10 Best Time Management Apps for College Students

A well-known adage goes, “Time and Tide wait for none.” This means a lot in life, especially in the life of a college student! Time management is a discipline that shapes young minds into a sense of direction and duty. 

Too busy? Let’s explore why time management is so important and what its benefits are:

Time Management Helps Develop Effective Learning Skills.

As a student, you will effectively learn more when you are very keen on managing your time. Since time management is more quantifiable for most college students, it is easier for you to set aside study hours and stick to it. When this is religiously practiced, it’s easier for you to develop better and stronger learning skills.

Time Management is the First Step to Become Successful.

Maybe you’ve heard your mentors and parents saying, “If you cannot manage your time, you most likely won’t be able to manage other parts of your life either.” That statement somehow rings true!

When your time management skills are exemplary, and you use every single minute you have to gain something, you’ll eventually find yourself a step closer to your ladder of success. Suffice it to say the key to becoming successful is to manage your time efficiently.

Money and Time Management Go Hand in Hand.

Simply put, the more time you waste, the more money is flushed down the drain. With excellent time management skills, you get to accomplish more in a short period.

Time Management Lets You Be More Productive.

Practicing proper time management results in you being more productive. It brings more organized outcomes with fewer to no mistakes.

Time Management Offers Great Opportunities.

As we know, the early bird will always have more options. If you remain at the top of your time, you produce greater opportunities in life.

Time Management Skills: Improving Every Student’s Learning

Everybody knows that in today’s extremely busy world, students must have exceptional time management skills. Gone were those days when life was simpler when time seemed to move more slowly. In modern society, young people are required to have skills in productivity and efficiency. 

For you to manage your time effectively, you must have these important skills as a student:

• Goal-Setting. It’s useless to create a time management scheme if, in the first place, you have no idea what to do with your time. As a student, you can benefit from having goals—be it short-term or long-term. For instance, completing your homework early every day is a good short-term goal. That way, you will have more time to do other things like soccer practice or music. Your long-term goal could be to make it to your school’s soccer varsity team or play in your school’s orchestra.
• Prioritization. When you take time to assess what needs to be complied with within a specified time frame, you can easily rate your tasks based on their importance. Setting daily, weekly, monthly, and even yearly priorities can help you achieve your goals. This also ensures that your other activities that are still important but not necessarily urgent (like exercise or adequate sleep) are still given precedence. Many students like prioritizing their easy tasks early in the day and then moving forward as the day progresses. There are also those who opt to handle the bigger tasks first. No matter your preferences, the key here is to know what and what not to prioritize.
• Organization. By the time you have set your priorities, the next thing is to get those priorities done. While some people are born naturally well-organized, others need a lot of help. Thankfully, you can incorporate several strategies to get organized, such as keeping an up-to-date calendar or a clean study environment. You can also find several helpful software and apps to help you boost your organizational skills.
• Managing Stress. When you are under excessive stress, you can’t expect to perform at your best. As a college student, you must know how to manage and deal with university life stress. You need to get ample sleep and get physically active. These simple but very helpful tips are perfect ways to deal with stress and, in fact, make learning more efficient. 

Understanding the Importance of Time Management Skills

Practicing efficient time management will allow you, as a student, to complete things in less time. How so? By focusing your attention on things that matter, and avoid wasting time on distractions like social media.

Using time efficiently will also help minimize stress because you will learn how to prioritize goals and easily tick off unnecessary things from your to-do list. And when you fulfill your goals, the sense of achievement is nothing more than fulfilling. 

When you use your time efficiently, you can complete your tasks on time, stay engaged with your lessons, and have ample free time doing extracurricular activities that are just as important as your hobbies, sports, youth groups, or just spending time with your family and friends.

Proper time management also gives you the chance to make the most out of your capacity and enjoy that satisfying feeling of accomplishment. And of course, this attitude is a major desirable skill that will come in handy once you scout for employment. 

The 10 Time Management Apps College Students Can’t Do Without

If you’re struggling with managing your time correctly and often end up thinking the day is just not enough to get your tasks done, you are not alone. Hundreds of college students share the same sentiments.

Thankfully, technology is the ultimate solution. You can find different software and applications to help you manage your time. Download these apps to check things off your to-do list, boost your productivity, and simply be organized and efficient. 

RELATED: Your Guide To The Essential Tools For College Students

Here are some of the most popular time-management apps that college students can download. 

myHomework Student Planner

While you may think only assignments are no longer for college students, think again. myHomework Student Planner is an app dedicated to all levels, from high school to college. This app provides you with a calendar to help you track your upcoming exams, assignments, projects, and other important events.

