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My tech stack in 2025
Teerakit Chantrakul
February 02, 2025
Over the years, I’ve tested countless tools and platforms, refining my stack to suit my specific needs. Here’s a look at the tools that power my work in 2025.
This stack gears toward solopreneurs and small teams with some specific criteria.
It has a free plan. I want to be flexible and try it out in a real environment (and I think you should too). Too often, the software looks nice, but nobody on the team uses it. I want to make sure that it is actually useful to the team before settling in.
It has to work on a browser. Since I travel a lot, the idea is that it should work on any device, anywhere in the world. Desktop and mobile apps are optional but good to have.
This one is going to be a bit long. Feel free to jump to the area that you are interested in.
Table of Contents
1. Productivity
Everyone can relate to this section as they are general apps used in any kind of business.
Office software: Google Workspace
There are a few players in this space: Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, Lark, and a few others.
I find Google Workspace better fits my needs. I use almost everything they offer. Gmail is the standard of email nowadays. Calendar is easy to use and integrates with pretty much everything. Docs have been upgraded recently to replace Notion. Sheets is collaborative and reliable. Slides and Meet work everywhere.
The cool thing about all this is, that with Cloudflare Email Routing, I can have business email in my regular Gmail account with no additional cost. I can get around with this for a while. However, it’s not a secure way to set up, so not recommended for bigger teams.
Sadly, there’s no project management tool in their suite, so I need another tool for this. And they lack database tools. I find myself still using Airtable for some type of work.
I can’t recommend Microsoft 365 from my personal experience. Read more below.
Lark is another good option and it’s getting more popular. However, it doesn’t fit me for the same reasons as Microsoft 365. Not all apps work on a browser. You will need to download the desktop app to experience the full functionality. And they integrate with nothing but themselves. If those are not the problem for you, I highly recommend you to try Lark.
Project management: Todoist
Back then at my previous company, my personal and work life were clearly separated. So I used two different tools for each purpose: Google Tasks for personal and Asana for work stuff.
This year, I will be involved with so many more projects, to the point that work and life are blended. Todoist works well in this regard.
With Todoist, I’m able to set up personal projects e.g. housework, home business, personal branding, etc., and work projects within one app. It also has a great Google Calendar integration, the best one by far compared to other apps I have tried.
If you’re like me, blending work and life stuff, and want to have one view for everything, Todoist is a great choice. If not, Asana for work projects and something else for your personal tasks will do.
Team communication: Discord
There are many great chat apps for teams. Slack, MS Teams, Google Chat, Lark, etc. But I find Discord fits my needs.
Discord is not exactly a work chat app, but rather a community app for gamers. However, it can work for this purpose too as it has everything other apps have to offer, from channels, DMs, voice chat, etc.
Some might argue that Slack is a better option. Yes, Slack is free and has more powerful integration with other work apps. But the free version limits chat history to only 90 days, 10 integrations, external and huddles only work 1:1, and the list goes on. Why bother with those limitations when you can have everything for free on Discord?
Still, Discord is not designed to be used for work. It lacks controls and security features which may be necessary for big teams. In that case, go with other options.
Knowledge base: Google Docs + Gitbook
Recently, Google Docs added “tabs" where you can group content into sections within the same doc. We can now truly forget about Notion🤣. I use Google Docs for internal documents where appearance doesn’t matter much.
For external docs, I use Gitbook. It’s prettier than Docs. And it’s free.
Note-taking: Google Keep
I’ve tried a few note-taking apps. Notion, OneNote, Evernote, Capacities, etc. I ended up coming back to Google Keep due to its simplicity. It’s free, fast, easy to use, and reliable. What else do you want?
I talk to AI a lot, at least 3 conversations every single day. I find Gemini is best for general purposes while ChatGPT is better for some specific topics like coding. I will also keep an eye on DeepSeek this year.
Automation is the key to running a small team as it eliminates routine tasks entirely, allowing you and your team to focus on other matters. Zapier is the most well-known in the category but I find it too expensive.
