic. Focus any future effort (updates, premium listings, featured placements) on those top performers.

The whole process — all 50 directories — takes maybe 8-10 hours spread over three weeks. For an AI startup, that's some of the highest-ROI marketing work you can do because these directories rank for the exact searches your potential users are making.

We track all of these directories (and more) on BlastDir with traffic estimates, approval times, and submission links. If you want to skip the research and get straight to submitting, that's what we're here for.

Now stop reading and go submit your tool. TAAFT first. Seriously.