The best productivity apps for studying

Life can feel a little hectic at uni. Juggling academic study, group projects, essays and keeping up with your social life may sometimes need a helping hand. We’ve pulled a list together of some handy apps to help you with your productivity and study time. Installing these apps can help you to make the most of your time at university.

1. Productivity apps

• Trello - is a great project management tool. It lets you break large scale projects down into bite size tasks. You can create cards for things that need to get done and organise these into lists. It is a great tool for long term projects like a dissertation or group project. As you can set priorities, assign timelines, due dates and add masses of information to cards. It is a great feeling when you can move a card to the done pile.

• My Homework Student Planner - is one of the best study apps for students - being your ultimate university companion. It gives you a calendar where you can mark your important appointments, upcoming examinations, and deadlines. There is a Homework section for your assignments and projects. You can also encode your class schedules and grades to track your progress. Being a digital organiser, it alerts you of your upcoming class schedules and deadlines.

• Be Focused or PomoDone - these apps help you to manage your time better. They use the Promodoro technique - you work for 25 minutes and then take a 5-minute break. Both these apps will help you build up clear focus time when you use the countdown clock.

• Forest - another fun time manage app, for this one you set the time you wish to focus for, and you grow a plant, tree or forest. If you are tempted to use your phone during focus time your plants will suffer for you getting distracted. 

2. Scheduling group work

• Doodle - the constant messages to try and co-ordinate a meeting can be tiring. Why not whip out this nifty tool instead? It is a great free tool to use to schedule meetings or group work. 

• WhenisGood - another fuss free tool to plan in a time for that annoying group workshop you still need to organise.

3. Study apps

• Notion - is a really popular note taking tool. It enables you to organise your notes in a way that works for you and is great for to do lists and bookmarking.

• One Note - office 365 is available for free for any student. Use One Note to take amazing notes. Snap photos of whiteboards or slides, sketch or write by hand. And it is super easy to share with others.

• Anki - do you need to try and memorise information for your upcoming exams? This flashcard / quiz app is so effective and simple to use. Create flashcards using text, photos audio or video. Anki uses a system called "Spaced Repetition," which assesses how well you remembered each flash card and figures out when you need to review it again. It is a fun way to help you quickly learn information. 

• XMind - do you find mind maps are a very helpful tool for studying? This is a great app to help with mind mapping and brainstorming.

4. Wellbeing & concentration apps

• Headspace - when you're feeling stressed or overwhelmed try out Headspace an app which offers an array of mind fullness and meditation sessions. The app also offers sessions to help with sleep. Sign up to a free trial. 

• Calm - an app that offers sessions to support with stress, anxiety and sleep. Calm also offers a free trial.

More tips and tricks to better study

Discover our bank of helpful articles on maximising the impact of your study time, revising well and smashing those all important exams.  Juggling studying with downtime How to avoid procrastinating & other study mistakes Study tips for smashing exams How to beat exam anxiety Snacks to help you study better