Built in add-ons I’d enable:
- LoopTools and Node Wrangler should frankly be built in to blender, but are instead built-in addons so enable them. I forget what F2 is specifically for, but I always have that enabled too.
- A.N.T.Landscape is a convenient way to make terrain
- Extra Objects adds extra primitives
- Import Images as Planes does what it says (not necessary for images being imported for references though)
- Collection Manager is my preferred way to deal with collections
- Copy Attributes will let you copy things like modifiers from on object to another
- Sun Position is useful for lighting outdoor scenes based on actual times or matching the sun to an HDRI
- Rigify isn’t required for rigging, but it gives you a base human rig you can start from even if you make your own control rig and is needed if you use characters with Rigify generated rigs (as many rigged characters in the blender community do)
- Archimesh is worth looking at to see how things are done if you do architecture even if you want to make your own models from scratch, same with Archipack, but the free version is no longer built into blender, but available here.
- Paint Palettes lets you make palettes for colors when texturing
Free External add-ons (I’m too lazy to track down links right now, except for SSGI)
- SKkeeper: Apply modifiers and keep shapekeys
- BagaPie Modifier: Useful geonode utilities. Look it up on youtube.
- Blender SSGI: it’s an alternative blender build with screen space global illumination (bounce light) for Eevee that spares you from having to set up light probes. It used to be an addon. Download the build for your OS here, and the BA thread is here.
- Transfer Vert Order: there’s a free addon for this by the guy better known for the famous Blender Hair Tool add-on (not free)