DEV Community: Mohit Patel

🚀 I Built 13 Free Online Tools… Here’s the Biggest Mistake I Made

Mohit Patel — Mon, 11 May 2026 11:19:07 +0000

A few weeks ago, I started building a collection of free online tools using Next.js.

I built tools like:

Image Compressor
QR Code Generator
JSON Formatter
Password Generator
Word Counter
Base64 Converter
Bulk QR Code Generator

At first, I thought:

“If I build useful tools, people will automatically use them.”

I was wrong.

📉 The Problem

After launching the website:

Almost no users
Very few clicks
Low traffic
Low engagement

I kept checking analytics expecting growth.

Nothing happened.

🧠 What I Realized

The problem wasn’t the tools.

The problem was:

Nobody knew the website existed.

That’s when I started learning:

SEO
Google Search Console
CTR
Keywords
Metadata
Internal linking

Things I completely ignored while coding.

🔥 The Biggest Lesson

I learned something important:

Building the product is only half the work.

The second half is:

helping people discover it
solving real problems
making content searchable
🚀 One Tool Changed Everything

One day I needed to generate hundreds of QR codes quickly for a project.

Most online tools had:

limits
login requirements
slow processing

So I built my own Bulk QR Generator.

That tool instantly made more sense to users because it solved a very specific problem.

That changed how I think about products now.

💡 What I’m Doing Differently

Now I focus on:

long-tail SEO keywords
writing useful content
improving tool pages
adding FAQs
solving specific problems

Instead of just building random features.

📈 Small Progress Still Feels Good

Traffic is still small.

But seeing:

impressions increase
pages getting indexed
users clicking tools

…feels motivating.

🔧 Tech Stack
Next.js
Tailwind CSS
Vercel
Google Search Console
Google Analytics
🚀 Final Thought

The internet is full of projects nobody discovers.

Not because they’re bad.

Because visibility is harder than development.

👉 Project:
AstonishBuddy

Still learning. Still building 🚀

🚀 I Almost Quit My Side Project After Seeing “0 Users”

Mohit Patel — Fri, 08 May 2026 12:24:20 +0000

A few weeks ago, I launched a small side project with multiple free online tools.

I thought:
“People will definitely use this.”

Reality?

📉 0 users
📉 0 clicks
📉 Almost no traffic

That part honestly hurt more than building the project itself.

So instead of quitting, I started learning:

SEO
Google Search Console
Page optimization
Internal linking
Better content writing

Slowly, things started changing.

Yesterday I finally saw:
✅ 1,000+ impressions in Google Search Console

Still small.
But for the first time, it feels like real progress 🚀

I wrote the full story here:
👉 https://medium.com/@patelmohitp0/i-almost-quit-my-side-project-after-seeing-0-users-36641364c1d5

Would love feedback from other developers building side projects 🙌

webdev #buildinpublic #seo #nextjs #programming

I built 13 free tools.

Mohit Patel — Mon, 04 May 2026 12:14:03 +0000

Spent days coding, designing, optimizing…

Then I checked analytics.

0 users.

That moment changed how I think about building products.

I wrote about what I learned 👇
https://your-medium-link

Curious — how did you get your first users?

🚀 I Built a Free JSON Formatter Tool (Fast, Clean & No Login) – Here’s Why

Mohit Patel — Mon, 04 May 2026 10:57:08 +0000

If you’ve ever worked with APIs or JSON data, you know how messy it can get.

Most tools out there have problems:

Too many ads ❌
Slow formatting ❌
Confusing UI ❌
Login required ❌

So I built my own.

🔧 What I Built

I created a JSON Formatter Tool that lets you:

✅ Format JSON instantly
✅ Validate JSON structure
✅ Clean and readable output
✅ No login required
✅ Completely free

👉 Try it here:
https://www.astonishbuddy.com/tools/json-formatter

⚡ Why I Built This

While working with APIs, I constantly needed to:

Debug JSON responses
Format messy payloads
Validate incorrect data

Switching between tools was frustrating.

