7 insanely useful academic apps you've not heard about!

In this video, I go through the seven insanely useful academic apps that you've not yet heard about. These can be used for your PhD, research, or other academic activities to make sure that your PhD flows as easily as possible.
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0:00 - introduction
0:24 - paper digest (www.paper-digest.com)
1:43 - writefull (link.andrewstapleton.com.au/w...)
3:10 - Penelope.ai (www.penelope.ai)
4:47 - Litmaps (app.litmaps.co)
6:16 - Biorender (biorender.com)
8:01 - Otlet (otlet.io)
9:31 - Kudos (growkudos.com)
11:17 - Summary
☕ Help keep the content coming by buying me a coffee here: ko-fi.com/andystapleton.
I really appreciate your support! ☕
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▼ ▽ RECOMMENDED ACADEMIC TOOLS AND SERVICES
AI TOOLS
▶ Best PhD Writing Tool - Writefull - link.andrewstapleton.com.au/w... (Get 10% off with my link)
▶ Chat with PDFs, Websites and more: HeyGPT - heygpt.lemonsqueezy.com/?aff=...
▶ Best Literature Search - Litmaps - app.litmaps.co (Get 10% off with code STAPLETON)
▶ Best Literature Review Writing Tool - Jenni.ai - jenni.ai/ (Get 20% off with code ANDY20)
▼ ▽ RECOMMENDED KZbin TOOLS AND SERVICES
▶ VidIQ - vidiq.com/drandy
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[@hilde703]

I'm one of the linguists at Writefull. Thanks Andy, for including our tool! Academic writing can be very challenging indeed, so it's great you're telling people about Writefull :)

[@vasavu3181]

Thanks so much for these apps.

[@dianayoussef9917]

Dear, how to get to know your KZbin channel or how to contact you?

[@multijoyjoy]

thank you so much for this, quick question though....how does one use Writefull outside of the word doc...am struggling to add the add-in in my document...suspect the school might have whitelisted it the app

[@blackcats_dogs]

Share some jobs

[@homamthewise6941]

Thanks 🙏 Hilde

[@emilyd253]

Ok, I've made it this many years just watching youtube videos and lurking without subscribing, but I'm now officially subscribed to your channel so I never miss another update. Your videos have been so, so informative this past year as someone who returned for a Masters after some time, and is now writing up a PhD proposal. I'm currently working on my MA Dissertation Literature Review and Litmaps is a total game-changer, especially as a visual learner. And as someone with ADHD in a postgraduate programme as well, I'm looking forward to testing out paper digest more thoroughly as a way of helping to recall broader arguments or methodologies, which can sometimes be a bit harder to isolate for me than minutiae, especially with the volume of reading for a Dissertation. These all sound incredibly helpful and really looking forward to exploring them all further. Thank you for sharing these, and your consistently invaluable advice!

[@Peale14]

Wow! What a treasure trove of awesomeness you've provided here. I am starting my PhD journey and Writefull, Paper Digest and Litmaps are being downloaded as I type. Thanks a million Andy... I have subscribed, binge watched and cannot wait for further updates.

[@mdasifrezwanshishir742]

Thank you Dr. Stapleton! I was already using Mendeley and writefull for my thesis and I got to know about 2 other very important and helpful apps. Will definitely share among my peers :)

[@angel21991]

Latex can be a good way to take care of formatting issues without ever having to think about it. Overleaf really helpful on that end. Also most journals provide their format in latex nowadays, makes life so much easier.

[@dorcasmalahlela2805]

Are you in the humanities or natural sciences? Until my brother started his science degree, I had never heard of lateX. I can do nonsense in word, but the setup for lateX scares me a bit.

[@angel21991]

@@dorcasmalahlela2805 I'm in Engineering. I was really overwhelmed by latex too. Wouldn't have used it if our of my PhD level courses didn't make it a requirement for assignment work. But once I got over the initial discomfort, the availability of easy to implement templets was a major help. I use Overleaf, their interface makes it easier to handle. Also they have a vast collection of document templets to choose from. My university even has its PhD thesis template in latex( as one of the options), made it a breeze to just upload onto overleaf and just focus on the content and not worry about the formatting.

[@markv559]

I use LyX, a Latex GUI. Better than overleaf and free, of course.

[@edwardpashkov5840]

Andy, thank you so much for making these videos (this one in particular). All of your videos are super informative and lessen the stress of grad school. Thank you a million!

[@asishreddy7729]

Loved biorender! As a doctor I’m always feeling sad about not having good diagrams to explain complex topics to students/patients. Thanks for that !

[@mrinaliniroy8496]

Thank you for this, after having absolutely exhausted my good writing, and with deadlines mounting, you are a life saver. Thank you loads!

