Free apps to help you save money

As it nears the end of the semester, is your bank account looking a little worse for wear?

Living on a budget is difficult, especially when you find new things you want to do every day. Don't worry, there's help available to make a little go a long way! You're just five apps away from your budgeting goals...

1. UNiDAYS – available on desktop, Android and iOS

You’ve probably heard all about it during Freshers’ Week, but it doesn’t hurt to mention it again. UNiDAYS is a discount website with an incredible amount of deals, all exclusive to students (for free!). You just log on to the website or app to deem your discount. UNiDAYS also has a ‘Share and Earn’ scheme, where you get £0.50 for every friend you invite who then joins. It’s not a lot, but when you’re broke every penny counts!

2. Student Beans – available on desktop, Android and iOS

Student Beans not only has loads of exclusive, and completely free, discounts. It also has a useful tool that lists the latest UK part-time and full-time jobs. This includes jobs for graduates, including weekend and summer holiday jobs, placements, internships, and volunteering opportunities.

3. mySupermarket – available on desktop, Android and iOS

Ever gone shopping and forgot half of what you wanted to buy? Which turns into ‘I’ll buy anything that looks good’? mySupermarket can help you with that! Choose where you want to do your shopping and draw up a shopping list - the app then tells you how much your basket comes to. What's good is that you'll be able to see where you can get the same item for cheaper, too!

If you don’t really feel like doing a shopping list, but want to stay within a budget, you can scan a product’s barcode with your phone whilst you're doing your weekly shop and the app will tell you if you can pick it up cheaper somewhere else.

4. VoucherCodes - available on Android and iOS, and vouchercloud - available on Android and iOS

It's one of the most annoying feelings ever - buying something only to find out they were putting on a huge discount sale the next day. Or going out for dinner and totally missing the 2-4-1 drinks offer.

These two apps help you make the most of ever offer and discount. VoucherCodes and vouchercloud feature a lot (and we mean a lot!) of discounts and give you the latest deals from thousands of popular retailers. Get used to checking them before you leave the house and it might just save you money in many of your regular shops.

5. BigOven – available on Android and iOS

Ever dreamt of becoming a chef when you moved away from home? Yeah, few of us have, but we all need to cook for ourselves and having a good recipe or two to rely on.

BigOven brings together loads of recipes to help you save money on meals. The app’s highlight is the leftover function – you can input any ingredients you have lying in your fridge and it will give you a few options of what you can make with them. It helps you avoid wasting food just because you don’t know how you can use it!