So I built a fast and simple solution.

🧠 Tech Stack

Next.js
Tailwind CSS
Client-side processing (fast ⚡)

📸 How It Works

Paste your JSON
Click format
Get clean structured output instantly

💡 Use Cases

API debugging
Data validation
Frontend/backend development
Cleaning messy JSON

🚀 What I Learned

Simple tools solve real problems
Speed matters more than features
Developers prefer clean UI over complex tools

🙌 Feedback

Would love your feedback!

👉 Try it:
https://www.astonishbuddy.com/tools/json-formatter

If you find it useful, share it 🙏

webdev

🚀 I Built a Free Bulk QR Code Generator (No Login, No Limits) – Here’s How It Works

Mohit Patel — Fri, 01 May 2026 11:53:35 +0000

🚀 I Built a Free Bulk QR Code Generator (No Login, No Limits) – Here’s How It Works

If you’ve ever tried generating multiple QR codes at once, you probably faced one of these problems:

Limited free usage ❌
Login required ❌
Watermarks ❌
Slow generation ❌

So I decided to build my own tool.

🔧 What I Built

I created a Bulk QR Code Generator that lets you:

✅ Generate hundreds of QR codes instantly
✅ Download as ZIP or PDF
✅ No login required
✅ Completely free

👉 Try it here:
https://www.astonishbuddy.com/tools/bulk-qrcode-generator

⚡ Why I Built This

I needed this for a project where I had to generate QR codes for:

Products
Events
Labels

And existing tools were either paid or too limited.

🧠 Tech Stack

Next.js
Tailwind CSS
QR generation libraries
Client-side processing (fast ⚡)

📸 How It Works

Enter multiple values
Generate QR codes
Download instantly

💡 Use Cases

Event passes
Product labeling
Inventory tracking
Marketing campaigns

🚀 What I Learned

SEO matters more than you think
Small tools solve real problems
Performance = user retention

🙌 Feedback

Would love your feedback!

👉 Try it:
https://www.astonishbuddy.com/tools/bulk-qrcode-generator

If you find it useful, share it 🙏

webdev #javascript #nextjs #tools #opensource

Why Most Free Online Tools Are Slow (And How I Tried to Fix It)

Mohit Patel — Tue, 28 Apr 2026 05:01:27 +0000

After using dozens of “free tools” online, I noticed a pattern:

❌ Slow loading
❌ Too many ads
❌ Login required for basic features

It felt like simple tools were becoming unnecessarily complex.

So I decided to build a few tools myself with one goal:

👉 Make them fast, simple, and usable instantly

What I focused on:

No signup required
Minimal UI (no distractions)
Browser-based processing where possible
Fast load times

Biggest realization:

Users don’t care about “features” —
They care about speed and simplicity

Example use cases:

Compress an image quickly
Format JSON instantly
Generate a QR code in seconds

What I learned:

Building tools is easy
Making them actually useful is hard

I’m still improving the platform — feedback is welcome 🙌

I Built 13 Free Online Tools Using Next.js — Here’s What I Learned 🚀

Mohit Patel — Tue, 21 Apr 2026 12:52:52 +0000

A few days ago, I decided to build something simple but actually useful.

Instead of another portfolio project, I created a collection of 13 free online tools that people can use daily — no signup, no ads overload, no friction.

👉 Live here: https://www.astonishbuddy.com/

💡 Why I Built This

Most online tools today:

Require login ❌
Are slow and bloated ❌
Show too many ads ❌

I wanted to build something:

⚡ Fast
🔓 No signup required
🧠 Simple UI
🛠 Actually useful

🛠 Tech Stack

I used:

Next.js (App Router)**
TypeScript**
Tailwind CSS**
Custom API routes for processing

Everything is optimized for:

Speed ⚡
SEO 📈
Clean UX 🎯

🔧 Tools I Built

Here are some of the tools currently live:

Image Compressor
JSON Formatter
Text Case Converter
Word Counter
QR Code Generator
Base64 Converter
Random Number Generator
Password Generator
And more…

⚡ Biggest Challenges

SEO & Indexing

Getting pages indexed on Google was harder than building the tools 😅
Had to:

Add sitemap
Fix redirects
Optimize metadata

Performance Optimization

Making tools fast without backend-heavy processing was tricky.