[@pereza213]

I wish litmaps would merge with readcube. The citation management along with what citations you may need to evaluate would be amazing!

[@jamie-leeranjit4708]

I absolutely love all your content! I never came across such helpful insights!

[@busra3374]

You are very helpful in all videos! Hope more people can explore you! Litmap was my favourite! I didn't know the others, thanks :)

[@bonniehoke-scedrov4906]

Great video! Thanks! All of these were new to me. I love how cutting edge your channel is. Thank you so much!

[@elizajberberian7231]

I installed the Writefull app, and it is free to word. It seem great and super helpful for the research paper that I have coming up! Thanks!

[@2mtk]

Thx Andy, absolutely awesome particular the first four apps you mentioned. Please keep sharing the content.

[@DrAndyStapleton]

Thanks, will do!

[@pianoboy3225]

Just got Writefull! Your channel is excellent! I started my masters degree and have been watching your videos! Thank you!

[@toddharrop9094]

Thank you so much for your positive, uplifting and inspiring survey. This brings a smile to my face and gives me a little boost as I near the end of writing my musicology dissertation. Cheers!

[@alexua45]

Andy, thanks so much. Its always great to learn from others and share with others. We need people like you to live for long ........................

[@udayabhaskarsuram6379]

Thank you Dr. Andy Stapleton . Through this you have enlightened and given me power to open up many knowledge windows. My deep respects to you for your kind sharing.

[@danielkebritmuluye3667]

For PhD Candidates in intensive writing periods like me, it's very helpful. Thank you. i appreciate if i hear your recommendation on paraphrasing tools

[@sandi_sandkorn]

I am a first year PhD student and I didn’t know any of those apps. Thank you very much 😍☺️

[@ashugupta1955]

I am also first year PhD. What is your PhD about Sandra?

[@franklinjeffers6055]

Thank you for sharing these wonderful Apps, Andy.

[@jasonm9838]

Absolute gold Andy, you're a lifesaver.

[@noufalhamdan8286]

Thank you, Andy. Such great content. keep going

[@alexandrarolya190]

I’m an undergraduate student doing my research and I find all of your videos very useful! Thank you!🥰

[@artscience9981]

Zotero is a really useful app for aggregating all the papers you are interested in, organizing them in folders, and exporting references. I find it invaluable.

[@HWCWTD]

I'm thinking of getting Zotero. I used Mendeley back in the day. Have you tried both? Do you have a preference?

[@draw4everyone]

@@HWCWTD I like Zotero for its chrome/Firefox extension and its PDF reader. I export highlights out of Zotero into my notes database with the click of a button. Haven't used mendeley, so consider this only a pitch for Zotero.

[@robw1571]

@@HWCWTD Zotero looks dated but works well. Mendeley was bought up by Elsevier and while still free, its seems like they're constantly fiddling with it so you never know when it's going to work properly or not. When it does work I like it better than Zotero but there is a lot to say about Zotero's stability.

[@hoperules8874]

zotero is not helpful on a mac...at all

[@FDExaminer]

I've been organizing a pre-existing collection of 25,000+ disorganized files in Zotero. What an endeavour! Trying to get it shared among multiple users (all offline) is a challenge.

[@tinalasquety]

Love the energy of this video. Really helpful tips. Thanks!

[@theupliftproject]

Thank you, Andy, your videos are very informative and super helpful!

[@Deedee-qu4or]

Thank you very much Dr. Andy for this helpful video at this moment of my Ph.D. journey. I did not know any of these apps. Especially the Litmaps and Paper Digest will be really helpful. Would it be possible to create more content on the writing process?

[@DrAndyStapleton]

Glad it was helpful!

[@tbennnett4277]

This is totally amazing. I am in my last year of a Master's and only knew about grammarly... I will definitely be using 1,2&3. Thank you for caring enough to share ☺️

[@DrAndyStapleton]

Glad it was helpful!

[@vritarita6871]

Nice update, Andy! I second the request about how to make academic writing better, any suggestions for actual academic writing skills and citation apps? Citation is sometimes so hard!

[@sarahjustme]

For citation, Mendeley is really good!

[@wackystar1991]

Scribbr has actually become really good

[@AuthenticMusicalInsight]

Thanks Andy, im just start my PhD this year. Your videos are very helptfull

[@shreyadas5065]

Thank you Andy! This is quite useful.

[@RemNetizen]

What a wonderful content. Thank you for your work and everything you share in your amazing channel.

[@MrDISCOJOCK]

This is gonna be so helpful. Thanks Andy 😁

[@mindcache5650]

Great job. Provision of extreme value. Well done. Appreciated.

