Essential Apps for UK Students

Whether you’re navigating your first year or you’re already settled into uni life, you’ll have a lot going on as a student. You’ll need to balance your studies, social life, and responsibilities at home, so anything that can make this easier is a blessing.

Thankfully, there are loads of great apps available to help you with academic success, practical aspects of living away from home, and even saving money. Some of these are specifically aimed at students, while others are just generally handy to have. In this article, we’ll go through the best UK student apps that every student should have on their phone, covering everything from study tools, to budgeting, to managing your mental health.

Study Planning, Revision and Note-taking#

It may not feel like it during Freshers Week, but you are at uni to study! Once you get into the swing of your lectures and seminars, you’ll need to stay organised and take your studies seriously. This is where productivity apps and planners for mapping out your study schedule come in – here are our top picks:

- MyStudyLife: This study planner and productivity app helps you to structure your schedule with a smart calendar, and keep track of your assignments and exams. The app’s notifications will make sure you never miss a deadline, while the productivity tools help you to focus on your work.

- Google Calendar: This free calendar can be used across PC and mobile devices to keep track of your schedule and deadlines. Set up your class timetable and add your assignment deadlines so you can plan efficiently, and get notifications on your phone to stay on track.

- Quizlet UK: While there are plenty of solid exam preparation and revision apps out there, Quizlet stands out for its prebuilt flashcard decks and revision tools tailored for UK curricula. If you don’t have time to make your own cards to revise with, check the app and someone may have already done it for you.

- Microsoft OneNote: This free note-taking app supports Copilot AI, sketching and annotating your notes, and voice transcription. You can also share your notes with your classmates, or work collaboratively on group projects.

Automatic cloud saving is a lifesaver — never worry about losing an essay again. The collaboration features for group projects are non-negotiable.

- Humayra, Business Admin at Birmingham City University recommends using Google Drive/OneDrive

Budgeting and Managing Your Finances#

As a student you’ll be more responsible for your own finances, budgeting for groceries, paying bills, and making sure your money lasts the term. A big part of this is making sure your budget stretches further, with different ways to save money.

Here are our recommendations for managing your money and saving some pennies:

- Mobile banking: Firstly, make sure you’ve got your bank’s mobile app so you can track your finances on the go. Check out our guide on the best student bank accounts to find out which bank accounts are best for you.

- UNiDAYS: This free platform gives you access to a massive amount of student discounts, offering deals on tech, clothes, and much more.

- Too Good To Go: This app helps to reduce food waste by offering huge discounts on food as businesses are getting ready to close for the day. If you keep an eye on the app you can stock up on cheap, high-quality food from local restaurants, cafes and bakeries.

“Free to sign up and instantly verify your student status. The discounts on everything from software (Adobe, Apple Music) to clothing and food add up quickly.”

Sumaya, MA Education Studies, University of Portsmouth recommends the app UNiDAYS

Transport and Travel#

One of the challenges you’ll have as a first-year student is figuring out how to get around your new locale, as well as how to make your way home for the Christmas break. As well as getting to know the area’s public transport, you’ll also want to save as much money as possible.

Here are our recommended apps to help you do just that:

- Citymapper: This app helps you plan your journeys and easily figure out public transport networks. It works in the UK’s major cities, so chances are your uni is covered.

- Trainline: Use this app to figure out the train routes around your uni. Travelling back home by train can get expensive, so it’s important to make sure you’re getting the best deal. Don’t forget you can get student discounts and save more money on your train travel!

- Stagecoach Bus: Buses and coaches often offer a more cost-effective alternative to trains, and this app helps with journey planning, purchasing mobile tickets, and tracking buses in real time.

- TOTUM (NUS Extra): As well as a range of other products, the TOTUM app and card can save you money on trains, your railcard, and even flights (handy for international students).

“If you're in a major city, it’s far superior to standard maps. It shows you all possible routes (bus, train, tram, even bike-share) in a clear, easy-to-understand way and gives real-time disruption alerts.”

Adnan, Computer Science, Ulster University recommends using Citymapper to get around

Student Accommodation and Flatmate Management#

As well as staying on top of your academic responsibilities, you’ll also have to keep things running smoothly at home. If you’re staying in halls a lot of this will be straightforward, but if you’re living with housemates you’ll need to make sure you’re paying bills on time, keeping the place clean, and making sure everyone’s doing their fair share. Luckily, there are apps to help with exactly that, as well as finding your accommodation in the first place:

- Flatastic: This app helps you and your flatmates keep track of your chores and responsibilities with shared shopping lists, cleaning rotas, expense tracking, and more. No more excuses when someone forgets to buy more loo roll!

- Splitwise: Easily keep track of your house’s shared expenses, such as your bills, shopping, meals out, and anything else that might crop up.

- SpareRoom: If you haven’t been able to sort your student accommodation yet, the SpareRoom app (there’s also a website) can help you find flatmates and shared accommodation. You can search and filter to find listings, or post a room wanted ad so students looking for an extra housemate can find you.

Mental Health and Wellbeing#

University can be a stressful time, as you juggle your academic workload and social life, all while trying to figure out new surroundings (and often living away from home for the first time). It’s vital that you take steps to maintain your mental health and wellbeing to ensure that you don’t burn out, especially as your schedule gets busier.

Here are some of our top picks for looking after your mental and physical health at uni:

- Headspace: This app offers a range of tools and programs to benefit your mental health, including managing your stress and anxiety, sleeping better, practising meditation. Students can get 85% off the annual subscription!

- Calm: This is a sleep aid and meditation app, perfect for when uni stress is affecting your sleep. There’s a free trial available, so you can test it out and see if it helps you.

- Sleep Cycle: If you’re not sleeping well, it’ll have a knock-on effect on your studies and social life. Using a sleep tracker can help you to identify problems and optimise your sleep.

- Student Minds: Student Minds is a charity offering mental health support specifically for UK students, including emergency support for students in crisis (this one isn’t actually an app, but it’s such a useful website we included it anyway).

- NHS Fitness Studio: The NHS offers instructor-led video workouts you can do at home, including yoga, aerobics, and resistance training. This is handy for staying healthy when your budget won’t stretch to a gym membership.

Uni life isn’t just about studying and staying sane with your flatmates – you’re also there to have a good time and expand your horizons. This means getting out, meeting new people and trying new things.

Here are the apps we recommend for finding events and making friends while at uni:

- Meetup: This popular app helps you find like-minded people in your area based on shared interests. Whether you’re into hiking, painting, or pickleball, you can find and organise events around your uni.

- Bumble BFF: Bumble isn’t just a dating app – you can also use its BFF mode to find new friends in your area. You can chat and meet people one on one, or join group events.

- Eventbrite: Event discovery apps like Eventbrite let you search and browse upcoming events in your area, including gigs, club nights, tours, and more.

- UNiDAYS Events: UNiDAYS offers deals on events as well as products, and also organise their own events from time to time.

Conclusion#

Uni students today aren’t stuck using notebooks and post-it notes to keep track of everything; there are so many useful apps to help you with uni life.

From streamlining revision and coursework to managing budgets, boosting mental wellbeing, and finding interesting events around your campus, these tools can give you more control of your university journey. By building these types of tools into your daily routines, you’ll be able to have a balanced, productive lifestyle at uni.

You’ll also want to check for any specific apps for your university, as these might be required for checking your timetable, messaging tutors and lecturers, or submitting your assignments. And of course, the apps we’ve talked about here are just our picks – it’s well worth browsing the app store to find more apps that are designed to help students with various aspects of academic life.

With the right tools for the job, your uni life will be a breeze!