18 student gadgets worth buying right now, from a £69 coffee machine to a £1,299 iPhone

Term is about to start and the overdraft is already hovering, so here is the kit we would actually buy, plus a few things we would only buy with a very understanding bank.

We have sorted these 18 gadgets by where students really use them: the lecture hall, the bedroom and the houseshare kitchen. Some are sensible buys that will still work when you graduate. Others are pure indulgence, and we say so. Prices are UK and were checked as we wrote this. Where we could not confirm a live price, we have marked it approx., so double check before you pay.

• The kit that carries the degree
• Lectures, recorded and on time
• Sound for the library, the bike and the kitchen party
• The room that does everything
• Kitchen kit that beats beans on toast

The kit that carries the degree

Four buys that do the heavy lifting, including the backup that will save a dissertation one day.

Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3 (15-inch, AMD)

Essays, spreadsheets and far too many browser tabs are exactly what this laptop is built for, and the Ryzen 5 chip with a 512GB SSD and Windows 11 Home copes with all three calmly. It starts at 1.4kg, so it will not wreck your shoulder on the walk to campus, though the 47Wh battery is modest enough that you should pack the charger. The 8GB of memory is soldered in and cannot be upgraded, which rules it out for video editing but suits everyday coursework fine.

reMarkable Paper Pure

Nothing on this 10.3-inch e-paper tablet pings or buzzes, and there is no TikTok to drift into, which is the whole idea. The 300ppi screen feels close to writing on paper, the tablet weighs 360g, and the battery lasts up to three weeks on an hour of note-taking a day. Handwriting search, unlimited cloud storage and the AI conversion tools sit behind a Connect subscription once the 50-day trial ends, so budget for that. The £399 bundle adds the better Marker Plus pen and a folio.

Apple iPhone 18 Pro Max (256GB, Glacier)

The 48MP main camera is what you are paying for here. It turns a whiteboard at the back of a lecture theatre into a readable photo, and a Saturday night into something worth posting. The 6.9-inch screen and A20 Pro chip give it plenty of room and speed, and it went on sale on 18 September. Still, £1,299 is a serious splurge, and a cheaper phone will do nearly everything else. Buy it only if your phone doubles as your camera and your notebook, and you plan to keep it for years.

Seagate One Touch Desktop

Backing up a dissertation is the dullest job in the degree and the one you will regret skipping most. This mains-powered drive has front-facing USB-C and USB 3.0 ports that connect and charge devices even when your computer is off, comes in sizes from 4TB to 20TB, and uses Seagate Toolkit to run scheduled backups so you never have to remember. It lives on a desk rather than in a rucksack, so treat it as a safety net, not a carry-everywhere drive. Prices depend on capacity, so shop around.

Lectures, recorded and on time

Two card-sized recorders and a watch that never asks for a charger.

Plaud Note Pro

Snap this credit-card-sized recorder to the back of your phone and it picks up a lecture from up to five metres away, then produces a transcript, a summary and answers to questions about what was said. Four microphones and a small AMOLED screen that shows what it is doing sit in a body about 3mm thick, and it records for up to 30 hours on a charge (50 in endurance mode). The free plan caps your monthly transcription minutes, so heavy users end up paying. Some universities also restrict lecture recording, so ask before you press the button.

HONOR Choice AI Note

At 2.89mm thick and 30g, this recorder slips into a wallet and still lasts up to 24 hours between charges, which is its main trick over the Plaud. It transcribes in more than 130 languages, labels different speakers and includes 600 free transcription minutes a month. Honor says five hours of audio syncs to your phone in 30 seconds over Wi-Fi, and that its 98% accuracy figure comes from a quiet room in its own lab, so expect less in a packed lecture theatre. It costs around £40 less than the Plaud.

Casio G-Shock GA-B2100C-9A

Solar power means this G-Shock never needs charging, and a Bluetooth link to your phone corrects the time four times a day. It is rated to 200 metres, weighs 52g, measures under 12mm thick and has a 1/100-second stopwatch, five alarms and a double LED light that makes it readable at 2am. The yellow octagonal case is a slim take on the classic G-Shock look. Flat phone before a 9am seminar? The watch still knows the time.

Sound for the library, the bike and the kitchen party

JLab Epic Sport ANC 3

Hybrid noise cancelling, dual drivers and Bluetooth multipoint for under £80 is the strongest value pitch in this whole list. These earbuds can hold a laptop and a phone at the same time, get LDAC on Android and AAC on iOS, and have an IP66 rating that shrugs off sweat and rain. JLab quotes more than 50 hours of playtime with the case, so charging is a rare chore. They are sport earbuds, which means the fit is built to stay put and suits the gym as much as the library.

Shokz OpenFit Air 2

Open-ear earbuds sit outside the ear canal, so you can hear the bus behind you while your playlist carries on, which is what makes the OpenFit Air 2 good for cycling to campus. Each bud weighs 9.4g, the IP55 rating handles rain, and you get 11 hours per charge and 48 with the case. A 10-minute top-up gives two hours. There is no noise cancelling, and open-ear designs leak some sound, so keep the volume sensible in quiet places and buy the JLab pair if the library is your priority.

Beats Pill

Bass is the selling point here: this speaker fills a houseshare kitchen with it and shrugs off spills, thanks to an IP67 rating against dust and water. Battery life stretches to 24 hours, Class 1 Bluetooth gives it longer range, and plugging in over USB-C delivers lossless audio from a laptop. Buy two and they pair for stereo. At 680g it is a bag-carrier rather than a pocket speaker, and the wall charger is sold separately, but it works with both iPhone and Android.

The room that does everything

Small rooms and flaky Wi-Fi come with the territory, and these four go some way to fixing both.

Desktronic HomeOne standing desk

A sit-stand desk sounds like a luxury until you have spent a semester hunched over a laptop. The HomeOne has dual motors that lift up to 120kg at 30mm per second, three memory presets on a touchscreen controller and built-in USB-A and USB-C ports, and it takes about 30 minutes to build. Its height range of 72.7 to 122cm suits people roughly 165cm to 192cm tall, according to Desktronic. Stock varies by size and colour, and a desk needs floor space many halls rooms lack, so measure first. A warranty of up to 15 years and 30-day returns take some of the risk out.

Philips Hue Signe gradient floor lamp

One slim column of light paints a gradient of colour up the wall, which is the quickest way to make a beige rented room feel like yours. The lamp stands 1.46m tall, puts out 2,550 lumens at 4000K and runs from the Hue app over Bluetooth, so you do not need a Hue Bridge. It is also a very expensive lamp for a room you will leave in June. If you only want colour on the wall, Philips’ newer Hue Play floor lamp large costs £129.99.

Simba Hybrid 3-in-1 duvet

Two duvets in one: a 3.5 tog summer cover and a 7 tog spring and autumn cover that snap together as 10.5 tog for winter. That suits a student room where the heating is either off or roaring. One side of each carries Stratos cooling fabric that Simba says feels up to 3°C cooler, and the whole thing is machine washable. It comes with a reusable storage bag and a 200-night trial, and students can qualify for up to 26% off.

Netgear Orbi 370 mesh Wi-Fi 7, 3-pack

Split five ways, £299.99 buys Wi-Fi 7 that reaches the attic bedroom. Three units cover up to 4,500 sq ft and handle up to 70 devices at speeds up to 3.6Gbps, and a 2.5 Gig port copes with fast broadband. You plug it into your modem and set it up in an app. Netgear calls it its most affordable Orbi, and the dual-band design is the compromise. It is overkill for one room in halls, but a big houseshare is a different story.

Kitchen kit that beats beans on toast

KitchenAid Artisan 2-slice toaster

Extra-wide slots, seven shade settings with an LED countdown and a sandwich rack turn bread and cheese into a proper toastie, which is roughly the level of cooking that gets plenty of students through week six. There are bagel and frozen modes too, and it lowers the toast back down to keep it warm if you wander off. The die-cast metal body carries a five-year guarantee, so it should outlast the degree and the flat. £269 is silly money for a toaster, and we know it.

Our Place Wonder Oven (Spice)

It air fries, bakes, roasts, toasts, reheats and grills in a 12-litre box, which saves you queueing for the shared oven. A splash of water in the top adds steam that keeps leftovers from drying out, and Our Place says it preheats in under 2.5 minutes. It draws 1,400W, reaches 230°C and fits a 2kg chicken. The bake pan is hand-wash only, and the oven takes up counter space you may not have.

Lavazza A Modo Mio Tiny bundle

Coffee shop habits get expensive fast, and this bundle attacks them at £69 with 48 capsules included. You get the compact A Modo Mio Tiny machine and three 16-capsule packs of Qualità Rossa, Lungo Dolce and Passionale, and Lavazza has knocked £39.35 off the usual price. The catch with any capsule machine is that you buy refills from one brand, and the bundle was showing limited stock when we looked, so check before you plan around it.

AeroPress Steel

A standard AeroPress already makes great coffee for a fraction of this price, so the Steel is for people who want one that lasts forever. The 304 stainless steel chamber has double-wall vacuum insulation, which holds heat without preheating and stays cool to the touch. It holds 12oz (360ml), brews in under two minutes and goes in the dishwasher, which a houseshare will appreciate. Standard AeroPress paper filters fit, so refills are cheap. The price is the only hurdle.

How to survive a houseshare kitchen

Watch the wattage

The KitchenAid toaster draws 1,250W and the Wonder Oven 1,400W. A standard UK 13A plug tops out at around 3,000W, so run both on one extension lead with a kettle and you are asking for trouble. Give big appliances their own socket.

Split the big buys and agree who keeps them

Divide the £299.99 Orbi five ways and it costs £60 each. Agree now who takes it home in June, because tenancies end faster than anyone plans.

Keep the receipts

KitchenAid gives five years, Desktronic up to 15 and JLab two, but a guarantee is only worth something if you can prove you bought the kit. Photograph receipts and register products the week they arrive.

If we had to pick three for a first-year student, it would be the Lenovo, the JLab earbuds and the Simba duvet. Everything else can wait until the bank balance recovers.