With a student, comes a lot of stress and overwhelming responsibilities, and with digital devices these days, it has become even more difficult to stay focused and reach success academically. But the same smartphone that seems to distract you, can be transformed into a secret weapon for academic excellence.
This can be made possible with the help of these 29 best free apps for students, available for both Android and iOS. From complete academic organization to managing personal social events, making flashcards and mindmaps to learning languages, getting courses from universities to increasing productivity with timers. There’s a whole lot in store for you. Jump right in!
1. Quizlet - Make Flashcards
Simply re-reading notes is a passive way to learn but to boost your academic year, quizlet has made it easy for you to create flashcards and learn with the method of active recall. Ditch old-school cards and make your life easy with Quizlet.
Create your study sets with customizable flashcards and organize them subject-wise to not to hassle at the last moment.
Get sets of pre-created flashcards according to your selected course
Its shuffle feature makes studying more exciting.
You can take a test with the flashcards you make and choose different question types to check how much you’ve learned.
With Quizlet Plus, you get expert solutions, can create quizzes and tests and you can track your progress.
2. Khan Academy - Get Educational Courses
Curious about the world? or Want to go in-depth into your studies? Well, Khan Academy has got you covered with over 4000 courses on every subject from math, science, computing, and humanities to life skills, music, and space. Khan Academy offers-
Video lessons with detailed explanations and practice exercises, and quizzes to check your progress.
Personalized learning dashboard to view your learning progress
It also helps you to prepare for different tests like CSAT.
3. Duolingo - For Language Learning
Are you a language lover and want to explore different cultures and nations through the languages they speak? Duolingo does the same for you and offers over 40 languages to choose from with its gamified and flashcard-type learning.
It focuses on vocabulary, writing, listening and speaking.
It starts with the basic learning of each letter and then gradually moves towards words and sentences.
This learning platform has an interesting way to keep you going. You receive feedbacks and earn points. You are kept responsible with a daily streak, of which you are reminded every day by the little ‘Duo’.
4. Evernote - For Note Taking
Type in any idea that pops into your mind or create and organize your notes efficiently with Evernote. Its following features make it the best:
Organize your notes into different labeled notebooks and keep them arranged for easy access.
You can type or handwrite notes, capture images, add documents, record audio, and clip web pages for later reference and also annotate them.
You can search your notes easily with a single keyword or add tags to sort them out.
It automatically syncs your notes across all devices.
With the paid version you can view your notes offline everywhere, manage tasks with Google Calendar, customize your dashboard with widgets and background, annotate PDFs, and save emails.
5. TED - Educational Entertainment
This expansive library of knowledge offers talks of experts in their respective fields with over 3,500 TED talks with something for everyone to feed their curiosity. You’ll be never out of content with TED.
It has videos with subtitles in over 100 languages.
Podcasts to listen to while working.
Save content and download to view offline. Bookmark videos for later watch.
Search with the filters of languages, topics, and duration to tailor specifically to your interests.
‘Surprise me’ feature lets the app choose a video for you when you are confused.
6. Grammarly - Check your Writings
Need to write eye-catchy essays or need someone to proofread your writing? Well, Grammarly’s got your back. It is your all time writing assistant. No more need to burn your eyes to check every single error. It checks:
Grammar
Punctuation
Spelling
Style of Writing
Detects Tone Grammarly's keyboard app is a personal assistant that checks your email and posts before sending them out. Grammarly premium offers:
Plagiarism Checker
Formatting Suggestions
Citation Suggestions
Synonyms Finder
Enhances writing with rephrasing sentences
7. Photomath - Maths Solver
Stuck with complicated and challenging math problems? Then, this is the only solution you need. Scan your math problems and know the step-by-step solution, which formulas to use, and where you went wrong. It has:
Animated tutorials
Explanations with different applications, graphs, and tables
Scientific Calculator
8. Google Drive - Storing Space
Life’s made easy with your digital school bag. Store your files, sheets, documents, slides etc. online to access anytime, anywhere. Gotta read some definitions while on your way to the exam hall? With its sync feature, view your file in seconds, uploaded frm your laptop.
Fast and easy collaboration with your classmates for projects and group assignments
Store in different file types - PDFs, Google docs, sheets, slides, Microsoft files and a lot more
Work offline, too
9. Notion - The Ultimate Planner
Notion is a whole customizable life-organizing platform. It is the most versatile app that can be used to manage your finances, hobbies, books, health, studies, and a whole lot. It helps to organize your notes or data easily.
You can view a single database in many views - a table, board, timeline, calendar, gallery, and list view.
Integrate text, images, files and also embed music in your workspace
Click a topic and open a whole new page to write your notes or manage it your way.
Sync across all devices to work seamlessly anywhere
Collaborate with your classmates to work on a single project
10. MyStudyLife - Online Planner
Finding it difficult to find balance between your academic and social life? Don’t worry. This planner will keep you on track and ahead of your life. Schedule your classes, exams, and semester along with social events and be reminded of your tasks before deadlines.
Organize tasks according to tags
It reminds you of an upcoming exam, classes, or tasks that are due or next right on your dashboard so you focus on your priority
It’s calendar view keeps you accountable
It also tells how much percent you have completed your tasks and fuel your motivation to reach 100%
Sync across all devices
11. Mint - Budget Tracker
Don’t be overwhelmed with the task to manage finances along with your stressful studies. Mint is here to save you from being broke this year. It’s following features makes it the perfect financing app:
Receive an alert when about to overspend
Keep track of all your accounts in one place
Create custom budgets and reach your goals
Monitor your subscriptions
Personalized Insights
Track your money spending
12. Oxford Dictionary - Work Your Way Through English
This app in itself in enormous because it has the 15 biggest Oxford Dictionaries and English thesaurus all in one application. Perfect for students learning foreign languages to navigate through life with everyday words in use. It also includes:
Audio Pronounciations
Auto Correction
Voice and Camera Search
Expand your vocabulary with word of the day
Save your favourite definitions
With premium, you can download content for offline use and get unlimited synonyms and antonyms.
13. GoConqr - Mind Maps and Flashcards
GoConqr is a social learning platform to help learners and educators to engage in learning content. It includes:
Flashcards - Learn with images to learn faster and efficiently.
Upload text from a spreadsheet and make multiple cards.
You can even take out a hard copy.
Share flashcards with your class groups on GoConqr.
Mind Maps - Create mind maps while playing with fonts, colors, visuals.
Attach snippets to fill with important points or news.
Visually connect the dots between different concepts
Notes - Embed videos, links, images, mind maps, quizzes, and learning
resources in your notes for better understanding.
Courses - Create your own courses to keep your learning sequential.
Quizzes - Make your own quizzes with different question types like fill in
the blanks, multiple choice, and true or false while adding images.
Include explanations as to why the answers are right or wrong.
Be on the right track with quizzes as a review strategy.
Slides - Gather all your learning material by adding images, videos, links,
mind maps, quizzes, flashcards, flowcharts, and notes.
Create visually appealing slides with pre-designed templates.
Present it in front of the class or share with your group.
Flowcharts - Visualize your thoughts and create charts and diagrams.
Embed flowcharts in your notes.
14. Merriam Webseter - Improve your Vocabulary
Merriam Webster is America’s most popular dictionary. It lets you build and expand your vocabulary either you are new to the language or aim to improve at it. It’s got you covered with some of its features like:
Audio Pronunciations
Voice Search
Play different word games to check your vocabulary
Find quick definitions and thesaurus
Word of the day to extend your vocabulary horizon
Save your favorites
Synonyms and Antonyms
Example sentences
History of the word
15. myHomework - Planner
This digital student planner lets you track your assignments, projects, classes, and tests with ease. With this app, You have control over your academic life and will never miss a deadline again.
Receive due date reminders
Add classes, events, and holidays in calendar view
Categorise assignments and projects by class, type and priority
Have widgets on your home screen to be reminded of your upcoming homework
Sync across all devices
Join your teacher’s classes and be informed of announcements
16. SimpleMind - Mind Maps
Organize your thoughts or summarise your chapters with aesthetic mind maps. Its user-friendly interface gives you a kickstart into your mind-mapping journey. It also includes:
15+ style sheets to start from
Different layout modes
Add topics and organize through topics
With free form layout start your creativity anywhere on the blank canvas
Or need an already sculpted workspace then use auto layout
17. SoloLearn - Learn to Code
With the constant need to stay on track with technology as the world moves forward, it’s really important to have a good hand at any technical skill which often starts with learning how to code. But with studying, it might seem a little harder than that. That’s when SoloLearn comes in.
It has over 25 courses to choose from
New content posted daily
Start as a beginner or an expert
Learn in a gamified way
Answer some questions and get recommendations for courses
Have discussions with over 40 million students
With SoloLearn Pro, have personalized practice and goal stats.
18. Anki - Flashcards
Anki is a flashcard app that uses spaced repetition to enhance your quality of learning. It uses your time efficiently by incorporating it into the study material that you’re less familiar with. It has many great features such as:
Use pre-made cards or make your own flashcards
Add images, and audios and play with text to escalate your learning experience
Organize your flashcards in decks for easy access
Card Scheduler - It sorts the cards for you according to those you answered or not, those you answered fast or slow, and priorities the ones you need to work on more.
See the results at the end of every session
You can view your progress in the statistics section with graphs to see how much you have learned
19. RefME - Referencing Made Easy
Writing citations can be a boring and tiresome task. But RefME has made it easy for you to do so. Easily write citations of a book, website, journal, newspaper and get through the time-consuming work in seconds.
Copy or paste URLs or scan book barcodes with RefMe’s easy interface to get the citations
Easily find your research papers with RefMe’s thousands of resources without scrolling through Google for your research
It formats your citations in MLA, Harvard, Chicago, RSC, and lots more
20. Daylio - Mood Tracker
It’s really easy to get stressed and overwhelmed amidst your academic and social life but it is really important to take care of your mental well-being. And you can do so with the help of Daylio. It offers you the following features:
Track your daily activities through emojis like and see how different aspects of your life affects your mood
Create goals, challenge yourself and track your progress
See your mood chart and mood count to see the frequency of different types of emotions you feel
Watch your entries in a calendar view
Create your personal mood palette by choosing different emojis and color sets
Get reminded of your important dates
Watch your achievements as you grow
See your average daily mood
Lock your dairy to keep your emotions private
21. Coursera - Courses
Not only you can gain information on different subjects with Coursera, but you can also take a whole degree online.
Wide range of topics to choose from
Suggested learning path based on your job role interests
Access to courses at top universities like Yale University, and Princeton
The courses are fully packed with video instructions, assignments, group discussions, and projects
You might have to pay for some courses but mostly they are free
Get a certificate and earn your degree
22. Todoist - To-do List
Todoist keeps you clear on your tasks and helps students never turn in a assignment late. It offers the following features:
Break tasks into sub-tasks
Sort with different labels and filters
Prioritize tasks with tags
Collaborate with friends
Set deadlines
With the pro version, schedule reminders to be reminded of unfinished tasks
23. Forest - Productivity
Forest apps use the Pomodoro technique with a gamified approach to keep you consistent with your study sessions and motivated to keep going. It does so with the following features:
When you start your study session, you plant a virtual plant that withers when you use your phone
Later you can see the virtual garden you made with each study session
24. Google Calendar - Planner
Google Calendar is the ultimate time management app that is more useful than just seeing a festival or a date. Its following features make it convenient to make a schedule:
Different calendars for different aspects of your life
Schedule and color code tasks and classes
Set reminders of any upcoming event
Collaborate with your friends or classmates
25. Office Lens - Scanner
This Microsoft app lets you take a picture of:
Whiteboards
Documents
Receipts
Business Cards
Tables
Handwritten Notes
And then turn them into editable digital files that can be saved, shared, and synced across all devices. It also includes:
Read the text aloud from your text
Easy access to files by searching keywords
Sync your notes with PowerPoint, one note, and Word.
26. EasyBib - Citation Generator
Don’t get tangled up in writing citations. With EasyBib, you can scan a book’s barcode and get last minute citations for your project without any hassle. You can also choose a citation style and sit back while EasyBib does the work for you.
27. Lumosity - Brain Training App
It’s really important to keep your brain trained well to excel in academics. It practices your abilities like memory, attention, flexibility, problem-solving, speed, math, and languages.
It takes a fit test with cognitive games to calculate your baseline
Get a tailored training program according to your scores
See where you stand compared to people around your age
28. Brainscape -Flashcards
Use brainscape’s easy-to-use flashcard technology with its following features:
Thousands of pre-made cards to practice with
Make your own custom cards
Track your progress
Maintain a day streak and be motivated to study daily
Bookmark your selected flashcards
Read articles made by Brainscape on different topics
29. Wikipedia - Information Hub
Wikipedia is an encyclopedia enclosing vast stretch of topics in over 300 languages. Do in-depth research for your assignments and projects and explore broader areas of subjects with this app. It also includes:
Detailed articles on varied topics
Reading lists of articles and blogs
Customized feed with your interests
With the Wikipedia app, dive deeper into the newest articles, fresh news, and pool of knowledge.