phd research software

10 research tools every PhD student needs

A PhD is the penultimate academic degree. With their research that looks into solving critical world issues, PhD graduates help everyone understand the world around them better; hence the important role of research tools that help them achieve this.

A PhD requires candidates to collect and gather data for their dissertation so they can make an informed analysis of whether their hypothesis is supported, as well as deduce future probabilities and trends. This is often a time-consuming process – one has to search from the library and internet for literature, conducting experiments, writing and publishing papers, on top of the tedious task of formatting these sources .

Since a dissertation can be upwards of 60,000 words, how then to efficiently collect and compile everything? Now that the world has become increasingly advanced in terms of technology, it makes sense to know how to use the many available online tools to help with the research process.

The right tools can help save time, effort and energy, helping you produce more accessible and visually presentable as well. You can even enjoy a better work-life balance since these tools will ease the long-drawn research.

These research tools can help free up precious time to concentrate on your PhD dissertation-writing. Source: Marc Wattrelot/AFP

Helena Hartmann – currently obtaining her PhD at the Social, Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Unit in Vienna, Austria – has compiled a useful list of research tools for PhD students. Many have found the list infinitely helpful (“superb,” “made my day”) and that is why these 10 top research tools that every PhD student needs are highlighted here in no particular order.

Research Tool 1: Journal Rater

Have you ever struggled to choose a journal to send your research paper because when you are not sure which journal has good or bad reviews? The Journal Rater by @PhDVoice does that tiring guess-work for you.

This easily accessible database has ratings about the quality of the reviewers, the speed of the peer-review and publishing process and whether you should submit to a particular journal, among others. You can even include your comments and experiences, and choose to be anonymous as well; the best part is you know exactly which journals are great to submit.

Research Tool 2: Connected Papers

When you are doing a literature review and want to find connections between published papers, Connected Papers by @ConnectedPapers can help you do that. By entering a typical paper there, they will show a visual graph of similar papers in your field.

The more you explore, the more likely you can see trends, popular works and dynamics in your field. With more new papers published every day, Connected Papers helps you keep abreast of these important papers; you can also access their Prior Works to search for ancestor works in your field and Derivative Works for literature reviews of your field.

Research Tool 3: Citation Diversity Statement

Citation bias means having a tendency for a research investigation that shows benefit to be quoted more than those neutral or negative ones. Another definition is a scientist tending to cite research articles published in their preferred journals more frequently.

Checking and clearly indicating the proportion of male and female first and last-name authors can be a tiring. Using this citation diversity statement by Zurn et al is a helpful tool to reduce citation bias; you can easily append this simple and effective statement to your paper as well.

Research Tool 4: CRediT

CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) aims to recognise individual author contributions while reducing authorship disputes and enhancing collaboration. Through CRediT, authors can accurately show and describe their varied contributions to the published work.

Here’s how it works: the corresponding author should confirm the descriptions are accurate and that all the authors have agreed on this; the various roles are listed according to the categories. The CRediT statement should be given at the time of submission – this will then appear above the acknowledgement section of the published paper.

Research Tool 5: Unpaywall – OpenAccess

Unpaywall is an open database of 30,887,744 free scholarly articles from over 50,000 publishers and repositories. That means you can easily find, track and use this Open Access content; it is completely legal.

Unpaywall uses the DOI function to search for articles published in peer-reviewed journals; in fact Unpaywall has already been integrated into many worldwide library systems, search platforms and other information products. To use Unpaywall, go to any closed access article, click on the green button and you can get an Open Access version.

Research Tool 6: Create your own website

Any academic wanting their research and publications to be easily found should consider making a website. Hartmann found Dan Quintana’s Twitter thread tutorial on making websites easy and invaluable – see Hartmann’s website here.

In one hour, Quintana will show you how to make a website for free. All you need is a @github and @netlify account, and the downloaded @code – and your website with all your research and publications will be up and running in no time.

Research Tool 7: Excel Journal Database

If you want to have an easy compilation of your literature review sources, Stephen McQuilliam ’s Excel Journal Database Webinar can help you in this aspect . In this Youtube video, McQuilliam explains step by step how to build an Excel database to organise your notes and bring them together for your writing.

