I've been seeing people say they study 8–10 hours a day, and I've always wondered how they actually do it.

So I decided to try it myself for a week.

I made one rule: the timer only runs when I'm actually studying.

Not sitting at my desk. Not getting food. Not checking my phone. Not taking a "5 minute" break that somehow becomes 30 minutes.

Here’s how the week went:

Mon: 6h 21m

Tue: 6h 13m

Wed: 7h 03m

Thu: 7h 15m

Fri: 8h 05m

Sat: 7h 56m

Sun: 9h 02m

Total: 51h 55m

And honestly, the number wasn't even the most interesting part.

My first 3–4 hours were easily the most productive. That's when I could actually deal with difficult topics and problem-solving.

After that, my brain definitely started asking for easier work. Revision, flashcards, notes, etc.

The biggest surprise was how much time disappears when you don't track it.

I'd think I'd studied all morning, but there was actually a lot of time spent eating, checking my phone, taking random breaks, staring at the screen...

I used grip study timer to track my sessions and see how much time I was actually spending on each subject. I liked that because instead of just seeing "7 hours studied," I could see where those 7 hours actually went.

And just to be clear, I'm not saying you need to use grip Study Timer. Any decent timer that helps you track your actual study time can do the job. I just happened to use it.

Another thing I learned: do the difficult stuff first.

Trying to learn something complicated after 6–7 hours of studying is brutal.

And honestly, I don't think 8 hours should be everyone's target.

I'd much rather do 4 hours of genuinely focused studying than 8 hours of sitting at a desk while constantly getting distracted.

Tracking my time for a full week definitely changed how I think about studying.

Has anyone else tried tracking their actual focused study time?

Hi, just curious do people actually study 10 hours a day, every day? I'm trying to make up an effective study method before I start school however I'm struggling to believe as much as they are saying :P I'm at school full time Monday, Tuesday and part time Friday, and I was planning to do 3 hours a day with free weekends. Is this viable? Thanks!

Recently, I have been contemplating all the different ways in which individuals study at university. Some individuals appear to be extremely well-prepared weeks in advance, whereas some individuals always find a way to do their best work within the deadlines set.

One of the things that I am hoping to improve on is the fact that I will start early instead of waiting to feel “ready” to start.

So I am wondering what is one single study habit, routine, or minor change that really helped make university life easier for you?

This could be a simple thing like using a calendar, taking breaks, studying in shorter sessions, putting down your phone, going to the library, and so forth.

When I first heard it I was like what.. this is so true.
It seems obvious but I never thought about it this way. No one has more than 24 hours in their day yet some people seem to get more things done than others. It's just a dilemma of choice.

What are your thoughts on this ?

task completed:
1. biology- revision+questions and quizzes

thoughts:
i sought advice from some of my seniors who've already taken the exam last year. they suggested different methods for studying math & physics (because rn, those scores are taking a hit too). as for biology, they just told me to keep revising and reviewing my mistakes.
also, i may or may not have fallen asleep for 2 hours while studying

Honestly, I’m struggling to manage everything right now.. I don’t know how, but my whole day just flew by in the blink of eye...I log in in the morning thinking that I’ll finish my work on time and study in the evening, but sometimes work keeps stretching and I end up working till night.

By the time I’m done, I’m mentally exhausted and just don’t have the energy to study. Then I feel guilty because I wasted another day, and the same cycle starts again the next day.

I’m trying to manage my job, preparation and everything else in life, but lately it feels like I’m not doing justice to anything. The worst part is that I’m not even able to properly track where my time is going.

I have only 1 year left because of the age limit, so I can’t afford to keep going like this. I genuinely want to give this attempt my best, but I’m finding it very difficult to stay consistent with a full-time job.

For people who are working 9–10 hours and preparing for competitive exams, how are you actually managing it? I don't want a perfect routine or motivational advice. I’d really appreciate practical things that have worked for you in real life.

Please Help

Hello,

I have recently started university and I have never done very extensive reading or writing before. Does anyone have any tips for academic readings, writing critical essays etc.

Had a ridiculously long training session last week. Made me realize something about myself. My brain just isn't built to stay focused for hours. It needs a break. I get why trainers do the small talk and warm-up thing, but I just want them to get to the point. Tell me what matters and let me go.

I tried watching the recording at 1.5x. Turns out the useless parts are still useless at 1.5x.Then I spent almost two hours trying to organize everything afterward. Total nightmare.

I googled how to handle this and VOMO AI popped up, so I finally tried it on one of my recordings. I searched and it took me right to the part I needed. I didn't have to dig through the whole recording just to find one thing.