Solution:

Use browser-based processing where possible
Optimize rendering with Next.js

Avoiding Spam Filters (Reddit 😅)

Sharing the project got flagged initially.
Lesson: provide value first, not links.

📈 What I Learned

Build something useful, not just impressive
SEO matters more than you think
Distribution (sharing) is as important as coding
Simple tools = high real-world usage

🔥 What’s Next

I’m planning to add:

PDF tools (PDF → Word, Image → PDF)
Background remover
AI-based tools

🙌 Would Love Feedback

If you have ideas, suggestions, or feature requests, I’d love to hear them.

👉 Try it here: https://www.astonishbuddy.com/

If you're building something similar or have done it before, what challenges did you face?

I Built a Free Image Compressor Using Next.js (No Signup Required)

Mohit Patel — Sat, 18 Apr 2026 05:53:06 +0000

As a developer, I often needed a quick way to compress images without installing heavy software or signing up on random websites.

Most tools online are either slow, filled with ads, or require login.

So I decided to build my own — a simple, fast, and free image compressor that works directly in the browser.

🚀 Why I Built This

While working on different projects, I constantly needed to:

Reduce image size for websites
Optimize images for faster loading
Avoid losing quality

But existing tools were frustrating to use.

So I built a clean and minimal solution.

⚙️ Features

⚡ Fast compression
🔒 No signup required
📱 Works on mobile and desktop
🎯 Simple and clean UI
🖼️ Supports JPG, PNG, WebP

🛠️ Tech Stack

Built using:

Next.js
React
Modern browser APIs

💡 How It Works

Upload your image
Select compression level
Click compress
Download optimized image

🌐 Try It Here

👉 https://astonishbuddy.com/tools/image-compressor

🔥 What I Learned

Building this taught me:

How to handle file processing in browser
Performance optimization techniques
Importance of user experience

🙌 Feedback

I’m still improving this tool.

Would love to know:

What features should I add?
Any improvements needed?

If you find it useful, feel free to share it 🚀

I built 10 free online tools using Next.js (no signup required)

Mohit Patel — Wed, 15 Apr 2026 10:15:32 +0000

I Built 10 Free Online Tools Using Next.js (No Signup Required)

As a developer, I often needed simple tools like image compressors, JSON formatters, or text converters. But most of the existing tools had limitations — ads, login requirements, or slow performance.

So I decided to build my own collection of free, fast, and no-login tools using Next.js.
🚀 Why I Built This

I wanted tools that are:

⚡ Fast and lightweight
🔒 No signup required
🎯 Simple and easy to use
📱 Mobile-friendly

Most tools online are cluttered or require login, which slows down productivity. I wanted a clean experience where anyone can just open and use instantly.

🛠️ Tools I Built

Here are some of the tools available:

Image Compressor
JSON Formatter
Text Case Converter
Word Counter
Base64 Encoder/Decoder
URL Encoder/Decoder
QR Code Generator
Password Generator
Lorem Ipsum Generator
Color Converter

🌐 Try the Tools

👉 You can check all tools here:
https://astonishbuddy.com

💡 Example Tools

👉 Image Compressor:
https://astonishbuddy.com/tools/image-compressor

👉 JSON Formatter:
https://astonishbuddy.com/tools/json-formatter

👉 Text Case Converter:
https://astonishbuddy.com/tools/text-case-converter

⚙️ Tech Stack

Next.js (App Router)
React
Modern UI with focus on performance
Fully responsive design

🔥 What I Learned

Building real tools helps more than tutorials
Performance matters a lot for user experience
Simplicity wins over complex UI

🙌 Feedback Welcome

I’m continuously improving these tools and adding new ones.

👉 I’d love your feedback:

What tool should I add next?
Any improvements needed?

Thanks for reading! 🚀