{{ revisionHeroStageLabel }} Start Review {{ revisionHeroCycleLabel }} Exam
Use YYYY-MM-DD; pick the first day you can actually revise.
Subjects and exams:
Add one row per exam; use date, 1-5 scores, and 0-200 target hours.
Subject Exam date Priority Difficulty Target Actions
h
Enter 20-180 minutes; 45 or 60 keeps most revision blocks readable.
min
Enter 0-12 hours per day; use 0 for weekdays that should never receive sessions.
Balanced mixes coverage and urgency; Front-load favors closest exams; Weak-subject favors difficulty.
Choose 0-4 days; 1-2 days gives spacing without starving urgent subjects.
Choose mixed, past-paper, or recall wording for the timetable focus column.
Enter 0-7 days; 1 keeps the day before an exam free for light review.
days
Enter 1-12 hours; keep this below your real focused-study limit.
h/day
Use HH:MM, for example 16:00; later blocks include the break length.
Enter 0-45 minutes; breaks appear in times but not planned-hour totals.
min
Use YYYY-MM-DD, one per line or comma separated, e.g. 2026-05-12.
Date Time Subject Minutes Focus Exam Copy
{{ row.date_label }} {{ row.time_label }} {{ row.subject }} {{ row.minutes }} {{ row.focus }} {{ row.exam_label }}
No revision blocks fit
Increase available study time, shorten blocks, move the start date earlier, or reduce buffers before exporting this timetable.
Subject Exam Target Planned Gap Status Copy
{{ subject.name }} {{ subject.exam_label }} {{ subject.target_label }} {{ subject.planned_label }} {{ subject.gap_label }} {{ subject.status }}
No study mix chart data
No planned study blocks are available to chart for the current inputs.
Warning Detail Copy
{{ warning.title }} {{ warning.detail }}
No active warnings
The current inputs fit the available study time with no overload warnings.
 
{{ jsonOutput }}
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Revision planning breaks down when the calendar pretends that every subject, evening, and exam deadline has the same weight. A useful timetable has to hold several truths at once: some exams arrive sooner, some subjects need more work, some days are unavailable, and a student still needs enough recovery time to remember what was studied.

Good exam preparation is not just a countdown to the nearest paper. Distributed practice spreads study across more than one occasion, and retrieval practice asks the learner to bring material back from memory through questions, blank-page recall, flashcards, or past-paper attempts. A schedule that protects repeated encounters with the same subject usually beats one long rereading session, but spacing can be overdone if urgent papers lose the time they need.

The planning vocabulary matters because each word changes the calendar in a different way. Target hours estimate how much focused work a subject needs. Capacity describes the real time that can be used on each weekday. Priority and difficulty help decide which subject wins a limited study block. Buffer days protect the final period before an exam from ordinary heavy scheduling.

Planning term What it means Common mistake
Target hours Focused revision time expected for one subject before its exam buffer. Treating hours as proof that the topic is learned.
Capacity Usable study time after weekends, school, work, travel, and blocked dates are considered. Counting every spare hour, including time likely to be tired or interrupted.
Spacing A preference for revisiting subjects across days instead of repeating one subject continuously. Spacing so aggressively that the closest exam is under-served.
Buffer Protected time before an exam for light review, sleep, travel, or final checks. Scheduling normal heavy work right up to the paper.
Revision timetable planning flow A diagram showing exam rows, capacity, spacing, timetable blocks, and coverage checks in a revision schedule. Exam rows date, target, scores Capacity weekday hours Spacing urgency and repeats Coverage planned vs target allocate blocks, preserve buffers, then check shortages before trusting the timetable

A revision schedule is still an estimate. It cannot know whether a target hour is realistic, whether a practice paper was marked carefully, or whether a topic needs teaching rather than repetition. The calendar is most useful when it exposes the mismatch between ambition and available time early enough to change the plan.

Treat the finished timetable as a working draft. Scores, practice results, illness, school deadlines, and new weak topics should feed back into the target hours and availability rather than being forced into a calendar that no longer matches the learner.

How to Use This Tool:

Enter the exam list first, then shape the plan around real weekly availability and blocked dates. The result is useful only when the targets, capacity, and buffer days are honest enough to schedule from.

