Got tired of SaaS products charging students $15/mo for basic tools, so I built a free alternative.

Hey IndieHackers! 👋

When I was in college, professors assigned presentations constantly. I'd watch my classmates spend 4-6 hours copying text from Wikipedia, fighting with PowerPoint formatting, and ending up with ugly slides.

I looked for solutions. Canva was okay but the good exports had watermarks. AI tools like Gamma and Tome were amazing, but they cost 10−16/month. If you’re a student in India surviving on a tiny allowance, paying $15/month for a presentation tool is simply not an option.

So I scratched my own itch. I spent my weekends building PPT Maker.

The MVP: A simple tool where you type a topic and get a fully designed .pptx file in 30 seconds using the Gemini AI API. No design skills needed.

The Pivot: Then campus placement season started. My friends were struggling with resumes. The big players (like Zety) let you build a resume for free, but hit you with a $20 paywall when you try to download the PDF. That felt like extortion to students who were just trying to get their first job.

So, I expanded the platform. Today, PPT Maker isn't just for presentations. It’s an entire free productivity suite for students and freshers. I added:

• An ATS-friendly AI Resume Builder

• A free ATS Resume Checker

• An AI Cover Letter Writer

• A "Company Vault" to find ATS keywords for specific companies (TCS, Amazon, etc.)

The Stack: React, Vite, Tailwind CSS, Firebase, and Gemini AI.

The Philosophy: Everything is 100% free. No watermarks. No paywalls. No required accounts.

I'm not trying to build the next unicorn or optimize for MRR right now. I just wanted to build the tool I desperately needed 2 years ago, and it turns out thousands of other students needed it too.

I’d love for you guys to check it out and tear down my UX/UI. What would you improve?

Link: PPTMaker.co.in