College Life
How to Prepare for an Exam: 5 Smart Study Hacks to Ace Any Test
Learn how to prepare an exam with these 5 hacks, time management tips and focus techniques to boost your performance and confidence.
Have an exam coming up? I bet you do. I would also bet you need some help studying for it.
No problem, my friend. I went through the same thing, so I know how rough it can be.
Studying can be hard; sometimes, it can feel impossible to improve on your own.
But don’t worry, you definitely can. If you know about the right strategies, you’ll be able to improve your study skills to make test prep a breeze.
These 5 hacks are loaded with helpful techniques, study strategies, healthy habits, and even a few bonus tips at the end.
Let’s work together and get ready for that exam!
In This Post:
• Plan & Prioritize with a Study Schedule
• Active Learning Techniques for Better Retention
• Optimize Your Study Environment
• Improve Memory with Strategic Review Methods
• Boost Exam Performance with Healthy Habits
• Bonus Tips: What to Do the Night Before & Day of the Exam
• Final Thoughts
Plan & Prioritize with a Study Schedule
Photo by Robert Kusk
• The Power of a Study Plan
In the stressful mess of a schedule college can be sometimes, it can be difficult to find time to study.
Sometimes, you forget about an exam and need to cram on the last day, but as I’ll touch on more later, that is a TERRIBLE idea.
It’s much better to spread out that studying over time, and the easiest way to make sure you do that is to create a schedule for yourself.
You’d be surprised how helpful writing everything down can be in not only helping you understand how much time you spend on everything, but it also helps you stick with it.
In the long run, if you make a habit of this, it will help you a lot with your time management and make getting everything done much easier.
• How to Create an Effective Study Schedule
So, how am I supposed to make a study schedule? It’s actually a lot easier than it sounds.
How you choose to organize it depends on what makes sense to you, but at its core, it starts with just a list of everything you have to get done.
Make sure you know all of the due dates and exam dates. This is essential to making sure you never feel like something is sneaking up on you. Once you have your list, put everything in order by due date from earliest to latest.
This will let you know what you need to prioritize first.
From here, it becomes very preference-based. You need to look at what is due earliest and judge for yourself what you need to work on the most.
For example, if you’re really bad at math but good at English, set aside more time for practicing math than studying for English.
No matter how you do it, the idea is to set time blocks for yourself so that you don’t spend too much or too little time on any particular thing.
• Digital & Physical Study Planning Tools
Photo by Robert Kusk
Whether you go digital or physical is another matter of preference (you’re gonna see a lot of that in this article), but there are advantages and disadvantages to both, and there are multiple ways to do both that we’ll talk about.
Let’s talk digital first. There are plenty of apps you can use to accomplish the same things, like Google Calendar, Notion, or Todoist. One that I personally use is MyHomework, although that is more of a homework tracker than an actual scheduler, so there are better options.
A big advantage to digital is the ability to set notifications for when sessions are going to begin and end.
If you aren’t good at checking your schedule manually, notifications can be a great way to keep on track and hit your goals.
So what about physical methods? These are actually my main ways of scheduling myself. Two that I’ve had success with are planner books and whiteboards.
A planner is nice because it’s a book you can keep in your backpack at all times and whip out at a moment’s notice if you need to adjust or add something.
Because they are usually laid out like a calendar, you’re gonna have to buy a new one every year, but if you find them as comfortable as I do, it will be well worth the cost. The whiteboard can also be extremely useful.
Hang one up in your room in a spot where you will always see it. It can be great for day-to-day reminders and can be written and erased in a flash.
Related: 30 Best Dorm Room Ideas You Will Absolutely Need in College
Active Learning Techniques for Better Retention
Photo by Robert Kusk
• The Science Behind Active Learning
You may have had experiences in the past where you thought you read your study materials over perfectly but still ended up with a grade you weren’t happy with on the exam.
This is likely because you were just passively reading. This may have worked fine with simpler material in middle and high school, but in college, the content is a lot more difficult and requires more active forms of studying.
Just reading over a chapter in your textbook will give you a general idea, but you’ll end up glossing over a lot of important details that the exam will expect you to know.
In order to prepare effectively, you need to be able to engage with the material in ways that allow you to fully grasp not only the major ideas but also the details that support those ideas.
