As students, we need to keep our wellness as one of our main priorities to enjoy our time at University. It can be incredibly challenging, with many suffering from anxiety and depression in silence. There are apps that can help our well-being. Although some are well known, others are a little more niche. Here are 10 of the best wellness apps for uni students.
1. Calm
Many people will have heard of Calm but it is still popular for people who enjoy a guided meditation. This app provides meditation ranging from 2 to 20 minutes to help people destress.
2. SAM: Self Help for Anxiety Management
Developed by the University of the West of England, this gives you methods to use on yourself to manage both physical and mental symptoms of anxiety. It helps with self-monitoring of anxiety and 25 self-help options including Thinking and Anxiety, Mental Relaxation, and Physical Relaxation.
3. Sleep Cycle
This app is a smart alarm clock to help with your sleep cycle (hence the name). It tracks and analyses your sleep from your bedtime until the morning to make waking up that little bit easier. The benefit of this app is that it is designed to gently wake you up when you are in your lightest sleep phase for a more effective night’s rest.
4. WorryTree: Anxiety Journal
This app is another one that helps you interrupt your cycle of worrying and reduce stress. Their methods to help you try and solve your anxieties is based on Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) techniques. It was featured in Marie Claire as the “Best app for overcoming fear”.
5. Headspace
Headspace is one of our favourite wellness apps. Like Calm, it offers guided meditation and mindfulness but it has a specific focus on reducing stress and helping you sleep.
6. Youper
This is an app that is perfect for specifically struggling with anxiety in social situations. Youper walks you through techniques that can help you to reduce this stress and become more confident.
7. Mood Tools
This is pretty much a “what it says on the tin” kind of wellness app. This app helps you implement six evidence-based techniques to manage low mood and depression.
8. SuperBetter
This is a game-based app to “build resilience, achieve goals and tackle challenges”. The app is designed to help people with many issues including stress, anxiety, depression, chronic pain, concussion recovery and more. Best of all, there is a free version of this app to try it out and see if it is for you.
9. Mind your mood
To help you support your mental health by tracking your mood. This will help you to find the ups and downs and trigger for your overall emotional help. The app offers a scale to measure the intensity of your mood.
10. Stay Alive
This app is for anyone experiencing self-harm or suicidal thoughts (or for those concerned about someone else). It provides a range of support materials and techniques specifically on this to keep you safe.
For urgent help, contact a Samaritan, call 116 123, email jo@samaritans.org or click here: https://www.samaritans.org/how-we-can-help/contact-samaritan/
