I built a free alternative to paid job application tools ($15-40k in Nigeria, $25-99/month globally)
Hi Indie Hackers!
I recently launched Job Hunter, a Firefox extension that gives job seekers the premium career services that others charge for - completely free.
The Problem:
Career services are expensive but essential for job seekers:
- Globally: Services like JobScan ($29.99/month), AIApply ($25/month), LazyApply ($99/year)
- In Nigeria: Career consultants like The CV Cook charge ₦15,500-₦40,000 (~$20-50) for basic packages
The Solution:
I built Job Hunter to provide all these premium features for free:
- One-click job saving from any website
- AI-powered CV tailoring for each application
- ATS-optimization to pass screening filters
- Personalized cover letter generation
- Hidden job discovery in docs & company sites
- Application tracking across your job search
The extension is 100% free. No subscriptions, no usage limits, no upsells.
Tech Stack:
- Firefox WebExtension APIs
- JavaScript/HTML/CSS for the extension
- GitHub Pages for the web companion
- Local storage to maintain privacy and avoid backend costs
Current Status:
This is a brand new product I just finished building. I'm launching it today and would love your feedback as early users. I'm particularly interested in:
- Feature suggestions
- User experience feedback
- Ideas for reaching more job seekers who need this
Why Free?
I believe career services should be accessible to everyone, especially those who need them most - fresh graduates, people between jobs, and career changers. The traditional model of charging per application or via subscription creates unnecessary barriers.
Link to Firefox Add-ons page
Link to web companion
Looking forward to your thoughts and suggestions!
This is a really cool approach — especially making everything free. A lot of these tools get expensive quickly, so this definitely lowers the barrier for job seekers.
I’ve been building a much simpler job tracker myself, and one thing I’m noticing is that even with powerful tools, people still struggle to consistently track things like follow-ups, recruiter conversations, and status updates.
Curious — have you seen users actually stick with all these features long-term, or do they tend to use just a few core ones?
I dropped this project after a few weeks as I hit some personal issues, and as soon as I stopped actively pushing it, usage dropped. That made me realise I has a bad PMF and figured it was better to figure out something else. So unfortunately I don't have an answer to your question, sorry!