Creating a revision timetable

This is a simple revision timetable that helps you allocate time to each subject. It’s useful if you’re stuck on how to balance your revision for your different exams. I did this for my final year of university and it really helped me be intentional with my time!

• You’ll know exactly how much revision time you have left for each subject.

  • This helps you use that time intentionally.

• If you want to revise for a different exam than what’s planned, you can make a more calculated decision. You’ll see how much time you gain/lose by adjusting the schedule, as part of the plan involves tallying how much total time is spent on each exam.

The image below shows my example revision timetable. Here’s a download link for the Excel spreadsheet. Scroll down for steps on how to create one yourself.

N.B. This method I describe is for allocating time not tasks. You can make the plan more detailed by putting in tasks you wish to achieve in your work blocks (doing papers etc.) in a separate doc.

Summary of steps

1. Separate your days into fixed ‘blocks’ of time that work well for you.

2. Open an excel spreadsheet (or equivalent) and make a calendar.

3. Find out how many total free blocks of time you have from now until your final exam.

4. Roughly estimate how many blocks of time you’ll need for each exam/module based on the ratio of marks between them and their respective difficulties. Make a table of this.

5. Allocate blocks of time to the different exams/modules in your calendar. Spread wisely.

6. Start following the plan and alter block allocation if necessary. Use the block allocation table to see if you’re happy with the new ratio of time spent on each exam.

Step 1

Separate your days into fixed ‘blocks’ of time that work well for you.

• Each work block could be a full day, half a day, a third of a day (a morning/afternoon/evening) or a certain number of hours.

• I’d recommend setting the length of your block as the least time you’ll spend revising for one exam on a given day.

  • For example, on a school day, you may only have the evenings to freely study whatever you wish.

• For this example, I’ve picked approximately 3 hours for the length of each block. This is roughly how much time I would spend studying in a morning/afternoon/evening. Do what works for you. We’re doing this because we’ll be tallying how many blocks of time we have, and then allocating them to different exams.

  • 3 hour blocks seem to strike a nice balance between being able to study for multiple exams each week (which is better for long-term retention) and also enabling enough time to settle into revision for that subject. For example, you could do a paper and mark it in approx 3 hours (if working efficiently).

• You don’t have to spend exactly 3 hours of time in each study block. It’s a rough estimate.

Step 2

Open an excel spreadsheet (or equivalent) and make a calendar.

Enter in when your exams will be.

• In my example, I’ve chosen three blocks per day, one for each ‘section’ of the day (morning, afternoon and evening).

• I’ve scheduled in some rest on some weekends. On those days I’ll just do 2 blocks (6 hours) of work. I can fit them in whenever and I’ll take the remaining time off.

  • There are days which don’t explicitly have ‘rest’ written in them. That doesn’t mean I don’t take breaks. I have 3 blocks of work (9 hours) to do on those days and I can take breaks around those blocks whenever I want. Choose the amount of work that you’re willing/able to do. The above schedule is intense, but doable for me over 2 months.

• On school days, I might only be able to do around 1 block of work in the evening (3 hours) where I have full autonomy over what I study. I’ve greyed out the remaining 2 blocks and written ‘School’.

  • If you have small blocks of time in school where you can study whatever you wish, you can work on things you’re finding particularly difficult or catch up if you feel you’re falling behind.

• On exam days I might only be able to do 2 blocks of work (6 hours), as most of a morning or an afternoon will be taken by the exam. 1 block has been taken by the exam.

  • I’ve placed morning exams in the first block of the day.

  • Afternoon exams have been placed in the middle block of the day, so I know I can schedule some revision before the test.

• In the weeks before the first exam, I’ve made sure most weeks will have at least 10 blocks of time so I can study for each exam/book every week.

• Notice the colour code in the top right. I’ll be using in the later steps for each paper/module.

• I’ve also entered where I have study leave and Easter holidays.

• To make things simpler, I haven’t entered any extracurriculars. Of course, do this for yourself.

I did it in a mathematical way with ratios. Yours doesn’t have to be as complex, but I would recommend doing it this way!

• I started with a ratio of 1 : 1 : 1 for maths, physics and further maths.

• I then created ratios within each individual subject. These are based on the weightings of marks for each paper/module. This is put in column 1.

  • Marks for pure and applied are split in a ratio of 2 : 1 in Edexcel.

    • We can break that down further: Pure, Mechanics and Statistics are split in a ratio of 2 : 0.5 : 0.5 or 4 : 1 : 1, respectively.

  • If we add 4+1+1 we get 6 parts for Maths, so I continued by giving Physics and Further Maths 6 parts each to split between the different papers/modules.

  • Physics papers have roughly equal marks in most exam boards, so each of the 3 papers got 2 parts.

  • Edexcel Further Maths papers all have the same marks, but there are 4 papers, so each got 1.5 parts.

• I then split the total number of blocks of time we found in step 3 (162 blocks) into the ratio written in column 1. This gives me column 2.

  • Column 2 tells you how many blocks of time to devote to each subject weighted purely on the marks you receive in the final tests. This is a good starting point.

• In column 3 I then adjusted the hours based on weaknesses. This is where you tailor the plan to fit your current ability in the different papers/modules. In my example:

  • I took some time off Pure maths and added it to Stats.

  • I kept all the physics papers roughly equal.

  • Core Pure Book 1 and 2 are individually longer than the applied modules (especially Further Mechanics), so I took some time from Further Mechanics which is quite a short book and added it to Core Pure Book 1 & 2.

• Then spread the remaining blocks for each subject across the previous weeks.

  • Generally speaking, the more you spread them, the better your long-term retention of that information would be.

    • For example, you’ll remember the topic better if you to study it for 1 hour a day for 10 days in a row rather than doing 5 hours a day for 2 days in a row.

• Adjust the table with block allocation to match the timetable if necessary (see below).

  • I increased the number of Maths Mechanics and Further Mechanics 1 sessions as the space between sessions was initially a bit too long (10 days or more). I wanted to make sure I study these every week before exams start. Although there isn’t a great deal of content in these chapters compared to Pure or Core Pure, I think doing a block most weeks is important to improve long-term memory and maintain proficiency.

  • Statistics and Mechanics were both changed by half a block to account for the mixed session on 16/06/2025.

• One problem with the plan is that there is only one Maths Pure session a week in the 3 weeks following 21/04/2025. Most of the revision blocks for Maths Pure occur in the week or two before Maths Paper 1 & 2 (the scheduling of these blocks is based off exam dates). Given how large Maths Pure is, if I were to do this plan, I would do some extra revision on this Maths Pure in any free windows of time that I have in school during those three weeks.