Research Tool 8: APA Word Template

For researchers, having to format their papers in APA can be an arduous process. Fortunately, Nicolás F. Narvaez Linares’ tip may make many researchers sigh with relief.

In Microsoft Word, just type APA in the New Document Tab, and the APA template automatically pops up. A word of caution: this template uses the 6th edition of the APA so you may have to make some changes since the APA has now released its 7th edition.

Research Tool 9: Notion

If you have many applications and want to keep them all in one place, Hartmann considers Notion as the best one. Basically Notion acts as an all-in-one workspace – you can keep your notes, tasks, wikis and databases there in Notion.

Research Tool 10: Canva

Finally, this design website is excellent if you have to prepare slides and figures for your presentations. The free, professional and nice designs can make your presentations more visually appealing.

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10 Best Apps for PhD Students | 2024

Best Mobile Applications for Researchers

There are millions of mobile applications available in the Android play store, but still, there are very few useful apps only available for researchers. We analyzed more than 50 applications and identified the 10 most appropriate applications for researchers based on daily activities like research collaboration, data collection, document reading, updating real-world issues related to their domain, resource gathering, daily schedule maintenance, and journal reading. This post gives an explanation to use the top 10 Useful Mobile Apps software 2024 for PhD Scholars that are really the best apps for PhD Students.

Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose – Zora Neale Hurston

10 Best Android Apps for PhD Students

Here are 10 of the best Android apps that can be extremely helpful for graduate students in their academic pursuits. I’ll also provide some insights on how these apps can benefit you.

These apps are essential for creating, editing, and presenting documents, spreadsheets, and presentations.
Store and sync your documents, making them accessible from any device. Collaboration features are a plus for group projects.
A reference manager and academic social network. It helps you organize your research, collaborate with peers, and discover the latest research.
An excellent note-taking app that allows you to capture and organize ideas, research notes, and web clippings.
Another robust reference manager that simplifies the process of collecting, organizing, and citing research materials.
Enhance your writing by checking grammar, spelling, and style. It’s an indispensable tool for proofreading.
Manage your projects and tasks effectively. Great for keeping track of deadlines and staying organized.
Boost your productivity by using the Pomodoro technique. Stay focused and limit distractions during study sessions.
Access a wide range of educational content in various subjects, making it a great resource for learning beyond your coursework.
Turn your smartphone into a portable scanner. Scan and digitize documents, notes, and books for easy reference.

10 Best iOS Apps for PhD Graduate Students

Here are 10 iOS apps that can be incredibly helpful for graduate students:

An excellent note-taking app that allows you to write, draw, and annotate PDFs.
A reference management tool that helps you organize and cite your research materials.
A writing assistant can help you improve the clarity and correctness of your writing.
Another powerful reference manager with a mobile app for on-the-go access to your research library.
A versatile note-taking app that syncs across devices and allows you to organize your thoughts and research.
If you struggle with staying focused, this app helps you stay on track by growing virtual trees when you avoid your phone.
A comprehensive digital notebook that’s great for organizing your research notes.
Access a vast database of scholarly articles and research papers.
A project management app that can help you organize your tasks and deadlines.
If your research involves multiple languages, this app can help you learn and practice them.

These apps cover a range of functions, from note-taking and reference management to productivity and language learning. They can be valuable tools for graduate students in various disciplines.

Best Apps for PhD Students

1. mendeley.

What is the Mendeley App?

Mendeley is a free reference manager and PDF reader crafted especially for researchers. It helps you to organize your literature in a proper manner so you could effectively use it during your thesis writing or dissertation. Mendeley is available in both mobile and desktop applications, It will help you to read your collected articles wherever you go.

How to Use it for Research?

Create a free account at www.mendeley.com and download a desktop version in your system.
Add all your Journals , Magazines, Book Chapters, Thesis , and other materials in an organized manner.
Segregate the files based on year, author, publication, and domain using TAG option.
Download the Mendeley mobile application and log in with the same account.
Allow the application to synchronize with your account.
Now you can see all the files that you saved on your desktop that will appear in the mobile application.

Organizing Resources is the first step towards the solution

2. Flipboard

What is Flipboard App?

Flipboard is the most popular mobile application used by millions of people every day, It helps you to keep yourself updated with your domain-related information and also read the daily news, blog posts, and trending topics all together in one place. Flipboard allows the user to collect posts based on their passion and interest. The powerful and smooth user interface gives a pleasant feel to reading more articles.

Download the Flipboard mobile application and create your account.
Flipboard will give a virtual tour to learn the basic features of the application.
Click “WHAT’S YOUR PASSION?” Next to the Flipboard icon.
Search for your domain. Ex: Machine Learning.
It will show many sub-categories inside the topic. Based on your requirement personalize the magazine. That’s it!
Keep up with the news related to your domain every day with The Daily Edition.

Don’t be outdated, Because you are working for the future!

3. Researcher

What is a Researcher App?

Researcher is a free journal-finding mobile application that helps you to read new journal papers every day that are relevant to your research. It is the most popular mobile application used by more than 3 million scientists and researchers to keep themselves updated with the latest academic literature.

Download Researhcer mobile application on your mobile.
Open and search for your required journal in the search bar.
You can follow any number of journals and you can read new articles as well.

4. Plagiarism Checker

What is Plagiarism Checker App?

Plagiarism Checker is a free application that works with Plagiarisma.net. It will detect duplicate content in your papers from more than five popular search engines like Google, Yahoo, Babylon, Google Scholar, and Google Books.

Download Plagiarism Checker mobile application.
No need for registration so you can directly go into the app.
Scan your essay, article, term paper, or dissertation with a single tap of your smartphone.
It also has voice support and direct URL support.
Save results to HTML, PDF, EPUB. That’s it!

5. Google Keep

What is Google Keep App?

Google Keep is a free remainder application from Google LLC, It helps researchers quickly capture what’s on their mind and get a reminder later at the right place or time.

Download Google Keep mobile application.
Log in with your Google account.
Record a voice memo and Keep will transcribe it so you can find it later.
Take quick notes.
Schedule your daily plan and enable the remainder.
Take handwritten notes.
Capture important results using the camera and save them.
Access it when you working on a desktop or laptop as well.

6. Curiosity

What is Curiosity App?

Curiosity is a very popular mobile application from curiosity.com, it helps researchers to learn new scientific inventions in a more detailed way with videos.

How to Use it for Research?

Download the Curiosity mobile application.
Create an account to access the app.
Read inspiring articles from your topics.
Watch smart videos from millions of creators.
Personalize your favorites, then follow your favorite categories.

7. Paperity

What is Paperity App?

Paperity is a free mobile application for researchers from www.paperity.org. It helps you to aggregate various open-access journals through your mobile.

Download Paperity mobile application.
Browse the most recent articles.
Browse journals and their Tables of Contents of Open Access papers.
Search papers and their full text for specific keywords, phrases, authors, publication dates, languages, and countries of origin.
View and read full-text PDFs of more than one million articles. All for FREE!

What is Slack App?

Are you doing Collaborative Research? Then Try this useful mobile application Slack it brings team communication and collaboration into one place so you can get more work done, whether you belong to a small lab or doing collaborative research with researchers from another part of the world. Make effective conversations on different topics using #TAG.

Download Slack mobile application.
Include your lab members using their Email-ID.
Communicate with your lab mates and organize your conversations by topics, projects, or anything else that matters to your work.
Message or call any person or group within your team.
Integrate into your workflow, the tools, and services you already use including Google Drive, Salesforce, Dropbox, Asana, Twitter, and Zendesk.
Customize your notifications so you stay focused on what matters.

What is Dropbox?

Dropbox is a free another free mobile application for researchers to make creative collaboration space, store all files together in one central place, and safely sync them across all your devices.