Make and Relay is a great alternative and I find it more flexible than Zapier in many ways. I also find that some apps integrate better in Relay so I still keep both. But if I were to choose just one, Make is the way to go. Whatever apps you using, Make will likely be able to connect them.
2. Product Development
This section is specific for businesses that build software products and may not apply to many types of businesses.
Front-end: Toddle
I’m no coder, so I will need to use a no-code, low-code tool to build my apps. If you can code, you may skip this section.
Before I was able to make the decision, I studied a lot about the rendering technique each platform uses, why one is faster than another, and most importantly, why one is more SEO-friendly. It’s a big topic for another time😅.
Last year, I started building my app with WeWeb, a web app builder. While they’re great in what they do, I find it lacks SEO functionality which my business relies on a lot. So this year, I migrated almost everything to Toddle.
Toddle is a visual development platform. If we compare it to a website builder, this is similar to Webflow but for building web applications.
In my roadmap, I will need to build native apps on Android and iOS too. Flutterflow looks promising. I will share my experience later this year.
If you want to build a simple website, I highly recommend Webflow. I no longer recommend using WordPress. If you want to know why, read this one below.
Back-end: Supabase
Supabase provides all I need as a backend: database, storage, authentication, etc. It’s not a no-code platform so I need to learn how to write SQL a bit. But thankfully, AI helps me a lot here.
Internal tool: Retool
This section will vary across the different types of businesses you’re in. For most businesses, all you need is a way to store data and a portal for your team to access and manage them. Tools like Airtable, Notion, Glide, Lark Base, or AppSheet will be your best bet.
Each has its advantages. Airtable is like the standard of a no-code database. Glide is mobile-friendly and easy to learn (Sadly, they keep increasing their pricing to the point that it’s no longer a valid option). Lark has Base which is pretty much their version of Airtable. AppSheet works with data in Google Sheets. Depending on where you keep your data, pick one that connects with it.
In my case, as I’m building a web app, it depends on what type of database I use for my app. In my case, I use PostgreSQL. Giving your team direct access to the database is dangerous, so I need another layer.
There are a few tools in this internal tool space. Budibase is great for simple databases. Mine is quite complex so I chose Retool.
Content Management System (CMS): Hygraph + Contentful
If you use something like Webflow, WordPress, or Bubble, you already have built-in CMS. However, I prefer a modular approach to avoid vendor-lock-in.
People seem to hate GraphQL but I find it better for complex queries. So I use Hygraph for blog content. For regular page content, I use Contentful. However, Contentful pricing is steep once exceeds the free plan. So I will explore some other alternatives.
Planning: Linear
I keep my development tasks separate from other business operations. I find Linear fits this space. Linear is like Asana but for product development. I use it to plan what to build next.
Product analytics: PostHog
PostHog offers everything you need to build a better product from analytics, heatmap, session replay, surveys, and more.
Notification: Mailersend + Loops
For email notifications, Mailersend does the job. If you are a coder you may want to checkout Resend. Loops is another great option built for software companies specifically. It’s a bit more expensive so I keep this for my B2B customers.
Payment: Stripe
I chose Stripe because it’s easy to implement as a no-coder. If I can code, I would explore other options like Opn and 2C2P. But as of now, Stripe is good enough.
Tag management: Cloudflare Zaraz + Google Tag Manager
Thanks to these tag management tools, implementing tracking pixels is easier than ever. I find Cloudflare Zaraz has better performance as they’re server-side by default so I prefer it for public pages.
Google Tag Manager (GTM) is client-side which can slow down your website quite a bit. It does offer a server-side option, but it comes with a price. Because of that, I prefer GTM for private pages where SEO doesn’t matter much.
3. Design
I’m no designer so I don’t use professional design tools like Illustrator, Photoshop, Lightroom, etc. My design work mostly relates to web and UI design, and maybe some simple social media posts.
General-purpose: Figma
I use Figma for everything from designing a logo, banner, social media post, prototype, web UI, and the rest. My design work is mostly vector-based so Figma will do just fine.
For most people, just go with Canva.
