For Daniel, studying had never been a struggle, and he sailed through grammar school without any problems. “Once I enrolled at university, though, I was shocked by the sheer amount of stuff to learn. I didn’t expect it to be that much,” recalls Daniel, now a fifth-year student General Medicine at the Faculty of Medicine of Masaryk University, and smiles at the memory.
He didn’t rest on his laurels and threw himself into the books from the very first week. “I studied the same way I had in secondary school. It worked, but it was extremely time-consuming. I spent all my time either studying, or exercising – that was basically it,” he says about his first semester.
Exam period as a turning point
He expected his heavy time investment in studying to pay off during the exam period. “But do you know what the brain does best? Forget. Even though I kept up with the material during the semester, I ended up stressed during the exams and pulled all-nighters over my textbooks.”
Although he eventually passed all his exams, he had no energy left to celebrate. “I was unbelievably exhausted. The thought that the exams would just keep on coming made me feel sick. I knew that if things carried on like that, I wasn’t sure I could handle it,” says Daniel.
Looking for a solution
Instead of giving in to self-pity, though, he decided to find a way out and threw himself into the study of learning methods. “I told myself I had to try something different and find a way to study faster and more efficiently,” Daniel explains.
In his free time, he began diving into the world of biohacking and the psychology of learning, exploring how the brain works and how it stores information. “I was learning how to learn, and I gradually realised it wasn’t nearly as complicated as it seems at first sight,” he says with enthusiasm.
He didn’t hesitate to share his experiences from medical school and his study tips on social media. “That’s where it all took off, and within a year I had more than thirty thousand followers on Instagram asking me to share more study tips,” he says, describing the interest that showed him his problem was far from unique.
From inspiration to action
The methods he promoted, however, required a considerable time investment. “Whether it’s flashcards or creating tests to study from, everything takes time. And to make it work, you often need a deeper understanding of the methods. Most people struggle to put them into practice,” he says, reflecting on his experience as a successful influencer.
So he decided to look for a solution that would make it easier to apply these methods in real life and turned to the AI market. “But whatever I tried was either incredibly expensive or not very friendly to Czech, Slovak and other European languages,” he says.
Birth of the StudyFi app
In the end, he decided to create the missing tool for students himself. “In September 2024, I asked a friend who works in IT if he could help me build an AI app for generating flashcards and tests. He agreed. And while he was doing the programming, I was building the website,” the future doctor says with a smile.
The result of their cooperation came quickly. This May, the two launched StudyFi – a blend of scientific knowledge about learning combined with AI. “Students no longer have to create the flashcards or tests themselves. They just upload their study materials and AI generates everything for them. There’s also an AI chat included,” he explains.
“I realised that the problem isn’t that we’re all stupid or lazy. The problem is that nobody ever taught us how to study effectively.”
The usefulness of the app is reflected in its growing user base. “In September alone, the number of registered students shot up to 35,000, with more than two thousand active subscribers,” Daniel says.
But running the app comes with hidden costs, which is why it isn’t entirely free. “We pay for every student–AI interaction, for servers, databases and much more. But we now use a freemium model – the limited version is completely free, and the full version is free for the first seven days,” he adds.
Future of effective learning
Today, Daniel is continuing with his fifth year of medical school while developing his tool, which he plans to expand abroad. “We’re working to make the app accessible to as many students as possible,” he says cautiously about his future plans.
His story shows that life’s biggest challenges often lead to major innovation. The young medical student refused to accept exhaustion as an unavoidable part of studying medicine. Instead, he decided to change the rules of the game – first for himself, then for thousands of others. “I realised that the problem isn’t that we’re all stupid or lazy. The problem is that nobody ever taught us how to study effectively. And once you understand that, a whole new world of possibilities opens up,” concludes Daniel.
The author of the text is a student of the Faculty of Social Studies and a member of the student editorial team of Magazine M.