• Effective Active Learning Strategies
Photo by Robert Kusk
There are, of course, many ways to do this, and a lot of the effectiveness comes down to your preference.
I can’t tell you what the definitive best option is, but I can present you with some options for you to try in hopes that you can find one that works for you.
The first method is what is sometimes called the teach-back method, but I originally learned it as the EDGE method.
This method involves teaching the material to another person, if available, or to yourself.
The thought is that you have to have a good understanding of the material to be able to teach it to someone else thoroughly. Another solid method is called the mind-mapping method.
This method is incredibly personalized and may be good for those who think more visually.
It involves creating a chart or map of the content to create visual connections to everything to help you remember it.
The third method is an all-time classic: flashcards. The goal of flashcards is repetition.
No matter what you put on them, the method involves answering the same questions every time until eventually you have them memorized.
The mistake some make with flashcards is trying to do too much studying at once. The goal with these should be to look at them once or twice a day, for only a little bit.
After a few days, you will start to see the results as you get more and more right each time.
You can either make these physically on notecards or use the beauty of modern technology to make them in an app like Anki or Quizlet.
The final method is my personal favorite, and that is to try and simulate a testing environment as your study session.
This can be especially effective if you know the test format in advance and can plan to study in that same format.
A great way to do this without too much extra work is to follow our last method and try Quizlet.
That program has features that will present your flashcards as full exam sessions.
Related: College vs. University: Understanding the Differences and Making the Right Choice
Optimize Your Study Environment
Photo by Robert Kusk
• Choosing the Right Study Spot
It might seem a bit odd, but the area you study in can have a lot of effect on the results of your study sessions.
Sometimes, you might not even know why you dislike a certain spot, but it’s very important to feel comfortable but also free from distractions.
Optimizing the space in which you work will help you to make the most of the time you spend and will lead to even greater results.
This spot is going to be different for everyone. Some people prefer more public spaces that allow for collaboration and community, while others prefer more isolated places where they feel the most in control.
I found that when I tried to study in my school’s library, it was much too open, and I was constantly having my eyes drawn to people walking past me.
I found much more success in my dorm room, where there was no movement around me and the room was smaller.
Some other good options aside from the library or a dorm room would be study cafés, private study rooms, outdoor parks, bookstores, or empty classrooms.
• Minimizing Distractions
As I mentioned before, a big aspect of choosing your ideal study area is how well you deal with distractions.
My main problem with distractions comes from other people in the space, but there are plenty more ways to get distracted than that. A big problem many have with distractions comes from our phones.
It is so easy to be plugged into our phones and get distracted by messages, games, social media, and so much more. If I tried to list them all, we’d be here all day.
My advice? Cut the phone out as much as you can.
Shutting it off or using do not disturb mode are both good options, but if you require something more nuanced, there are apps such as Forest, Freedom, and Cold Turkey that help you customize your phone to limit certain things while letting others through.
• Study Music & Focus Techniques
Photo by Robert Kusk
Music and audio can be great tools to enhance your study sessions. Really, any music can be helpful to you if it’s something you enjoy and helps you concentrate.
I would recommend sticking to lyric-less tracks because it could be distracting if you focus on them too much. White noise and binaural beats are also very good options if you prefer.
These audio tracks are designed specifically to help with reducing stress and increasing focus, so they can be very helpful.
Related: Best Mini Fridges With Freezers for Dorms – The Ultimate Student 2025 Guide
Improve Memory with Strategic Review Methods
• The Forgetting Curve & How to Beat It
To explain the Forgetting Curve, let’s remember what I said earlier about study plans.
For the study plan and all of our techniques to work, we must overcome the Forgetting Curve, the hypothesis of memory retention over time.
How can we beat this? By staying consistent with our review. Repetition is the key here.
You have to not only follow the techniques, but you also have to study consistently every day so that you can extend your memory of the material for as long as possible.
Each day you miss makes it a little more likely you’ll forget something important.
• The Best Review Techniques
Alongside keeping up with regular study sessions to beat that curve, there are other things you can be doing to extend your memory and really lock in the information.
Firstly, after you read the information once, instead of continuing by just rereading, try to test yourself by going through the information and seeing how much you retained.