It also features a homework widget that allows you to sync your tasks and reminders when these assignments are nearing their submission date. The myHomework Student planner is indeed a perfect app to avoid getting caught off guard by your assignment deadlines.

This platform is created so that participating schools can update class info, set assignments, and publish announcements within the app. Apart from the website, it’s also available both for iOS and Android.  The free version of this app is already an amazing standalone app perfect for full-time students.

However, if you have other things to monitor, go for the premium version ($4.99/year). This version lets you synchronize your myHomework calendar with an external calendar like Google. That way, it’s easier for you to go over your commitments in just one place.

myHomework Student Planner Tips:

• If you have a long history of submitting your work late, missing your homework, or procrastinating, it’s important to dedicate yourself to making plans in the app.
• Think of your planning as something that you should complete every week.
• At least once a week, go over the app to check on your upcoming week. You can add additional tasks to the app as you go along.
• Add a “homework” that repeats weekly at a time where you will spend thirty minutes looking at the upcoming weeks and figuring out what tasks should be added.
• Go over your app regularly (ideally after your class), so you can plan for the task you will work on later at night.

Microsoft To Do

Everybody knows Microsoft. This company made an all-in-one task management app designed to help you keep organized and manage your daily life. With Microsoft To Do app, you can make a list of your upcoming tasks, take down notes, record collections, plan an event, or set reminders to boost your productivity and focus on what matters to you as a student.

With this app, you are guaranteed to stay organized and take control of your life. Microsoft To-Do features My Day and Suggestions, where you can personalize your daily planner tools.

It even comes with intelligent suggestions where the relevant tasks from across your list are recommended. Whether you need to go to the grocery or do housecleaning routines, your everyday tasks are simple with the app.

Microsoft To-Do Tips:

• You can sync your other Microsoft apps and services with Microsoft to Do.
• You can flag emails as tasks in your Outlook (or any email account hosted by Microsoft), create a list with Cortana, or see your tasks assigned on Microsoft 365 service.
• Customize your list for a more personalized look. 

My Tasks

This helpful app features a planner, a to-do list, and an organizer. Just by going over the app, you can easily check what is happening in your current week. This app’s key features include a planner for all ongoing tasks, a to-do list of the day, a smart calendar, a voice recorder, and synchronization options.

With My Tasks, you can do tasks with a specified date and simply start working on them once you are free. Take control of all your events, and when you complete them, just mark them as completed. For unsolved goals, the app’s smart calendar will remind you about them.

Tips for My Tasks App:

• Plan your daily tasks, compile your to-do list for the current week, plan repetitive tasks, or control personal effectiveness.
• Just by using the app for a week, you can define your productivity and think about organizing your time efficiently. 
• The planner reminds you of your school and personal events, so you won’t miss any critical details. This helps you be a step ahead of your peers. 

Focus to Do App

This is a science-based app that combines Pomodoro Timer with Task Management and is designed to encourage you to keep focused so you can get things done quickly.

It integrates the To-Do List and Pomodoro Technique in one place so you can organize and capture your tasks into your to-do list, start your focus timer on study and work, set reminders for your most important errands, and tasks, and check the time you spend at work.

The Focus to Do app is probably your most ultimate app for reminders, managing tasks, calendar events, lists, or checklists, ensuring that you focus on study and work and track your total working hours. 

Focus to Do Tips:

• For each day, have a list of your repeating tasks that are due and upcoming. Use the Pomodoro clock for each task so you can focus on progressing.
• Try purchasing “Time Zen,” a type of time management system that you can buy at Amazon, or Udemy, a type of video course. These two are highly rated and perfect complements for the app.
• For each of your tasks, try not to start the Pomodoro clock normally. Instead, click on your task, then click the tiny “play” button on the right. This will start the Pomodoro clock only for that specific task, allowing you to better track how much time you spend on it each day.

Any.do Calendar and To-Do List

This is a free calendar, planner, and to-list app for organizing and managing your to-do lists, reminders, notes, calendar events, checklists, grocery lists, and so much more. It features an advanced daily planner and calendar where you can keep your calendar events and to-do list. It has built-in reminders, and you can choose from either its 3-day calendar view, weekly calendar view, or agenda view.

To keep all your tasks, notes, reminders, and agendas organized, you can sync them all together. From your Google calendar, phone calendar, outlook calendar, or Facebook events, sync them seamlessly so you will never forget any important event.