  1. Set Plan start date to the first day that can receive revision blocks. If an exam is earlier than that date, the validation message names the subject row to fix.
  2. Add one row per paper in Subjects and exams. Each row needs a subject name, exam date, priority from 1 to 5, difficulty from 1 to 5, and target hours from 0 to 200.
  3. Choose Revision block length from 20 to 180 minutes. A weekday must have enough usable minutes for at least one block slot, although a subject's final slot can shrink to its remaining target minutes.
  4. Enter Available study time for each weekday from 0 to 12 hours. Use 0 for days that should never receive sessions, then add one-off exclusions under Rest or blocked dates.
  5. Open Advanced when the first timetable needs tuning. Spacing preference changes subject ranking, Repeat gap penalizes recent repeats, and Session focus mix changes labels such as first pass, spaced review, recall, or timed-paper work.
  6. Set Exam buffer, Daily load cap, Study start time, and Break between blocks. Breaks change the displayed time labels, but they do not add revision minutes.
  7. Read Timetable, then check Coverage Ledger and Load Warnings. If a subject is short, try an earlier start date, shorter blocks, more available days, fewer blocked dates, or a more realistic target before printing the schedule.

Interpreting Results:

Revision Coverage gives the first read: planned hours, subject count, surplus or shortage, busiest day, next subject, and total block count. A surplus means the planned minutes meet the entered targets. It does not prove exam readiness, because target hours and study quality are still user judgments.

Coverage Ledger is the main audit table. Covered means planned minutes reached the target. Near target means the subject reached at least 80% of its target but still has a gap. Short means the subject is below 80% of its target. Over target is reserved for planned time more than 30 minutes beyond the target, though normal allocation clips final subject slots to avoid overshooting.

Load Warnings should be resolved before trusting the timetable. They flag capped days, dates with availability too short for the selected block length, subjects that miss targets, invalid blocked-date tokens, and exams that cannot be scheduled from the chosen start date.

Use Study Mix Chart to see which subjects dominate the planned hours, then use the ledger for exact target, planned, and gap values. A covered row should still be checked against practice scores, teacher feedback, and recent recall, especially for high-priority or high-difficulty subjects.

Technical Details:

A revision timetable is a constrained allocation problem. Subjects contribute deadlines, target minutes, priority scores, and difficulty scores. Calendar days contribute capacity only when their weekday has entered hours, the date is not blocked, and the available minutes can hold at least one revision block slot.

The schedule is filled one slot at a time from the plan start date through the latest exam date. A subject remains eligible while it has target minutes left and the current date is not later than its exam date minus the selected buffer. When several subjects are eligible, a ranking score compares remaining work, urgency, priority, difficulty, same-day repetition, and recent repetition.

Formula Core:

The subject-ranking score uses the same terms in every spacing mode. The selected mode changes the weights attached to remaining work, priority, difficulty, and urgency.

score = RwR + PwP + DwD + UwU - S - G

R is the remaining target ratio, P is priority from 1 to 5, D is difficulty from 1 to 5, and U is 1 / (days until exam + 1). S is a 2.4 same-day penalty. G is 1.2 + ((repeat gap - days since last session) * 0.55) when a subject was studied inside the selected repeat gap.

Spacing preference Remaining work Priority Difficulty Urgency Main effect
Balanced 4.0 0.8 0.6 18 Balances uncovered target time with exam nearness and subject scores.
Front-load 3.0 0.7 0.4 30 Gives stronger pull to the closest exam dates.
Weak-subject 3.5 0.6 1.45 14 Moves more blocks toward subjects marked as harder.

For a balanced plan, a subject with 60% of its target still unplanned, priority 5, difficulty 4, and an exam in 7 days has R = 0.6 and U = 1 / 8. With no same-day or recent-repeat penalty, the score is (0.6 * 4.0) + (5 * 0.8) + (4 * 0.6) + (0.125 * 18) = 11.05. A recently studied subject can lose enough score for another eligible subject to take the next slot.