[@AcademicLife]

Very fantastic information Andy. Thank you so much. I only heard Paper Digest and Kudos. I have used Kudos Add-on for MS Word. I am new in KZbin. 🙂

[@AnngladysGichuhi]

Awesome stuff! I can't wait to check out Paper Digest!!

[@akscience9690]

Your content is just outstanding Andy, really one of the best PhD-content related channels. Keep going. Hope you reach 100K fast.

[@ashwinimakhale5553]

Only knew biorender from the list! Thank you for putting together these useful apps.

[@DrAndyStapleton]

No problem! It's my pleasure!

[@peddler931]

I used Docear, which had a category map of references and a Word extension to manage in-document citations. It was an open-source project, for which support petered out. It looks like Litmaps, with a citation manager, could replace those functions.

[@onyemowoestherogangwu4059]

Please what app can help me write a competitive statement of purpose or motivation letters?

[@clinpsydoc]

Thank you Mr. Stapleton. I could have used 5 of these apps 12 years ago during my dissertation process! I'll pass this on to my kids.

[@bc4198]

This is freaking great!!! Almost all of this also applies to people working in government, science, and no doubt other fields - PhD or no :)

[@jonathankiles6148]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/mnrNoaJ_q7iNhtE

[@umashankarmishra9629]

Thank you Andy. It was great help

[@spagoettios9481]

Mr. Stapleton you are the cure for what ails me. I never even got a masters degree and always felt like a failure because of a background filled with poverty. When you're brought up poor, nobody wants to network with you because you only have hard work and honesty to offer. Now, I'm retired from 3 jobs and making more than I ever did working. Thank you for the insight into all I thought I'd missed. I'm more than content with my Journalism undergraduate degree. You Rock. Thank you from a fan in Fairbanks, Alaska.

[@AviyahAbides]

How are you making more retired, if you don’t mind me asking?

[@ShaareiZoharDaas]

I blew the whistle twice and went back to school and finished degrees after attempts were made on me and it took me four years to see the seedy side of academia. Now that I know it exists its easier to navigate. This channel rocks

[@mkyrene]

Thank you very much for these treasures! I have just found your channela nd i'm binging all your videos. it is a sort of haha moment for me right now. please keep making such great content

[@ndidiamakaakpunonu1232]

Thank you Andy for sharing. All these apps are new to me.

[@annreign2556]

Thank you! I'm certainly going to check out Paper Digest, Writefull and Litmaps. I think Paper Digest could save me a world of time!

[@76MUTiger]

Andy, I downloaded Litmap and it is a rocketship for my progress! In 4 hours I pulled up an enormous number of research articles that will be vital to my success. This is easily the most productive day I have had in my program. Litmap is rocket fuel!!!

[@laurenpinschannels]

what other tools like it have it tried and rejected? I've tried it and found it very difficult to use compared to simply browsing citations on semantic scholar. I've also fallen in love with semantic scholar's paper feeds feature, which you activate by adding papers to a library folder. I've bugged them asking for integration with other library management tools like zotero. but semanticscholar doesn't let me view an overview of things in a time vs citation-influence graph view the way litmaps does. I guess I'm curious what features you use. KZbin is terrible for science because you probably won't be notified xD

[@Desperado202]

Thank you so much for the great video, Andy! I haven't found a real, good KZbin video in a long time.

[@mpalomaresv]

Thanks, Andy. I didn't know any of the tools, so I'm looking forward to trying them out.

[@jillfarley520]

Thank you Andy, this is so helpful!

[@andreipopescu7636]

Really interesting! Definitely will check some of them out

[@AKK875]

This video is so so so helpful. Thank you so much for these. I have never heard of them. I am going to share this video with my entire cohort. Thank you again.

[@DrAndyStapleton]

Thanks for sharing!!

[@TheOn3LeftBehind]

These are AMAZING! I think Paper Digest is going to be the most useful for me. I’m a neuroscientist in biopharma and sometimes I just have zero energy to catch up on literature. This is going to help me out a ton! Same with litmaps.

[@zimmejoc]

The algorithm just served your channel up to me a few days ago so I know I'm late to the party. When I first saw paper-digest, I was excited, but after about a week of usage, I have grown disenchanted with it. I wanted to use it to help prioritize a bunch of papers I need to read, but after about 3 to 5 papers summarized, I get repeated "500 internal service errors". This happens every time I try to summarize multiple papers. When I review the summaries, they aren't very good. The summarizing algorithm misses too many important details or tosses up some statistical analyses without proper context to really understand the point. In the end, it has not been the time-saver I was hoping it would be. Litmaps, on the other hand, is FREAKIN' AWESOME!!!! It helped me turn around a revise & resubmit I received very quickly. You know good ol' reviewer 2 (it's always reviewer 2) made the criticism that I needed more up to date references in one of my sections. Litmaps made it a simple process to make sure that section was as current as current could be.