One-time reminders, location reminders, recurring reminders, and voice reminders are also integrated into this app. And, if you want to share your list and assign tasks to your friends or classmates, the app also comes with a feature that lets you collaborate with other people.

You can also integrate other to-do and time management apps to synchronize everything efficiently. Whether your files are in Outlook, WhatsApp, Google Calendar, Gmail, Slack, Google Tasks, Trello, Evernote, Wunderlist, Zapier, Todoist, Asana, Salesforce, Microsoft to-do, OneNote, Amazon Alexa, Google Assistance, Exchange, Office 365, Jira, and so much more, everything can be integrated for a seamless experience.

Any.do Calendar and To-Do List Tips:

• Check the Any.do Tips page to understand how you can make the most of the app, accessible to both free and premium users for both iOS and Android.
• Connect any.do with more than 2000 apps, with the help of Zapier, a premium integration system.

Todoist

With this app, planning your day has never been so easy! Jot down your ideas, organize them into goals with due dates and deadlines, and automatically convert them into reminders! With more than 25 million users to date, Todoist will help you organize, plan and collaborate on your projects, whether it’s big or small. 

Use to-dos to keep track of your deadlines with due dates and reminders, capture and organize your tasks the moment they pop into your head, build lasting habits with recurring dates like ‘every Sunday,’ or collaborate on tasks by assigning them to others.

You can also prioritize tasks with priority levels, track your progress with your productivity trend, and integrate other tools like Google Calendar, Gmail, Amazon Alexa, Slack, and so much more.

Todoist Tips:

• Keep track of all your tasks using the Inbox, Today, and Upcoming views
• Use projects to create bigger goals
• Stay on schedule by simply setting your due dates and recurring due dates for all your tasks
• Add and complete tasks every day
• Focus on the right things by setting task priorities 

TickTick

This simple but helpful to-do list and task manager app does its job. It helps you keep your schedule, manage your time, keep you focused, and remind you of your deadlines. This app helps you make the most of your day and aids you in getting things done.

Whether you have an idea you wish to document, personal goals to achieve, workloads to accomplish, habits to keep track of, projects to collaborate with your classmates, and so much more, you can easily achieve these goals with this productivity planner.

TickTick is easy to use. With its intuitive design and personalized features, you can simply add tasks and reminders in split seconds, and from there, just focus your attention on the things that truly matter. If you want to create notes and tasks quicker, add these by typing or via voice input.

Through its Smart Data Parsing, the date information you will enter is automatically set as its due date so that the alarm will coincide with the task. 

This app also has a handy widget that allows you to access your notes and tasks easily. You can do this by adding a checklist widget to your home screen. 

TickTick Tips:

• Use white noise with Pomo Timers (available only for premium subscribers)
• Track your performance with the app’s statistics and insights. The app has a dedicated page where you see several types of charts based on your performance. This will show you how well you keep up with your deadlines. 
• Customize the app with themes. TickTick has an ample number of themes that are applicable to both mobile and desktop applications. You can see this via Settings, under Theme. 
• Work together on a shared list. Since the app is also a very competent collaborative tool, you can invite your friends or family to join a common list, and all of you can manage it together. Members can even assign tasks, leave comments, and edit existing tasks. 

Habitica

To stay organized and motivated, why not treat your life as if it were a game? Habitica is one app that will make your goal accomplishments fun. Input your daily goals, habits, to-do list, and make a cute and custom avatar. Tick off your tasks to level up your avatar and discover new features like skills, pets, armors, and even quests.

It’s really like you’re playing a game!  Fight off monsters with friends to keep each other accountable. Take advantage of the in-game rewards like equipment with the use of your gold. Custom awards like access to your favorite T.V. show are also available. Habitica is flexible, social, and fun, just the perfect way to push yourself to accomplish anything. 

Habitica Tips:

• Customizable tasks to fit your personal goals. Work on your creative projects, emphasize self-care, pursue a different dream, and so much more.
• Eliminate the stick and keep the carrot. Create dailies that are not due on any day of the week. 
• Schedule your dailies: 6 AM Breakfast; 8 AM Work Out, 10 AM-5 PM work/study, 6 PM Dinner, 8 PM read.
• Schedule To-Dos like a planner. 
• Limit your spending. Buying things should be a reward, like setting 3x-5x the gold amount for each dollar. 

Trello

Trello is another time management app that allows you to organize any projects you’re working on through boards. You can then customize either alone or collaboratively (making it ideal for delegating tasks for a group assignment). You can also keep separate lists for tasks on your to-do list, tasks in progress, and tasks completed.

