Five apps international students should have to make life convenient in Australia

WHAT are the five apps that international students should need to know about in order to live conveniently? Trinity College Foundation Studies students Yoskey Yao, Yolanda Zhuang and Lucy Wang offer their suggestions. 

Apps play an essential part in our everyday lives and offer a more convenient way to live life. Google Maps, eBay, Uber and a litany of social media apps available on people’s smartphones are used on a daily basis with new apps emerging every day.

For international students, the types of apps they will have on their phone will depend on their needs. Do you need to move out of your apartment because you can’t stand your roommate any longer? Are you planning to travel interstate to see what else Australia has to offer? Or are you simply just not in the mood to eat outside and want something delivered to your door?

Whatever outcome you want, there’s usually an app to answer it. So if you want to know which apps might be crucial to your life as an international student in Melbourne, we have five apps — all of which can be found on iPhones and Androids — that might just help you in various aspects of student life.

Tripgo

Need to find your way around Melbourne or plan your next trip? Tripgo is a fantastic trip planner app with a simple interface that’s easy to use. With it’s fresh green appearance, Tripgo assists users  looking to find a certain destination by offering the best mode of transport to get there. Whether by foot, bicycle, public transport or car, Tripgo does it all and suggests the best routes for one or all modes of transport.

Moreover, Tripgo uses a GPS to find your current location and update the real time position of buses or trains. After comparing Tripgo with other transport apps,  we found Tripgo to be more concise and accurate than others.

For the environmentally conscientious, another interesting point to make is that Tripgo can also find the best way for you to get around based on the lowest carbon emission. How’s that for being sustainable?!

Domain Real Estate

When international students arrive in Australia to study, they might not know too much about the areas that they’re living in or who they might be living with.

If you’re someone who wants to ensure you’re living in the best environment or someone who simply wants to move out, Domain Real Estate’s house renting app can help students find a suitable place for them to live in.

Already popular amongst locals, this app can help students contact agents directly to ask for an inspection and provides images of the home they want to move into. It can also add inspections to your calendar and set reminders for you.

Menulog

Having to make a phone delivery order is now a thing of the past thanks to Menulog, a convenient food delivery app that students should take advantage of.

The app provides menus from hundreds of restaurants and for students who are either too busy to cook or too lazy to go out, Menulog is a great alternative.

The service is often reliable, the app is easy to use and delivery is fast enough – depending on where you live and the location of the restaurant.

Hello Fresh

If however you are the type of person who wants to cook, or someone who is simply fed up eating the same food all the time, Hello Fresh’s app might be useful.

The app sends customers new recipes with the exact food ingredients every week and will do almost everything for you except cook your food.  So if you’re too busy to go to the market, the Hello Fresh app might be just for you.

Just follow the guidelines step by step and you’ll find that it’s actually really easy to cook a nutritious meal!

Skyscanner

International students are always flying in between countries during long semester breaks but sometimes, the prices for tickets can be quite steep. Going to an agency may prove too inconvenient and you can’t always rely on your parents to buy your tickets so what other alternative is there?

Skyscanner is a great app that can assist students looking to find the best and most affordable flight for them. All you have to do is simply sign up, log in with your email, set up your billing information and preferred language, then search for your flight based on the dates you need to go.

From there, Skyscanner will run a search and alert you to some of the cheapest flights available. Far more convenient than to have to negotiate with your travel agency!

This story was produced by Media and Communication students at Trinity College Foundation Studies as part of Meld’s community newsroom collaboration. Education institutions, student clubs/societies and community groups interested in being involved can get in touch with us via meld@meldmagazine.com.au.