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Short answer: start early, turn your material into questions, and spend most of your study time answering them from memory instead of re-reading. Spread sessions over several days, mix topics, review what you get wrong, and finish with at least one timed practice exam. Research rates practice testing and spaced practice as the two most effective study techniques.
Why do most study methods fail?
The most popular study habits — re-reading notes, highlighting and summarising — are also among the least effective. A landmark 2013 review by Dunlosky and colleagues rated ten common techniques and gave only two a "high utility" rating: practice testing and distributed (spaced) practice. Re-reading and highlighting were rated low utility.
The reason is simple. Exams ask you to produce answers, but re-reading only trains you to recognise material. Familiar notes feel known, so you stop studying too early. The plan below is built around the two techniques that work.
Step 1: What exactly will the exam cover?
Before you study anything, list every topic that can come up. Use the syllabus, the lecture list, the learning objectives and past papers. Mark each topic red, amber or green for how well you know it today — honestly.
This list is your plan. It stops you from spending three evenings on the chapter you already like while the one you avoid stays red.
Step 2: How do you turn notes into questions?
For every topic, write questions whose answers are in your notes: definitions, mechanisms, comparisons, calculations, "what happens if" scenarios. A good question can't be answered by recognising a keyword — it makes you rebuild the idea.
This takes time by hand, which is why most students skip it. A tool can do the first draft for you: Ace turns a PDF, slide deck or YouTube lecture into four-option questions checked against your material, so you can start practising within minutes. See how PDF-to-question conversion works.
Step 3: Why should you test yourself instead of re-reading?
Retrieving an answer from memory strengthens that memory far more than looking at it again. In a classic experiment, Roediger and Karpicke (2006) had students either re-read a passage or take recall tests on it. A week later, the students who had tested themselves remembered substantially more. Karpicke and Blunt (2011) found that retrieval practice even beat building detailed concept maps.
Make answering questions the core of every session. Re-read only to check an answer you got wrong. For the full research, read our guide to active recall vs re-reading.
Rule of thumb: if a study session felt easy, it probably did less than you think. Effortful recall is the point.
Step 4: How far apart should study sessions be?
Spread your study for each topic over several days instead of cramming it into one. A large meta-analysis by Cepeda and colleagues (2006) confirmed that spaced sessions produce better long-term retention than massed ones, and that the ideal gap grows the further away the exam is.
A simple rhythm: review a topic one day after you first study it, again three days later, and again a week later. Our spaced repetition schedule shows how to set this up without software.
Step 5: Should you study one topic at a time?
Not in the final stretch. Once you have covered the basics of each topic, mix questions from different topics in the same session ("interleaving"). Real exams don't tell you which chapter a question comes from, so practising the skill of choosing the right approach matters. Mixed practice feels harder; that difficulty is useful.
Step 6: What should you do with wrong answers?
Every wrong answer is the most valuable thing your session produced. For each one:
- Read the correct answer and the source passage it comes from.
- Write one sentence on why you got it wrong — a confused term, a missing step, a misread question.
- Ask the question again at the end of the session and again the next day.
Feedback matters: Butler and Roediger (2008) found that seeing the correct answer after a multiple-choice test boosted learning and stopped students from remembering the wrong option they had picked.
Step 7: How do you prepare for exam conditions?
In the last week, sit at least one full practice exam: timed, closed-book, no phone. It shows you what you still don't know, trains your pacing and makes the real exam feel familiar. Revisit the red topics from step 1 afterwards.
Studying with a friend helps here too. A quiz duel adds a clock and a little pressure — closer to the exam room than a quiet desk.
What does a two-week study schedule look like?
| Days | Focus | Daily routine (60–90 min) |
|---|---|---|
| 1–2 | Map and set up | Topic list, red/amber/green ratings, turn the first topics into questions |
| 3–7 | Learn and test | One or two new topics a day; answer their questions; review yesterday's topics |
| 8–11 | Mix and repair | Mixed question sets across all topics; fix every wrong answer the same day |
| 12–13 | Rehearse | One timed practice exam; then target the topics it exposed |
| 14 | Light review | A short mixed quiz, early night. No new material. |
Starting with less time? Compress the same order: map, question, test, mix, rehearse. The order matters more than the number of days.
Frequently asked questions
How many hours a day should I study for exams?
Quality beats hours. Two or three focused 45–60 minute sessions of self-testing a day, with breaks, usually beat six hours of re-reading. Stop a session when your accuracy drops sharply — that is fatigue, not learning.
Is it better to study the night before or in the morning?
Neither replaces spacing. Sleep helps consolidate what you studied, so a light review the evening before and a good night's sleep beat an all-nighter. Cramming can help you pass tomorrow, but you will forget most of it within days.
Are multiple-choice questions good for studying?
Yes, when the wrong options are plausible and you see the correct answer afterwards. Weak distractors let you guess by elimination; strong ones make you recall. Try to answer before looking at the options.
How do I study for an exam in one day?
Skip re-reading. Get the topic list, turn the highest-value topics into questions, and spend the day answering them, reviewing every mistake. Mix topics in the afternoon, sleep properly, and do a short quiz in the morning.
What is the most effective study method?
Practice testing (active recall) combined with spaced practice. Both earned the highest rating in Dunlosky et al.'s 2013 review of learning techniques.
Sources
- Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students' learning with effective learning techniques. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4–58.
- Roediger, H. L., & Karpicke, J. D. (2006). Test-enhanced learning: Taking memory tests improves long-term retention. Psychological Science, 17(3), 249–255.
- Karpicke, J. D., & Blunt, J. R. (2011). Retrieval practice produces more learning than elaborative studying with concept mapping. Science, 331(6018), 772–775.
- Cepeda, N. J., Pashler, H., Vul, E., Wixted, J. T., & Rohrer, D. (2006). Distributed practice in verbal recall tasks. Psychological Bulletin, 132(3), 354–380.
- Butler, A. C., & Roediger, H. L. (2008). Feedback enhances the positive effects and reduces the negative effects of multiple-choice testing. Memory & Cognition, 36(3), 604–616.
