Tool time

The best resources to compare your setup with the one used by startups of all sizes. Plus a few hidden local gems that will give you an edge.

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We are working in technology since >10 years. The pace of technological progress and the rate at which new tools appear are absolutely amazing.

As with most things, there is a flip-side. With an exponentially growing tool supply, which ones and how many to use? Opt for a low-cost, low specialization “Swiss army knife” such as Google (Suite)? Or resort to more specialized, best-in-class (and more expensive) ones?
And when? Speed up your work processes early on (and spend time setting it all up) or bootstrap your tools as long as possible?

There is no free lunch. We have seen it time and again: The prices of great new tools will go up over time. You may call it part of the SaaS playbook.

We recommend services such as startupstash if you want to know what other startups or companies work with.

We prefer to list a few local heroes that are yet free or cheap + providing large value + need early adopters. Not on the list? Let us know at tools@beamberlin.com, please.

Other tools we 💙 to use at Beam

Some are obvious, some less so. We hope there is something new and helpful in here for you:

  • 1Password: A most secure password manager (€€) – Website
  • Alfred: An outstanding, very powerful productivity app (freemium) – Website
  • Bear: A beautiful, flexible writing app for crafting notes and prose (€) – Website
  • Circula (App): Simple, mobile expense management solution (€) – Website
  • Copied: A full featured clipboard manager for iOS and macOS (€) – Website
  • Dashdash: Type formulas in cells that connect to services and automate your tasks – Website
  • Deskish: Create moving graphics for social media, ads, blogs and more without Photoshop or animation skills – Website
  • Gimp: A cross-platform image editor available for GNU/Linux, OS X, Windows and more operating systems (free) – Website
  • Fantastical: The calendar app you won’t be able to live without (€€) – Website
  • f.lux: Makes the color of your computer’s display adapt to the time of day, warm at night and like sunlight during the day (free) – Website
  • JPEGmini: Reduce image size by up to 80%, without compromising quality (free) – Website
  • Little Snitch: Makes all your Internet connections visible and puts you back in control (€€) – Website
  • Outbank: Send, analyze & compare all your personal finances in one banking app (free) – Website
  • Kap: An open-source screen recorder built with web technology (free) – Website
  • ProClip: Instantly copy & paste, and access actions like search, spelling, dictionary and over 100 more (€) – Website
  • Raindrop: An all in one bookmark manager (€) – Website
  • Skitch: Get your point across with fewer words using annotation, shapes and sketches, so that your ideas become reality faster (free) – Website
  • Smallpdf: Makes working with PDFs a lot easier – it offers compression, conversion from/to MS Office formats… (free) – Website
  • Sublime Text: The best text editor for code, markup and prose we know (free) – Website