Download Dropbox mobile application.
Create a Dropbox account and choose a free version. (Limited space only but more than enough for document files).
Work on files with others through shared folders.
Use the document scanner to turn receipts, whiteboards, and notes into PDFs.
Comment on files to share feedback with your team
Sync, share, and edit Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files.

10. Camscanner

What is Camescanner App?

Camescanner is a mobile document scanning and sharing application, It helps you to scan, store, sync and collaborate on various contents across smartphones, iPads, tablets and computers.

Download the Camscanner application and Create an account.
Use your mobile camera to scan and digitize all kinds of paper documents.
Using smart cropping and auto-enhancing ensures the texts and graphics in scanned documents.
Easily share documents in PDF or JPEG format with friends in various ways.
Instantly print out any documents in CamScanner with a nearby printer via AirPrint.

Hope, this article would help you to know about the 10 Best Apps for PhD Students.

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[…] 10 Useful Apps for PhD Scholars | 2020 […]

Hello, I loved this article! All of your resources listed here are spot on, thank you for taking the time to write this. I sent you an email about a tool we created by (a team of researchers) that is free for PHD and graduate students to use. We started this no-code app to help our own academic research students and faculty, and would love to help more people. Thanks again! – Pathverse Team

Mendeley App was removed in 2021 – the mobile web version is sadly close to unusable. If anybody finds a proper workaround or a usable third party app, please include that in the article.

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iLovePhD is a research education website to know updated research-related information. It helps researchers to find top journals for publishing research articles and get an easy manual for research tools. The main aim of this website is to help Ph.D. scholars who are working in various domains to get more valuable ideas to carry out their research. Learn the current groundbreaking research activities around the world, love the process of getting a Ph.D.

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Jun 7, 2021

Useful Software for PhD Researchers

I have been asked what my top software picks for prospective and current PhD researchers are a few times now, so here's my answer!

Microsoft Office

The Microsoft Office package is extremely useful throughout your PhD, so it is definitely worth spending some time familiarising yourself with each of the programmes. It's very likely you will be writing your thesis and other important documents up in Word, whilst Excel is great for planning (I use it to create Gantt charts to plan each academic term/year) and PowerPoint is also really useful for designing research posters and presentation slides.

Referencing Software

Referencing is an important part of your PhD thesis, and something you'll do throughout the duration of your degree. Referencing manually is extremely time-consuming, increases the risk of making errors, and doesn't allow you to keep all your notes or PDFs in one place. Here's where referencing software comes in. I personally use EndNote , but there are various others to choose from as well, including Zotero and Mendeley

Note-Taking

Before starting my PhD, I'd never used Microsoft OneNote but now I can't live without it!! I have 3 notebooks - one for my PhD, where I store a whole variety of notes linked to my research, training notes, opportunities, etc, as well as useful links, document attachments and checklists. I have another where I store my notes from readings. OneNote is excellent for this, as there is a search function making it easy to scan for keywords in all of your notes at the same time, as well as the ability to tag key theorists, titles, or keywords that you may need to come back to. I also have another notebook for personal things like my shopping list or ideas for family days out, as well as for my writing, such as drafts for this blog, picture book ideas, writing opportunities, etc. If OneNote isn't your cup of tea, there are other great note-taking options out there, such as EverNote .

Organisational Tools

I admit I don't actually use software for this - I use a paper diary (well it's the family organiser so it's easier to have everything in one place and we're all at home presently so it works!) but I would definitely recommend looking into a digital alternative. I've heard Trello and Microsoft To Do are great for making to do lists and managing your time and tasks.

Virtual Meeting Software

Virtual meetings have been the thing for 15 months already! So you've probably already familiarised yourself with many of the main online meeting platforms. But if you haven't, it would be a good idea to gain some familiarity with the key ones - for example, Microsoft Teams , Zoom , Webex , and Google Meet , as I doubt they'll be going away any time soon! It would also be useful to have some knowledge of these platforms if you plan on attending a variety of webinars and meetings, or even organising your own online meetings or interviews.