UI Framework: Shadcn/ui
I don’t really use Shadcn directly but rather my own version of it. As I use a no-code platform, I will need to rebuild the design system in those platforms which may be slightly different from the original. I like the look and feel of Shadcn so I base my design on it.
There are other great UI kits like Untitled UI, Ant, Stratis, and more. Just choose whichever you like.
Design Materials: Lucide
Clean, customizable, icon packs. Some honorable mentions: Material Icons, Phosphor.
4. Marketing
Marketing is necessary for every business. You will probably need one for each of the categories below.
Marketing analytics: Google Analytics
I need to admit that Google Analytics is still by far, the most accurate marketing analytics out there due to the ability to track cross-device. It’s also one of the most not-so-privacy😅.
There are many privacy-focused analytics out there. But they’re not so reliable. What’s the point of making a decision based on inaccurate data, or even worse, incorrect data?
Email marketing: MailerLite
MailerLite is great at one thing, email. It has great email tools, segmentation, grouping, automation, and reasonable prices.
While they also offer other tools like website and landing page builder, they’re not the best. If you want an all-in-one solution, Brevo is a great option.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO): Search Console + Ahrefs
I find the Search Console and the free version of Ahrefs are good enough to keep me busy for a while.
Some other useful tools are Keyword Planner, Semrush, Ubersuggest.
Content marketing: Publer
If you need to post to multiple social media, Publer or Buffer are great. They are similar in many ways so whatever you pick will be good.
This year, I will also work to semi-automate content creation and publication. I plan to use a combination of Airtable, Make, and OpenAI (or DeepSeek). It’s not done yet so I’ll share what I learn along the way.
Advertising: Google Ads + Meta
While I focus on organic growth, I do run some ads focusing on the B2B side of the business. And when it comes to online ads, you can’t get away from these big ad networks. For B2C business, you may want to include TikTok ads too.
Dashboard: Datapad
I really like the simplicity of Datapad. Just connect the data sources and display them in one place. It supports data from a few platforms but you can always expand it with Google Sheets.
If you find Datapad too basic, check out Looker Studio.
5. Sales & Customer Support
Every business needs to sell. However, due to the nature of my business, I may not yet use these tools at their full potential.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM): Attio
I like Attio that it focuses on being just a CRM. This makes it easy to use and affordable. Folk is another one similar to Attio.
These tools are geared toward small teams. If you’re in a big team, you may consider Salesforce or HubSpot.
Outreach: Apollo
I’m too lazy to write and send emails one by one. Apollo helps me do exactly that but at scale.
Scheduling: Cal.com
I use this for scheduling meetings, avoiding the back-and-forth of endless emails. And it’s better than Calendly. If you’re on Google Workspace, you can just use the appointment feature built-in to Calendar.
Customer support: Helpscout
I chose Helpscout as a temporary solution because it’s free and looks nice, haven’t had a chance to use it that much yet.
6. Financial Management
Bookkeeping: Peak
There are many traditional accounting software. But I prefer the cloud ones as it makes more sense to me. Financial data should always be available at your fingertips, not the accountant’s schedule.
While I prefer Xero’s integration with other apps, Peak works well in my country (Thailand) as it covers local requirements better like tax documents.
FlowAccount is another great option but it lacks bank reconciliation. In Peak, you will be able to import your bank statement and be able to map each statement line to the transaction in the platform. This makes sure you won’t miss a single line in the statement. In FlowAccount, you need to do this manually which is a pain🥲.
Banking: K BIZ
I prefer SCB Business Anywhere over K BIZ. But due to my limitations, K BIZ is my best bet. Read my experience about this below.
eSign: Documenso
There are quite a few good options here. In the end, I chose Documenso due to its modern UI. It’s free up to 5 docs per month which is more than enough for me.
signNow is another good option if you need to sign more documents.
Conclusion
My tech stack is designed for automation, simplicity, and scalability. These tools help me run multiple businesses while traveling and staying flexible. I hope this stack gives you some inspiration!
If you’re on a similar journey, I’d love to hear about your favorite tools—what’s in your 2025 tech stack? Let’s share insights and keep building!
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