Apps make our lives easier, and our work faster, that’s true. But with hundreds of them out there (and new ones popping up what seems like everyday) it’s a miracle if you don’t get lost in the noise. That doesn’t change the fact that you can’t build your personal brand without them, so we’re jumping in to help. We’ve curated the best tools to build your personal brand in 2026, from beloved favorites we still stand by to exciting new AI tools you need to try.
You’ll find recommendations for every step of the brand building process, starting with figuring out what your personal brand is even like, through designing assets and building your website, all the way to staying consistent and productive. Read until the end to see our curated toolkit to build a successful personal brand while staying on budget.
Define your personal brand
How could you start showing up online before even figuring out what it is you want to say and how? So the first step is always actually defining your personal brand and we have just the tool for you if you don’t want to spend weeks doing that.
Brandi, Copyfolio’s branding coach
Skip the research on workshops and exercises on how to figure out your brand character. Copyfolio’s branding coach, Brandi, already knows all there is to know about branding.
All you have to do is chat with Brandi to find your secret sauce (aka your unique selling point or USP), discover your brand personality, and nail your tone of voice. It’ll give you guidelines to refer to when creating content, so you always remember the message you should get across and the way you should act online.
Once you have these, Brandi can also help you put together a color palette to match and suggest fonts that could work with your brand too. You won’t have to research color psychology or learn advanced typography, since Brandi’s an expert already.
You can also always come back to chat and work with Brandi on writing things like a new tagline for your website or an updated LinkedIn bio. Or even to add portfolio pieces to your site.
You can chat with Brandi for free, but you can upgrade to Copyfolio Premium for $15/month to also publish the website she can help you build. But more on that a little later.
Create on-brand graphics
With having to post on social media and continuously appear online, you’ll need a design tool, of course.
Canva
If you’re looking for a design tool with more templates you could probably imagine, Canva might be the one for you. They have tons of options for popular assets like social media posts and stories, which you can then customize for your own visual branding.
Unfortunately lots of their templates and elements are paid, just like popular features like removing the background, or saving your brand assets. If you want access to all those, you’ll have to upgrade to Pro for $15/month. But it’s totally possible to get away with using the free plan too.
Kittl
Kittle feels like Canva’s cooler friend. They have more professional templates and on-trend designs and fonts. If you want your designs to look more unique and recognizable instead of using the Canva templates everyone can already spot, it could be a great choice for your personal brand. It might be a bit more advanced, but the end results will be too.
Kittl has a free plan where you can create 5 projects and 100 AI images. But if you want to use it regularly, you’d need to upgrade to Pro for $15/month. That’ll give you unlimited projects, full access to all tools and models, HD exports, and more.
Lovart
Admittedly, Lovart is a bougie-er option, but it looks pretty promising, so wanted to add it to the list.
People love it because its “chat prompt to finished design” flow is not only fast but produces actually good-looking, high-quality results. It can create all kinds of visual brand assets like graphics, promo videos, or even complete brand systems for you.
You can also easily edit bits of whatever it created for you, and it’s supposed to be really good at understanding your style and keeping it consistent across designs.
Lovart has a free version with limited models and usage, which is basically enough to try it out. Their most basic plan you’d need to consistently use it called Starter is $19/month. That’ll get you 2,000 monthly credits, access to all video and image models (like Nano Banana Pro, Seedream, Sora, Kling, and more), and 2 concurrent tasks.
Edit videos for social media
Gone are the days when posting photos was enough to get around on social media.
CapCut
CapCut got famous alongside TikTok (it has over 100 million downloads by now) as they’re both owned by ByteDance and were designed to be used together. It’s easy to use, lets you post straight to TikTok, and doesn’t add watermarks on your video exports. You can use it on mobile or desktop, and the free plan most probably already has everything you need.
You can of course upgrade to Pro for $10/month for more effects, text animation, retouch features, auto cutout options, and premium templates.
Kapwing
Kapwing is a cool new AI video editor that can generate videos (complete with voiceovers, visuals, subtitles, and music) from a simple text prompt for you. They of course also have the basic video editing features with the beloved drag-and-drop timeline and all the effects and adjustments you need to perfect your content.
They do have a free plan, but it’ll add a watermark to your video exports, limit their length (up to one minute) and quality (720p max). To remove watermarks, export in 4K, and have unlimited projects, you can upgrade to Pro for $24/month, which will give you 1,000 credits.
If you enjoy their AI editing features and want to post loads of video content, it could be worth a try.
Native video editors of your fave social media apps
You might not even think of them, but they’re still great options. By now, the video editors of both TikTok and Instagram (especially their Edits version) are pretty solid option. They have similar feature sets and are quite intuitive to use. Not to mention that they’re free and the platforms often reward you for editing your videos with them before posting.