Research Skills and Databases

Developing research skills and the ability to locate important papers, statistics, and information relevant to your research, is an invaluable skill for PhD researchers. So one of the first skills you want to master at the start of your PhD is how to use the library search functions and how to use the key databases in your area of research. In addition to the library search function, I use Web of Science and on this platform, I've set up alerts so whenever a paper is published relating to the keywords I have set, I get an email. This saves so much time as I don't have to trawl through the millions of papers out there looking for updates each month. It would also be wise to familiarise yourself with Google Scholar , ResearchGate and Academia.edu which are also very useful for finding resources too.

Professional Development

Professional development is such an important part of the PhD journey, and one that often isn't given as much attention as it deserves. The first port of call should be the trainings organised or shared by your university, but I would also strongly recommend complementing your professional development activities with free courses from places like LinkedIn Learning (most universities subscribe so you can access the videos for free), Coursera , FutureLearn , and edx.org .

Social Media

Social media isn't an essential part of the PhD journey but it is super useful for connecting with other PhD researchers and academics, creating a web presence for yourself, assisting with public engagement and looking for future opportunities. Twitter is probably the overall best for academia, but other sites like LinkedIn and Academia.edu are good too. To help you get started, look for trainings on effective social media use and personal branding on the sites mentioned previously.

Graphics and Design

Depending on the nature of your research, you may or may not get opportunities to design images and graphics. If you do however, and especially if you use social media, it can really help to use dedicated software to produce professional-looking images. My favourite application is Canva as you can produce so many amazing designs for free, from social media posts, to research flyers, to infographics.

Discipline-Specific Software

In addition to all of the programmes I've mentioned above, there will undoubtedly be others specific to your discipline, your research methodology, and your research activities. Find out what software is commonly used in your discipline - I'm a qualitative researcher in sociology so the software I make most use of is NVIVO but if I did quantitative research, I would be using SPSS. Each discipline has its preferred software programmes, so try to find out which ones are common in your discipline and get familiar with them.

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10 research tools every PhD student needs - Study International
Many have found the list infinitely helpful (“superb,” “made my day”) and that is why these 10 top research tools that every PhD student needs are highlighted here in no particular order. Research Tool 1: Journal Rater.
11 Best Data Analysis Software for Research [2023]
In this comprehensive guide, we will delve into the best data analysis software options available for PhD research. By exploring their features, advantages, and limitations, we aim to equip you with the knowledge necessary to make an informed choice that will streamline your research process.
10 Best Apps for PhD Students | 2024 - iLovePhD
Find the top 10 Best Apps, and software tools for PhD Students which is Useful to PhD Scholars, Grad Students, and PhD Students, researchers.
Useful Software for PhD Researchers - Ellie Atayee-Bennett
Useful Software for PhD Researchers. I have been asked what my top software picks for prospective and current PhD researchers are a few times now, so here's my answer! Microsoft Office. The Microsoft Office package is extremely useful throughout your PhD, so it is definitely worth spending some time familiarising yourself with each of the ...
10 Essential Tools for Phd Students - Pathverse
Create intervention studies, send out timed notifications, and create custom surveys or questionnaires for your study participants. Pathverse also hosts a large library of features and an exclusive FREE tier for Ph.D. students and early career researchers.
Top 10 Tools for PhD Students - EduEarth
What are the top 10 apps and websites that can be helpful during your PhD program?

10 research tools every PhD student needs

Research Tool 1: Journal Rater

Research Tool 2: Connected Papers

Research Tool 3: Citation Diversity Statement

Research Tool 4: CRediT

Research Tool 5: Unpaywall – OpenAccess

Research Tool 6: Create your own website

Research Tool 7: Excel Journal Database

Research Tool 8: APA Word Template

Research Tool 9: Notion

Research Tool 10: Canva

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What is the Mendeley App?

How to Use it for Research?

2. Flipboard

What is Flipboard App?

3. Researcher

What is a Researcher App?

4. Plagiarism Checker

What is Plagiarism Checker App?

5. Google Keep

What is Google Keep App?

6. Curiosity

What is Curiosity App?

How to Use it for Research?

7. Paperity

What is Paperity App?

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10. Camscanner

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