As a sprint learner, I love not having to spend so much time on this. So I'm not bad at learning. I just don't have the patience for the marathon version of it.

What’s the biggest difference between how you planned to study and how you actually studied?

When studying a subject on our own, how can we formulate questions that help us understand and comprehend it better? Whether we are studying a field of knowledge, technology, or any other subject, what kinds of questions should we ask ourselves to deepen our understanding?

For example, if we wanted to study a topic as though we were preparing for an exam, what kinds of questions should we ask ourselves? When reading a text, what questions should we keep in mind as we go through it in order to understand the subject more deeply and reinforce what we have learned?

In short, how can we develop a method for studying on our own that allows us to answer the question:

“How can I test whether I truly understand this subject, and what questions can I ask myself to comprehend it better?”

I have the worst possible habit ever and it’s falling asleep straight after school. I’m a junior in Hs, and last year, i nearly slept all of spring semester away. I feel like I’ve conditioned myself to feel sleepy the second I step through the threshold of my apartment and I don’t know the solution. I have a good sleep schedule, but i fall asleep even at school. I know I skipped the entire unit of revolutions and communism in apwh (still got a 5 🤤bc i got lucky) but it’s irritating me. It’s getting in the way of my studying n frankly disturbing my lifestyle idk what to do

We have a final project for the term and I was chosen as the director

Throughout the project I constantly had multiple other leading roles to fix as well and I quite particularly suck at time management. So one tumble into the devil’s staircase our group submitted some requirements late (or at least we think its late in worse case) and our teacher said to the classes that there would be big deductions

I didnt know what to say to my groupmates knowing that it was my fault and because of their particular nature to gossip and be toxic at times. Im okay with being the topic of the gossip but what Im not okay with is how its my fault

What can I do to help my groupmates? I sent some messages swallowing my pride on how its my fault, that im sorry and what Im going to do to help their own grades:

Heres what I said in our chat for the group:

I have no excuses for that, and it's genuinely just my fault in the groupings because I also did other stuff that was originally also due for today if there was still classes

I can talk with sir about my negligence to lessen deductions for the team if we inquire any on the duedates I'll try to claim most of the deductions if possible since most of the submissions required that we passed late is the director's responsibility so ung other roles should be exempted in a way

Either way, I owe you all an apology because my actions and how I work affected the team as the director, especially with how the late submissions were under my watch. I try to be more timely, but I'm not good at time management since I take on more than I can handle, and it built up to this

I'm sorry to everyone in our group; it's my fault, and you guys contributed timely and consistently

And I can ask sir about the deductions again and I'll explain this situation to take off the unfair deductions that came from my work in the first place

Thank you guys for all of your works on this peta! I'm still trying to uh fix myself in this way so Im really so sorry that I wasnt able to do the stuff I needed to do on time or correctly… Its not any of yalls fault and I'll make sure to tell that to sir

-I didnt want to be the late leader and the guy who cant own up to their shortcomings. I desperately need help on how to be more efficient and how to handle myself better in my self imposed dumspter fire with how much I have to fix and do. Its like being so self aware but I still dont do it anyways?

Im just so tired after something that happened before the school year started but I dont want any more of my actions to affect my hardworking members just because I suck at time management.

This entire a subreddit has become karma farming. Does anyone else which they made a rule against because it's pissing me off

Paying attention in class can be rough, especially after the first few weeks when you are in a routine and do not feel the novelty anymore! Though I have noticed a few ways to get better at this.

• Actively take notes: Taking notes by hand has especially supported my attention span during class. I am actively focuses on what the professor is saying and the slides in front of me. Challenging myself to summarize the words in a way that will be cohesive and understandable to me later gives me so much more focus than just listening to the lecture.
• Brain games before class: The NYT games, Sudoku, and games that give your brain a small challenge in the morning has helped get me into a mindset to solve and decipher as I go about my day. This applies in class as well as I think more about the content being taught beyond face value.
• Taking notes in a certain color: Colors has helped me to add some variation in my notebook and break routine of one color every time I take notes. Even assigning certain colors to specific classes can help support retention of the content through association.

Whenever I sit down to study, I get distracted by my phone..like in a min I would be opening Insta and stuff. It's not like that I'm not aware that I should be studying cause It's almost midnight and I got a test tmrw while I obviously haven't studied a thing. It's just that I would be playing a game, doom scrolling, reading webtoon, watching a movie/anime andd...after I get bored of everything, I just still don't study and would be doing random things on phone. I am fed up with my behaviour. I wanna change but I don't know How...Like whenever I'm on my phone, I know that I should Studyy and my inner voice keeps screaming at me to get up but I still won't-- Btw I have mid terms coming up the next Monday. It's stressing me so much but I still won't put my phone down....I Wanna study fr, I really wanna...but don't know how-? Actually I used to be a topper till 10th but since the start of 11th grade it's just a downfall and nothing else.!

