Yesterday's Top Launches: 5 Tools from January 16, 2026 | thistools

Yesterday brought another wave of clever apps and tools aiming to smooth out digital friction, especially for developers and teams looking for creative new developer tools. From turning your GitHub activity into an arcade game to an AI assistant that lives on your phone, January 16th, 2026, was a day for practical, and sometimes playful, innovation.

Cursor AI Mobile

If you’re someone who relies on Cursor AI for coding on your Mac but constantly find inspiration striking when you’re away from your desk, Cursor AI Mobile could be your new favorite thing. It’s a simple companion app for iPhone and iPad that acts as a remote control for the Cursor CLI on your Mac. The concept is straightforward: you type a prompt on your mobile device, send it, and it executes instantly on your computer back home or at the office.

This solves the age-old problem of having a brilliant idea for a code fix or a new function only to forget it by the time you sit down at your machine. It’s perfect for that quick bug fix you remember while commuting or testing a one-liner during a break. Being free removes any barrier to giving it a try, though it does require your Mac to be on and connected. It’s a niche tool, but for developers already embedded in the Cursor ecosystem, it’s a remarkably convenient piece of the puzzle.

GitHub Space Shooter

Who says your GitHub contribution graph has to be a static grid of green squares? GitHub Space Shooter injects a hefty dose of fun by visualizing your commit history as a classic space shooter battlefield. Your contributions become ships you control, blasting away against a backdrop of stars. You can use it in two ways: as a one-off web app to generate a cool image or video of your "coding battle," or you can set up a GitHub Action to auto-generate these visualizations on a schedule, perhaps for a weekly team recap.

It’s less about solving a critical problem and more about bringing a spark of joy and a different perspective to productivity. For team leads, it could be a lighthearted way to celebrate activity, and for individual developers, it’s just a fun way to see their hard work represented differently. It’s a free project that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and sometimes that’s exactly what’s needed.

Indy: Your ADHD Copilot

Tackling a much more significant challenge, Indy launches as a free, AI-powered support app designed specifically for neurodivergent brains. Instead of forcing users into rigid productivity systems that often clash with how ADHD minds work, Indy uses adaptive systems and structured prompts. It focuses on three core areas: future-mapping to help visualize goals, daily scaffolding to break down the day into manageable pieces, and guided reflection to process what worked and what didn’t.

The potential benefit here is substantial. For individuals with ADHD, traditional planners and to-do apps can feel punishing. Indy’s approach of providing structure without rigidity could be a game-changer for staying connected to personal and professional priorities. The fact that it’s free and built with genuine understanding makes it stand out in a crowded field of wellness apps. It’s an empathetic tool that recognizes the user’s challenges and aims to work with them, not against them.

WizzyPoke

We’ve all been there—sending a message in a busy group chat or collaborative tool only to have it scroll up unnoticed. WizzyPoke is a browser extension that offers a playful, slightly mischievous solution: the ability to send a subtle screen shake to the tab where the recipient is working. If your colleague is deep in a spreadsheet and misses your Slack message, a quick "poke" from WizzyPoke will give their screen a gentle jumble to grab attention.

Operating on a freemium model, it works across all browser tabs without requiring accounts, which lowers the barrier to quick adoption within a team. The obvious question is around potential for abuse—could this become the digital equivalent of tapping someone on the shoulder repeatedly? Its success will likely depend on team culture and the implementation of respectful usage norms. But as a lightweight, immediate way to cut through digital noise, it’s certainly inventive.

Flowdy

For e-commerce managers and content creators, capturing a reader’s interest at the exact moment it peaks is crucial. Flowdy uses AI to automatically scan product descriptions and blog posts, identifying key terms and turning them into shoppable links. The clever part is what happens next: when a user clicks a highlighted word, a window instantly pops up with relevant product recommendations without ever reloading the page.

This addresses the direct need to reduce friction in the customer journey. Every extra click or page load is an opportunity for a potential buyer to drop off. By keeping the shopping experience seamless and immediate, Flowdy aims to boost conversion rates significantly. The freemium model suggests there’s a tier for smaller shops to test the waters before committing. For any business relying on content to drive sales, this tool could turn passive reading into active shopping.

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