Lifehacker described Trello as “an awesome project management tool that makes collaboration easy and, dares I say, even fun.” It’s free and available on both the Apple Watch and your phone.

Trello Tips:

• Keep an eye on Trello cards, lists, or boards that you want to keep an eye on. It’s a convenient way to stay on top of significant changes or updates in the project workflow.
• Convert your spreadsheets to Trello cards.
• Checking off tasks as you complete them, like celebrating small victories, provides a sense of accomplishment and much-needed motivation to continue working.

Evernote

Evernote is the app used by many for organizing thoughts as well as assignments. It allows you to sync personal checklists and notes across devices, which means you can work on a school task on one device and switch to another without losing anything.

Notes can be taken in various formats, including text, photos, audio, web clippings, and videos, and Microsoft Office documents and PDFs can be attached. It also allows you to collaborate with others, share ideas, plan events, and set reminders.

Evernote Tips:

• Merge Several Notes into One
• Create Stacks and Stacks of Notebooks
• Add Reminders
• Make a Task List

Time Management: The Online Student’s Guide

While college students need to practice proper time management during their university years, online students are no exception. Say, for instance, you are enrolled in four online courses for this semester.

That means in any given week. It’s possible to have two or more video lectures, chapters after chapters of books to read, presentations here and there, and a quiz or two to attend to; all these while you are trying to balance your active personal life and a part-time job. It’s so hard to come by, considering you are an online student.

No matter what major you have or what degree level you need, managing your time efficiently is the key to becoming successful as a virtual learner. From assessing where you are exactly wasting your time, making a workable personal schedule and sticking to it, below is a guide to help you as an online student and make the most of your precious time.

Read on and discover the basic but helpful steps to time management, come up with useful resources, and take a sway some time-saving strategies and tips. 

Tip Number 1: Know your Timewasters.

The first step to having your time management problem fixed is to check what causes it. In time management, you need to check where your wasted time is going. In most cases, the biggest timewasters normally consist of those small but many activities spread throughout the day. Once they add up, you will be surprised at how much time you can waste with these.

To assess these timewasters, know how you spend every minute for the coming week—how long you sleep, how much time you spend on social media, how long you take to linger over a meal, the time you spend calling and texting, among others.

After observing for a full week, create a list of all your activities. Add up the time for each, then divide by seven. This will result in an average number of how much you spend every day on each activity.

Some of the most common timewasters include:

• Incessant scrolling through your social media accounts. Since all of us have this innate drive to check on other people’s lives, social media makes it tempting to do this. We’re always glued to our mobile phones, checking on our social media accounts, and before we know it, we spend so much unnecessary time that we could have spent studying. 
• Playing video games. Since video games are readily available today for smartphones, it’s not surprising that these games become major distractions from more important tasks.
• Watching Videos. What may start as a simple YouTube video, checking on news and other relevant content, can easily turn into binge-watching. Before you can even notice it, you’ve spent your whole night watching YouTube or TikTok, which can certainly eat so much of your time. 
• Meetings, misplacing items, sitting in traffic. Spending ten minutes (or more) trying to find your car keys? Or how about those files you made weeks ago? Disorganization can sabotage a lot of your time. The same goes for sitting in traffic. While this is unavoidable, you can simply adjust your commuting time by a few minutes. Or better yet, try not to have a grocery run always. Meetings, especially those with no clear agenda, can eat a lot of your time as well.
• Interruptions, checking mails, multi-tasking. Especially when you are very deep in your thoughts, an interruption can break your concentration, and it will take some time to get it back. For example, a five-minute unexpected phone call may lead to another 5 minutes (or more) wasted just to return on track with your study time. 

Checking mails are also timewasters. Having a “quick mail check” can potentially lead to checking this and that, and by the time you’re done, you just realize how much time you have wasted. It will certainly take some discipline to avoid looking at your mail several times a day.  Finally, multi-tasking, although this is a good attitude in general, should also have its own.

But sometimes, it’s better to keep your attention to a specific activity. For example, don’t read your books and study your lectures while updating your social media accounts.  So, how do you kick your timewasters to the curb? These are helpful tips to keep these things away from sabotaging your productivity. 

• Find ways to make it impossible to play on your phone constantly. 
• Schedule your activities.
• Make your meetings more productive. 
• Prevent distractions
• Limit the use of emails.

Tip No. 2: Make a Schedule and Stick to It.

Once you have cleared so much of your time, it’s now time to structure it. It’s best to create a schedule with the commitment to stick to it. But admittedly, it’s easier said than done, right? So, how can you successfully stick to your new schedule?