Hey everyone,

I spend a huge amount of time studying through YouTube lectures, and my biggest productivity bottleneck has always been scrubbing through 40–60 minute videos just to find a single explanation, formula, or concept.

Since I was losing so much time, I changed my workflow over the last few weeks:

1. Instead of watching at 2x speed blindly: I started converting video transcripts into structured outlines (Key Concepts -> Deep Dive -> Quick Recap).
2. Targeted Q&A: Instead of re-watching sections, I use transcript indexing to search for specific questions (like "What was the exact definition given at the midpoint?").

This simple shift cut my study time for video content almost in half because I only watch the specific sections I actually struggle with, rather than sitting through the fluff.

How do you guys handle long educational videos? Do you take notes manually while watching, or do you use specific transcript/note-taking workflows to speed things up?

Hi everyone! I recently started a PhD at the intersection of AI and computer networks (July 2026). I don’t have a background in networking - I previously worked as a full-stack developer and have some experience in data science - so a lot of the field is new to me.
What I’m struggling with most is explaining my technical progress during weekly/biweekly meetings. Even when I’ve worked on the code, experiments, and tried to understand what I’m doing, I sometimes completely block when I have to explain technically what I changed, why I changed it, or what the results actually mean.
I do use AI for some coding and debugging, but I always try to understand the code rather than blindly use it. Still, I sometimes wonder: is this a normal part of entering a new field, or am I approaching the learning process the wrong way?
For anyone who has experienced something similar, what helped you go from “I got it working” to “I actually understand it and can explain it clearly”?
Any advice would be really appreciated!

Hi! I have an exam coming up soon and I have to go through 7 subjects, but the content is so much. I divided them into days like 2-3 subjects per day but I feel like I don't finish much in each subject when I do that. Also I can't study continuously, concentration is hard. I was thinking maybe I should finish one by one subject. But I'm worried I might forget the things that I studied at the beginning then. How do I do this ? Any tips please?

I legit cant bring myself to study like i’ll be free i have nothing to do but i’ll find the craziest stuff to do just not to study, i try to force myself but i zone out 10 mins in. I keep telling myself “you’ll regret this in the future” but i still dont take those words in.i get so bored studying like i cant sit still i have to do smth else while trying to study. Please help me!!!

What’s something students pretend to understand because they’re too embarrassed to ask?

I made a small Telegram bot that turns study PDFs into summaries, flashcards, and interactive quizzes.

Just send it a PDF, and it does the rest.

Would really appreciate it if some students could try it out and give me honest feedback.

Thanks for your time!

@StudyPDF_AI_bot

​

I’ve always been the kind of person who studies only when exams are near. I somehow manage to get through exams, but I don’t actually study consistently or build a proper understanding of what I’m learning.

Now I genuinely want to change that. I want to focus on my studies, study regularly, and actually understand the subjects instead of just preparing for the next exam.

The problem is that I don’t know how to build that habit. Whenever I sit down to study, I either feel overwhelmed by how much I have to do or end up procrastinating.

For people who have gone through something similar: How did you shift from studying only for exams to studying consistently? What worked for you—daily targets, a timetable, Pomodoro, studying at the library, deleting distractions, or something else?

I’d really appreciate practical advice rather than just “be disciplined.” I want to know what I can actually do from day one.

I've been building a small habit/study tracker on the side (mentioned it over in r/PythonLearning), and the reason I started was this exact problem - I could not make myself sit down and study no matter how much I "knew" I should.

What actually moved the needle wasn't a better planner or more willpower. It was making skipping cost something. Every session I do now needs a proof photo the moment I finish, and a couple people I know can see the log - who studied, who skipped. Nothing gets deleted, nothing gets a quiet pass. Once skipping was visible instead of invisible, it stopped being free, and I show up on days I absolutely would not have before.

Not claiming it's some universal fix, and I know "just be accountable to someone" isn't a new idea. But there's a difference between saying that and actually building a system where you can't lie to yourself about it.

Genuinely curious though - for the people here who DO manage to sit down consistently, what's the actual thing that gets you to start? Not the thing you feel like you're supposed to say, the real mechanism. Trying to understand if proof-and-witness is the common thread or if other stuff works just as well.