Best apps to save student money

I made a completely formulaic budget spreadsheet to see how much money I would have leftover per week after assuming that I lock away my accommodation contribution for that loan/grant instalment period. One weakness in this however is that it assumes that I spend £0 for each week that I am not in accommodation ie: at home. How realistic this will be remains to be seen, but I will probably look for a little part time work to pile up some savings.

I'm probably going to adapt this a little once I get allocated to my accommodation and make it possible to see the impact of overspending/underspending in one week on the subsequent weeks etc... - I'm likely going to have to make a habit of logging my spending in the spreadsheet at the end of every week. The goal is to try and avoid having to use my overdraft, even though it is 0% it still has to be paid off eventually which I would prefer to not do.

just wondering on average after your rent is deducted how much do you al have to live on ?

I'm probably going to end up with something in the region of £80 - £95 per week, how high it is within this range will depend on whether I can negotiate a small contribution each month from my parents But loan alone, if all goes to plan then I will have about £80-£85 depending on how well I budget freshers week. I don't want to spend too much and I'm not planning to get absolutely hammered so I shouldn't spend too much.............. he says.


I've done a lot of research about what people spend per week and on what, with food being the most important thing, this usually comes in at £20-£40 depending on the student and what they like to eat with the rest probably varying



Here is a chart showing what the average student spent their money on (monthly basis) in 2016, as reported by the Student Money Survey 2016 from STS. This means that a student will spend £356 excluding bills and rent which are thrown in with accomm costs in the first year.

In another study by NatWest, it was said that the average weekly spending pattern of a student is as follows:
- £9.80 on alcohol
- £11.90 on eating out
- £24.60 on groceries
- £6.50 on travel
Implying that after accommodation, a student will spend very roughly, £211.20 per month or maybe if we throw in like a phone contract, clothing and study materials etc then it will come up to £270 per month.

The STS study claims (excluding rent ) that a student will spend £356 (£90 odd/week) excluding bills and rent which are thrown in with accomm costs in the first year.

The NatWest study, after a little buffing, will lead us to believe that £270 (£70 odd /week) or so will be spent with the same conditions as the STS study assigned.

The STS study had a sample of some 2000 students, of whom may or may not have been representative of the student body as a whole. Clearly there are some differences as shown though, so its probably going to very much depend on your capacity to make a budget and stick to it.

Here are links to the studies, they are quite interesting and provide a greater level of detail than what I have discussed here.

STS Study: http://www.savethestudent.org/money/student-money-survey-2016.html
NatWest Study: https://www.whatuni.com/advice/money/how-much-does-the-average-student-spend-each-week/43865/

It can probably be concluded that (at least outside London anyway) the safe range after deducting accommodation is £65 - £95 per week. I'm sure that some people manage on less than the given range so its probably very circumstantial and will depend on you as a person in a big way.

Good luck.

your reply , really went above and beyond . thank you very much. will have a read of those studies sometime tomorrow . I was really worried about my circumstance at uni as I'm from quite a low income family but hopefully with the right budgeting ill survive lol.
major respect for your reply

There is no shame in having to dip into the overdraft cause it is 0% after all and you can always pay it down with a summer job. For my degree, I have a year in industry between Year 2 and Year 3, so hopefully this will make Year 3 a bit more manageable (though I presume student finance will significantly dock the amount received in this year lel)

But anyway I read another tip somewhere that it is a good idea for you to just withdraw your weekly budget in cash at the start of the week, then it is impossible to overspend because when its gone its gone. Its a lot less conscious with a bank account, you can never see the money physically decreasing every time you pull out your wallet. That is probably one of the best bits of advice I have read tbh.

My pleasure to help, have a wonderful sleep as its like 20 past midnight or something rn

In my case, when I went to the University of Manchester, I messed up with overdrafts and subscriptions. I was also able to pay Netflix for a whole year without realising it. I simply forgot to cancel the free trial.

That's why after Uni, with a friend of mine, we have started building an app that makes people avoid overdrafts, find and cancel subscriptions, keep track of debt and save money. We want to fix all the problems we had back at Uni.

Do you guys think this can help?

Conceptually, it sounds like a good idea. It probably wouldn't help me personally because I keep track of that stuff anyway, but there are people who are not able to budget well and struggle in that department so I think that there certainly is capacity for such an app to take off. Only problem is its quite niche and would only benefit students - maybe make it applicable to everybody and just let the user declare whether they are a student etc to customise the experience, while still allowing a broader range of demographics to use the app.

Stick an ad at the bottom and you're on your way to making some dosh, if it takes off.

Well, we are building a finance assistant. It's called Emma, this is our website. We want to build an AI that sits between you an your bank account; so it can help with pretty much everything.

I think Overdrafts, Subscriptions, Debt and Saving are 4 interesting verticals that everyone has; but there are many ways something like this can be of help, like improving your Credit Score, for example. Our idea is that everyone can now afford to have a private financial advisor that monitors everything and improves your life.

We'll never use ads. There are better ways, like affiliates.

What a superb idea. Kudos to you, I think this will do very well.

Thanks! I'd love to have feedback , as we are in the early stage of development and we want to iterate on the ideas/problems that other people have.

Only thing that wouldn't really apply to students is the overdraft fee because they are 0% these days (unless you exceed the limit which I would imagine everybody would avoid doing)

Maybe you could put a few quirky things in like "You have enough money to go out this weekend!" with this, you could gauge whether the student can afford to go out by analysing the amount of money typically spent on a night out in the area either through user declaration or other means, another thing might be "Go ahead and order that Pizza!", I think little things like that will make the experience more engaging. Let's face it, nobody likes looking at their finances (which are mostly negative for students) so this adds a splash of personality to Emma and makes her much more human, which I presume is what you're after.

In another study by NatWest, it was said that the average weekly spending pattern of a student is as follows:
- £9.80 on alcohol
- £11.90 on eating out
- £24.60 on groceries
- £6.50 on travel

It can probably be concluded that (at least outside London anyway) the safe range after deducting accommodation is £65 - £95 per week. I'm sure that some people manage on less than the given range so its probably very circumstantial and will depend on you as a person in a big way.

Not really apps but:

Using a spreadsheet I work out how much I can afford per week - bearing in mind that it's different for each term due to the total amount you get being different in the final term (by 0.1%) and the final term is much shorter (well for me in 17/18: 12/13 weeks, 11 weeks and 7 weeks - not including holidays).

I then ensure I stick to this by tracking what I spend and earn in a spreadsheet. This has worked well for me in my first year of university - never once went into my overdraft and had money left to spare. You don't have to do this in a spreadsheet - you could do this on a whiteboard. I've also seen people have worked out how much they can afford per week and put it into envelopes marking out specifically what the money inside should be used for (food, socialising etc.). I've generally found using cash makes it much easier to track money especially compared to contactless cards.



That's not even close to my spending pattern! Mainly due to the last sentence - I tend to cook meals from scratch and don't go out getting drunk. Saves £££!

Interesting. That sounds like my style.

How much do you spend per week, out of interest?

It's a good method! Especially when tracking using the spreadsheet.

In a general university week (not including holidays, reading weeks and placements) I spend on average £22.59! Which is actually quite low looking at it! I also made on average in a university week £12.59 so my rough expenditure was about £10 per week.