Build your website
Especially with social media algorithms being as sassy as ever, you need a website to be the stable hub of your online presence. Here’s the best tool to build your personal brand website, especially if you’re a creative.
Copyfolio
Copyfolio was built to make website and portfolio building fun and easy for creatives. It checks absolutely all the boxes for that with:
- A drag-and-drop visual editor with no annoying back-end view (*cough cough Wordpress*) that makes building easy even if you’ve never done it before.
- Dedicated portfolio sections for easy sample showcase, whether you want to upload videos, add a link, or write a short case study.
- Custom, pre-filled content based on your profession to give you ideas on what to write and where.
- Global color palettes and font presets to make design updates super quick.
- A thumbnail designer to make your projects stand our even if you don’t have stunning images to represent them.
- Built-in, cookieless analytics, so you can always see how many people visited your site, which pages they checked, and where they came from.
- Custom domains that you can buy and connect instantly to show up as a true professional & show you take your career seriously.
Copyfolio has a 7-day free trial where you can try all features and build your site. To publish your website, you’ll have to upgrade to Copyfolio Premium for $15/month (or $108/year, which comes to $9/month).
You might be surprised that Mailchimp isn’t on the list. Isn’t that what everyone recommends, after all?
Well, while it’s a great tool, it might be better for bigger teams who want to invest. Here’s why we think MailerLite or Kit would be the best fits for your personal brand as you get started.
MailerLite
MailerLite is often recommended, and for good reason. They have a free plan, where you can have up to 500 subscribers, send 12,000 emails a month, and set up one marketing automation trigger.
You can easily put together your newsletters from blocks with a visual drag-and-drop editor, segment your audience, and even sell one digital product.
Their free plan is great to start, but if you want more emails or automations (and access to other features), their Growing Business plan starts at $10/month (or $108/year) for 500 subscribers.
As the number of subscribers increases, the price will go up too, like with most email automation platforms.
Kit
Trusted by people like Neil Patel, Lindsay Stirling, or even Matthew McConaughey, Kit is an amazing choice for writers, marketers, and creators. It has a beautiful and easy-to-use interface and a great free plan.
You can use their free plan up until 1,000 subscribers (which is twice as much as MailerLite’s), send unlimited newsletters, sell digital products or run paid newsletters, and even set up one automation, which Mailchimp’s free plan is missing.
If you want more than 1,000 subscribers, want to remove branding, and set up unlimited automations and email sequences, their Creator plan starts at $39/month (or $390/year).
It’s pricier than MailerLite, if you fall in love with the interface and use all the features (lots of automations, selling digital products), it very well could be worth it.
We have a few different options for you that could all work. It just depends on how much you want to post, how important features like first comments or analytics are for you, and if you’re willing to pay a little or want a completely free platform.
Skedchie
Skedchie is a small monthly investment (literally the price of a cup of coffee), but it lets you schedule unlimited posts on unlimited channels in exchange. It might not have the fanciest website or UI, but if you want to post to multiple platforms daily without actually spending time with it every day, it could be a great option for you.
They have a 14-day free trial, and their Pro plan is only $8/month after that. You really can’t beat that price.
Viraly
If you’re not planning on posting a ton (or at least only need a couple of them to be scheduled), Viraly could be a great free option for you.
In their free plan, you can have 10 posts/month scheduled for 3 channels. And what makes it better than Buffer’s free plan (whoops, spoilers) is that first comments (under your scheduled posts) are actually included here. They also offer analytics and reporting for most platforms with 2 weeks of historical data.
For more posts and stats, you can upgrade to their Influencer plan for $19/month, which includes 5 platforms, 200 posts/month, and 6 months of historical data.
Buffer
Buffer’s well-known, especially among marketing teams, but it’s also a handy tool for creatives building their personal brands.
In the free plan, you can post to 3 channels, and can have 10 posts scheduled at a time. With that, it’s not as limiting as Viraly’s: you can ultimately post more than 10 times a month. According to Buffer’s pricing page, you also get basic analytics with a 30-day history in the free plan, and their many integrations work here too.
For unlimited posts per channel and analytics, you can upgrade to their Pro plan for $6/month/channel (so $18/month for 3 channels).
Write content
We’re pretty sure you can write kick-ass content already, but a little help never hurts, does it? Here are the two tools we recommend, so your copywriting always stays on-brand.
Claude
Claude, the LLM of Anthropic (who specialize in AI safety research, so brownie points for that), is described as sort of a smart, slightly caffeinated editor by people.