Then, go back through the material while focusing on what you couldn’t remember the first time.
If the topics you couldn’t remember were large and complex, try breaking down the idea into smaller parts.
This is called chunking and can help with retaining more complicated concepts by remembering parts of it.
• How to Review Effectively Before the Exam
Photo by Robert Kusk
You aren’t done yet; we still have a few more options for you as your final review steps if you need even more.
It’s always a good idea to look over previous homework assignments or quizzes before an exam.
These will help to give you ideas for what questions may be asked on the exams.
Another tip that has helped me in the past is to create a study sheet from memory.
Just take a sheet out of a notebook and try to fill it with as much material as you can remember.
Similarly to when we talked about teaching the material, you need to have a good understanding of the content to be able to summarize it effectively, so it can be good for practice.
Related: What to Do When Bored in Class: 120+ Productive and Entertaining Ideas
Boost Exam Performance with Healthy Habits
Photo by Robert Kusk
• Sleep & Rest: The Key to Retaining Knowledge
An extremely common mistake that I’ve been guilty of in the past is trying to make all-night study sessions work.
It’s extremely rare that an all-nighter results in any serious progress. More often than not, staying up all night does more harm than good.
Any amount of good work that does happen is offset by you being too tired to take advantage of it.
Short-term sleep deprivation results in losing your ability to problem-solve and harms your memory, two things we want to avoid when test prepping.
Even if you think you need a few extra hours to cram, trust me that it will be better to just make sure you sleep well, as that will help more than any last-minute cramming.
For best results, you’re going to want around 7-8 hours of sleep, going to sleep no later than 11:00 pm.
• Nutrition & Brain-Boosting Foods
Photo by Robert Kusk
Maintaining a healthy diet can really affect your studying and testing performance in noticeable ways.
You’re definitely going to want to stay hydrated. A lack of water not only causes headaches and fatigue but can also contribute to short-term memory loss.
So, make sure you drink plenty of water during your study sessions and before you enter the exam room.
There are also certain foods that you can eat to help stimulate your brain, such as eggs or leafy greens.
These will also help keep your brain energized and improve your studying.
• Stress Management & Relaxation Techniques
Sometimes, all of this test prep can be overwhelming, and you may find an increase in stress as you get closer to the exam date. Well, I have some suggestions for keeping that in check too.
After all, stress will hurt your studying, so you have to learn to deal with it.
What has always helped me was breathing exercises and stretching. Put away the work for a minute and try some deep breathing routines or meditation to help calm your mind.
If you prefer something more active, stretching and yoga can achieve similar effects.
Related: Good Habits for Students-The Complete Guide to Thrive in School
Bonus Tips: What to Do the Night Before & Day of the Exam
• Night Before the Exam
Photo by Robert Kusk
This is it, the test is tomorrow. It can be tempting to start cramming now, but you need to try to ignore that urge.
We’ve mentioned before how cramming just doesn’t work as well as you’d want it to, and there are more important things you can be doing tonight. So, trust your work and relax.
The best things to do tonight are to pack up your backpack with all of the supplies you will need for tomorrow and make sure you get a full night’s sleep.
• Exam Day Strategies
Today is the day. You studied hard, got a full rest last night, and you’re ready. Be confident in your studying and try to keep your nerves calm. Let’s quickly go over some test-taking tips.
For multiple-choice style tests, my biggest piece of advice is to not spend too long on each question. If you spend more than around 30 seconds to 1 minute on a single question, it’s best to just leave it blank and move on.
Once you get to the end, go back through and answer the ones you skipped last.
For essay-style tests, these can be tricky, but just take your time and make sure you fully understand the questions before you begin writing your answers.
Related: What To Bring To College – The Ultimate 2025 College Packing List
Final Thoughts
That’s it! You now have all the tools necessary to prepare for your big exam, and I’m sure you’ll do fantastic.
Just remember to follow your study schedule, keep learning actively, stick to a comfortable environment, review strategically, and keep up healthy habits.
Five simple tricks and you’ll be a studying machine! Be sure to consistently keep up with these methods. Making habits of these will help you keep up your momentum throughout the entire year.
I hope this article was helpful for you. Let us know in the comments if these tricks helped you out or if you have other suggestions that worked for you!
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