• Be realistic. Life is unpredictable. Keep this in mind as you make your schedule. Allow some wiggle room. When necessary, be open and ready for change. 
• Schedule some fun. Who hasn’t heard the saying, “All work and no play makes a boring and stressful day”? The same applies when you are still a student. If you are so buried with schoolwork, chances are you will feel tired and overwhelmed. It’s okay to schedule an activity for yourself to do nothing but relax, engage in self-care, and relieve some stress. 
• Pinpoint your productive times. If you are not a morning person, do not schedule most of your studying during that time. If you think you are sharper and more productive at night, do not binge-watch your favorite Netflix series at night. Be wary of the things that will and will not work for you until you finally find an effective routine. 
• Find the needed tools for scheduling. As you make your schedule, write it down. Whether on your phone, your laptop, or just a scrap sheet of paper, choose what system will work for you.
• Have the proper mindset. If, at some point, your schedule doesn’t go as planned, don’t get easily discouraged. You can still get back on the right track. There’s no point ruining an entire week just because something bad happened on a Monday. 
• Learn to Prioritize. When you make a schedule, ideally, it has to have some hierarchy in priority. You may be tempted to complete ten tasks in a day, but you know you don’t have enough time to do so. Identify which tasks are important and learn to prioritize.
• Practice the 80/20 rule. This rule is simple: most of the time, 80% of your preferred results will have to come from 20% of your hard work. As far as time management and scheduling are concerned, make sure you create a schedule to get the highest return on your time investment. 

Tip No. 3: Handle the Small Tasks First.

Have you ever heard of the cliché “baby steps”? It is there for a reason. When you are up for a major project, you have to start small baby steps. Start with simple tasks initially to avoid early discouragements, which easily lead to procrastination and distraction.

Accomplishing smaller tasks can make you feel satisfied. Thus, your motivation to continue is further boosted. This will place you in a proper state of mind where you can handle even the more challenging and lengthy portions of your plans. Education is a unique journey. You have to do it on your own. But this doesn’t mean that asking for help is unavoidable, especially if you come across tasks that you know you cannot handle single-handedly.

Understanding the importance of delegating the less important tasks is very crucial. For example, if the house needs some cleaning, or dinner needs some preparation, or a grocery run is on top of the household’s daily need, ask someone to do this. 

Tip No. 4: Take Advantage of Time Management Methods and Techniques.

Now is the perfect time to hone your time management strategies and techniques. Remember, this is different from time management skills. The latter concerns the internal process, while the former refers to external actions and theories that will help you achieve the desired behavior. So, what are these useful methods and strategies? 

• STRATEGIES. In the context of improving one’s time management, “strategies” refer to the rules and laws that will help you manage your time. These rules will vary for every person. We all have our unique quirks and personalities, and we are all in varying education and working conditions. 

Still, below are the five common strategies that are universal. 

• Don’t do too many things at a time, as this can lead to problems.
• Be flexible and rational
• Take care of yourself. During this point, your mind is the most important tool. Treat your body and mind well!
• Be consistent.

TECHNIQUES. There are several techniques you can use to improve your time management skills. The secret is to find the best one that will work for you. Here are a few techniques worth trying. 

• Kanban Technique. This technique is based on Toyota’s manufacturing strategy, and it includes a visual board. You can see three or more columns on the board representing the different stages of your task, such as your to-do, in progress, and done. This is perfect for visual learners or for those who appreciate accessing information through visual means. 
• Timeboxing. This is another time management technique, and it involves using a calendar and illustrating physical boxes that represent blocks of time to achieve a certain task. Timeboxing can curb your urge to make something perfect by limiting a task to a certain block of time. 
• Pomodoro Technique. This is a technique that revolves around the idea that people must take ample breaks to work efficiently. For students who are bent on engaging in marathon studies or work sessions, this is a good reminder that it is important to take much-needed breaks once in a while. 
• S.M.A.R.T. This technique focuses on creating goals and achieving tasks in a more efficient method. When you have your tasks at home, take time to make them clearer. S is for specific, M for measurable, A for achievable, R for relevant, and T for time-bound. The SMART technique is very easy to implement, and its distinct elements are easy to measure, making it easier for everybody to effectively determine their progress. 
• The Eisenhower Box. This is also called the Eisenhower Matrix and is designed to help you prioritize your tasks. This works by assigning tasks into four different groups: important plus important, not urgent plus important, urgent plus not important, and not important plus not urgent. With this technique, you are required to decide if a specific task is indeed needed. This will allow for an opportunity to think if a task you think you need to comply with is really necessary.