Daily capacity is clipped before block slots are counted. The weekday entry is limited by the daily load cap, converted to minutes, and divided by the revision block length.

block slots per day = ⌊ min(weekday hours,daily cap)×60 block minutes ⌋
Rule Boundary Result meaning
Subject target 0 to 200 hours, converted to rounded minutes Target minutes control both coverage status and when a subject stops receiving ordinary slots.
Block length 20 to 180 minutes Daily capacity must fit at least one block slot; otherwise that day's availability is unused.
Coverage status planned / target >= 0.8 becomes Near target when a gap remains Below 80% remains Short; a zero-target subject counts as Covered.
Exam buffer 0 to 7 days before each exam Ordinary slots stop on the last day allowed by the buffer even if target minutes remain.
Repeat gap 0 to 4 days Recent study reduces the subject score but does not fully ban another session.
Rest dates Valid YYYY-MM-DD dates only Invalid tokens prevent results until corrected; valid blocked dates receive no slots.

Accuracy Notes:

The timetable is a planning estimate, not a learning measurement. It assumes the entered target hours, priority scores, difficulty scores, and weekly availability are realistic enough to allocate from.

  • Whole block slots can leave unused minutes on days where leftover time is shorter than the selected block length.
  • Priority and difficulty are user-entered scores, so two learners can create different timetables for the same exam list.
  • Session focus labels describe planned activity type; they do not verify that recall, past-paper marking, or feedback happened.
  • Calendar times are labels based on the chosen start time and break length. The scheduling math allocates minutes, not real calendar events.

Advanced Tips:

  • Use Balanced first, then switch to Front-load only when the nearest exam is clearly being under-served.
  • Use Weak-subject when difficulty scores come from recent marks or practice evidence rather than a vague feeling.
  • Set Repeat gap to 1 or 2 days when you want spacing without starving urgent subjects; set it to 0 when exam proximity matters more than variety.
  • Keep Daily load cap below your real focused-study limit. A capped warning is useful because it shows where entered availability was too optimistic.
  • Check Load Warnings before printing. Short subjects, days too small for the block length, and invalid rest dates change whether the timetable can be trusted.
  • Use Session focus mix to make the timetable say what kind of work belongs in a slot, then compare those labels with actual practice scores later.

Worked Examples:

These examples show how the same exam list can change when capacity, block length, or targets change.

Three-paper exam month

A student starts on May 1 with Mathematics on May 19, Biology on May 25, and History on June 1. Mathematics gets priority 5, difficulty 4, and an 18-hour target. With weekday availability entered and a 1-day Exam buffer, Timetable fills eligible slots before each buffer date, and Coverage Ledger shows whether each subject is Covered, Near target, or Short.

Optimistic Saturday

Saturday is entered as 6 hours, but Daily load cap is 4 hours. The schedule uses 4 hours for that date, Load Warnings records the cap, and the ledger may still show a shortage if those removed hours were needed for a subject target.

Block length recovery

A plan uses a 90-minute Revision block length, but the available weekdays have only 1 hour. The timetable cannot place sessions on those days, and Load Warnings explains that the availability is shorter than the block length. Reducing the block length to 45 or 60 minutes creates usable slots without changing exam dates.

FAQ:

Why does the same subject appear twice in one day?

The repeat gap lowers the subject ranking after a recent session, but it does not ban repeats. A nearby exam, high remaining target, high priority, or high difficulty can still make that subject win another slot.

Why are some entered hours not used?

The timetable counts block slots after applying the daily load cap. Leftover minutes shorter than one full block stay unused, and blocked dates are skipped completely.

Does Covered mean I know the subject?

No. Covered means planned minutes reached the target hours entered for that subject. Use practice questions, recall drills, marks, and feedback to decide whether the target should change.

What should I fix first when a subject is Short?

Check the subject target and exam date, then inspect Load Warnings. If the shortage is real, add earlier study capacity, shorten blocks, reduce blocked dates or buffers, or lower less important targets.

Is my study data sent anywhere for scheduling?

The schedule is calculated in the browser from the values on the page. Copy, download, print, and chart export actions use the current results you generated.

Glossary:

Distributed practice
Study spread across more than one occasion instead of compressed into one long cram session.
Retrieval practice
Study that requires bringing information back from memory through questions, recall, or exam-style work.
Target hours
The planned amount of focused revision for one subject before its exam buffer.
Repeat gap
The selected number of days that should make a recently studied subject less likely to repeat.
Coverage gap
The difference between target hours and planned hours for a subject or the whole plan.
Daily load cap
The maximum study time allowed for a day, even when the weekday availability is higher.

References: