The Six Best Mobile Apps for Students
Getting organized can take just a few clicks. With mobile apps that are geared toward student success, it’s easy to stay on top of assignments, find notes and schedule professor meeting times.
We haven’t found an app yet for instant pizza delivery or dealing with messy roommates, but they’re probably in development.
In the meantime, check out these six top mobile apps:
Everstudent
Lodged inside the popular free app Evernote, this easy-to-use app helps you manage your assignments and tasks, creating a killer planner that will keep you on track. Organize assignments by class, add color codes and input other notes like test dates, professor emails and office hours, and schedule reminders.
Dictionary.com
When your professor throws out a word like “antithetical” or “disputatious” (making you long for the word “commencement”), you’ve got it covered. Dictionary.com lets you find definitions fast, and even works without an Internet connection once it’s downloaded.
Want to throw around a few terms yourself? An audio pronunciation guide is provided, too, along with sample sentences and word history. Go ahead, get voluble.
JiWire Wi-Fi Finder
Your English Lit paper is due in four hours, but you’re off campus (or maybe even out of the country) for the day. But you won’t be out of luck: with the handy JiWire Wi-Fi Finder, you can lock onto a signal and get online quickly. The app lists nearly half a million free and paid Wi-Fi hotspots in over 144 countries. You can help out other students, too, by sharing a hotspot via email or your Twitter or Facebook accounts.
Google Goggles
As part of its mobile search app collection, Google includes this funky app, which uses image-recognition technology to return relevant search results. Snap a picture of a famous landmark, and the app will let you know what you’re looking at.
You can also scan barcodes to get product information, add contacts by taking a photo of a business card or even translate foreign language text by capturing a snippet of it in a picture. Not that you’re goofing off during class, but it’s also excellent for solving Sudoku puzzles.
Bump
Sharing notes and contact info is a breeze with the simple app Bump. The software lets two mobile-device users swap info simply by “bumping” two phones together. It’s ideal for creating a study group and exchanging contact information quickly as you hustle off to your next class. As a bonus, you can also use the app to share photos with friends and family, and move contacts and photos from your device to your computer.
Mint
Whether you’re a business student who’s saving for an entrepreneurial venture, or you’re cash-strapped and tired of rooting between couch cushions to find change for coffee, Mint will help you find your way. The financial-management app lets you put all your accounts into one place so you can set a budget and track goals. By the time your first student-loan payment rolls around, you’ll be way ahead of the game.
Mobile apps like these can be a boon for any organization, so you’ll spend more time studying (and playing) and less time trying to juggle school and social time. Best of all, they’re free. Better scheduling, more robust study resources and financial management? Now, that’s smart.