It’s great at helping you write on-brand content, as it’s one of the most human-sounding AIs, which can also remember way more context than any others. You can create a project to teach it all there is to know about your brand, and it can even check the brand-fit of your texts when compared to one of your on-brand designs or website.
You can use Claude for free with limitations, or upgrade to their Pro plan for $20/month, or $200/year, which comes to $17/month.
Copyfolio’s branding coach & writing assistant
Did you know that Brandi, Copyfolio’s branding coach, can not only help you figure out the basics of your personal branding but also help add pieces to your portfolio? She can also help you write. Think things like a new headline for your website, or a case study based on data you drop in about your project.
Copyfolio also has a built-in writing assistant you can use in each section of your website. You can ask it to correct your grammar, shorten your copy, or apply your tone of voice (if you’ve nailed it down with Brandi already).
Brandi’s free to use, but if you want to publish all the copy she helped you write on your website, you’ll have to upgrade to Copyfolio Premium for $15/month (or $108/year, which comes to $9/month).
Check your stats
This is the one category where we won’t recommend fancy new tools. Because the truth is, your best bet is probably checking your stats in the tools you’re already using.
Social media platforms’ native analytics
Most of the social media platforms have pretty detailed analytics by now. Your account might need to be a professional/creator account to see them, but it’s all there for you nonetheless. So take a look at your:
- Professional dashboard on Instagram
- Insights page on Threads
- TikTok Studio
- YouTube Studio
We just recommend logging your most important stats in a table somewhere else, so it’s easier to see your progress. That might be the only thing these native analytics pages are not the best for.
Your scheduling tool’s analytics
A lot of social media scheduling tools also have built-in analytics features—though how long you can look back at your numbers might depend on your plan. So if you’re already using a scheduling tool anyway, might as well use it to track your stats, so it’s all in one convenient place.
Stay organized & productive
There are a million and more productivity tools out there, but there’s one that our team wholeheartedly loves and uses daily: it’s Notion.
Notion
We gotta start with a heads up: with Notions capabilities being almost endless, it can be a little overwhelming at first. But trust us, it’s so worth it.
Imagine it as a really smart notebook. You can use it to just take notes or write content. But you can also use it as a content calendar. As a way to track your social media stats. As a place to log your clients and all the work you do for them. Or your to-do lists. Important links. Do we need to say more?
And the best thing is (well, there are two, actually) that there are loads of Notion templates out there. So if you know what you want to use it for but want to skip the setup, you can just grab one, and you’re good to go.
The other best thing is that Notion is free to use as long as you’re using it alone. You only need to upgrade to Notion Plus if you want to add team members, want unlimited file uploads, custom forms, or integrations. (In that case its around $12/month/member, but you most probably won’t need it.)
Our curated personal branding toolkit recommendation + costs
If you don’t wanna go through the whole list and try every single app, here is our curated personal branding kit that’ll make sure you stay efficient and on-budget while still building a killer personal brand and online presence.
- Copyfolio ($15/month): you’ll get to check off multiple categories with just one tool. You can define your brand, build a portfolio and website, and even write on-brand content (like post captions or scripts). For all that, it’s a bargain.
- Canva Pro ($15/month): for your graphics, we recommend you use Canva, and upgrade to their pro plan. You can create really cool designs with the remove background feature, premium elements, and their exclusive templates.
- Capcut (free): to edit your videos, go with Capcut. It’s easy to use, available on both mobile and desktop, and you can edit and export (without watermarks) even on the free plan.
- Kit (free): owning your audience is key while fighting with all the algorithms, and Kit will let you collect 1,000 subscribers for free. You’ll also get to sell digital products, send unlimited newsletters, and even set up one automation without paying.
- Buffer (free): you might only have 10 scheduled posts at a time on the free plan, but they don’t limit you within the month or week. So if 3 channels is enough for you, choose Buffer’s free plan and spend some time scheduling your posts a few times every week.
- Claude + Brandi (both free): for writing, use both Claude’s free plan (for writing things like blog posts) and Brandi (for website copywriting and case studies).
- Buffer + native analytics (free): if you go with Buffer for scheduling your social media posts, you might as well check your stats there. If not, rely on the built-in analytics of the platforms you’re posting on—it’s free, after all.
- Notion (free): grab a free template you like online, and start getting organized with Notion. You can track your stats, create a content plan, log your clients, and more. With Notion, the possibilities really are endless, all without upgrading.
With that, the total cost of your personal branding toolkit is $30/month, and it includes tools for defining your brand, building your portfolio and website, creating and editing images and videos, sending newsletters, planning and scheduling social media content, checking your stats, and staying productive and organized. It’s a pretty good deal, right?
Have fun finding your uniqueness and sharing it with the world. 🫶