[@aditisiddharth6472]

Would you be able to do a video on making our scientific writing better?

[@laubc8808]

This is so cool mate!!!! Thanks 4 sharing!

[@sanbejamin1]

Hi Andy, All were new to me. Thank you for sharing.

[@vibhabaid3477]

Thanks Andy for sharing the info about such useful apps

[@franciscoi.carrillo2295]

Thnks, I just started My PhD studies, this is very helpful. Keep up the great work!

[@colleenstuart190]

Love, Love You Andy... You are my go-to person for all things research!!!

[@majidshaalan5265]

So thankful to the great effort you put in these videos. I am a head of a graduate program and I have recommended these extenstions to my students 👍

[@testme2026]

what really be great if authors of papers do a video to explain in lay terms and technical terms their paper, like a KZbin for research papers of some sort . thank you Andy

[@navarclaudio]

Thank you very much again for your way to explain and give us very good advices!

[@lmitchener2554]

This is so helpful. Thanks so much for your help.

[@sumayakambal6634]

Thanks, Andy, for such helpful video :)

[@ColdDiva]

This was so uber helpful! Thank you!!!

[@atteker2023]

It is very helpful info. I appreciate it and keep up sharing your experiences.

[@DrAndyStapleton]

My pleasure!

[@seymadagistan555]

did not know about writefull :D sounds helpful!

[@nanaboateng3330]

This has been helpful. Thank you so much.

[@129parulsharma2]

Hey Andy, I recently got admission in PhD in finance. I am binge watching your youtube videos for past three days and it's been really helpful. I just wanted to ask you that as a PhD student in the field of finance, what else I can do that would ease my way for the next 3-4 years. Most of your videos are related to PhD in science and I just wanted to know that if you can help students like me get to know more about tools and techniques that will help me for my research in finance. Thank you, Lots of love from India

[@zwan1886]

study something that brings value to the planet. Best advice.

[@user-qg1pn8lh9l]

Thank you for sharing your knowledge and tips. I am doing research in the legal fields and finds that the tools you suggest are very helpful!

[@alexanderberyozkin]

Thank you so much for such useful programs!

[@damongreen6433]

So so grateful, thank you for this!

[@DD-xg4fe]

I have never owned any of those. Congratulations! A lot of research and insight in your videos

[@bonganizulu6587]

Absolute useful info. Thank you!

[@user-xg1fv3zc7q]

Thank you Mr. Andy Stapleton. Appreciations for your simple and easily understandable English for non-English speaking persons. God bless you friend

[@meredithlange6085]

Thank you for sharing this...I returned to academia late in life and these apps and sites are fantastic!

[@oscargarciacervantes3873]

I'm writing the literature review of my research and Litmaps is being very useful. Thanks a lot.

[@DrAndyStapleton]

I'm pleased that it is helping you out! They are a nice bunch of people!

[@viktorsaurus]

I knew none of these! This is such a great video to share with undergrads

[@lifewithcanines]

This is insanely helpful!! Thank you!

[@ready2makechange]

Awesome Andy...you are saving my time

[@marlonririmasse9954]

Thanks so much, Andy!

[@Sama-zd4nb]

Really great and helpful! thanks so much!!!!

[@AYBAZATA]

Thank you so much for the knowledge shared.

[@pb11118]

Oh way you're amazing! Subscribed

[@unmasquerade5559]

Haven't used any of these, but they sound absolutely amazing!

[@markgoode4109]

Very helpful video; thanks for sharing.

[@parfenyj]

Never heard any of these! Thanks for the tips!

[@spalding5198]

Thanks for your efforts; we are grateful. Best wishes.

[@Dentist_on_Youtube]

Paper Digest seems like the best tool to integrate into a PRISMA workflow while doing a systematic review...I can see the tool cut down database searching times drastically

[@dumitrachecristina8561]

Thank you so much, Andy. Great apps and totally new for me.

[@DrAndyStapleton]

My pleasure!

[@mikorabago]

Woah! This LitMap is so amazing! I am really get it right now!

[@jenes239]

Thank you so much for sharing!!! I can’t wait to use them!!!

[@sophia.2670]

Thank you

[@ksenooshkababooshka3115]

great info! thanks for sharing

[@nehaparashar8998]

Cannot thank you enough for this video. All of the apps were new to me and very useful.

[@donharris8846]

Very helpful, as usual!

[@maurilindberg]

I really thought I knew a lot of tools - I was wrong - hadn't heard any of these before. Thanks Andy!

[@fahadindata2001]

Very useful,Thanks for creating this video