You have probably seen the "Aistote method" on TikTok, with promises like "100 pages in one evening" or "120 pages in 31 minutes". Behind the name, there is a quiz app and two study techniques with solid evidence behind them. There are also numbers that do not add up. Here is what the Aistote method really is, what research says about each of its steps, and how to apply it to your own course all the way to exam day.
- The Aistote method was not published by researchers: it is the name videos give to a way of studying with the Aistote app.
- It rests on two solid techniques: testing yourself instead of rereading, and coming back to the material at intervals.
- The numbers in the videos do not hold up: just reading 120 pages takes an average reader more than two hours.
- It does not tell you what to study each day until your exam. That is the job of a study plan.
What is the Aistote method?
Aistote is a study app, listed as "Aistote : AI QUIZ" on the App Store and published by Rori AI Teknology Ltd. According to its listing and its website, it turns your documents (photos, PDFs, links, Word or OpenOffice files, YouTube videos, audio recordings) into study sheets and quizzes. On top of that come spaced repetition and game features: daily streaks, experience points, leaderboards, tournaments and duels with friends.
The "Aistote method" is the name many TikTok videos give to the way they use it. The creators, often medical and health students, show the same routine: upload a course, read the sheet the app produces, go through the quizzes, then come back later to the questions they got wrong. Most of these videos show the app itself.
Two mix-ups come up often. Aistote has no "r" in it: the method has nothing to do with the philosopher Aristotle. And some articles present it as a seven-letter acronym with seven steps; we did not find that breakdown on Aistote's website or in the videos we looked at.
The 4 steps of the Aistote method
As it appears in the videos, the method comes down to four steps.
- Upload your course: a PDF, slides, or photos of your notes.
- Read the generated sheet: the app summarizes the course in a color-coded sheet that highlights the key concepts and how they connect.
- Test yourself with quizzes: questions generated from your course.
- Come back to your mistakes at intervals: spaced repetition brings the questions you missed back over the following days, instead of reviewing everything in one block.
Steps 3 and 4 do most of the work. Step 2 deserves a caveat.
Does the Aistote method work?
Partly, and for good reasons: two of its steps rely on some of the best-documented learning techniques.
Testing yourself beats rereading
In 2006, Roediger and Karpicke had students read texts, then either reread them or test themselves on them. Five minutes later, the students who had reread did better. Two days and one week later, it was the other way around: the students who had tested themselves remembered much more.
A 2017 meta-analysis by Adesope and colleagues, covering 272 results, confirms that practice tests beat rereading, with a mean effect size of 0.51. Aistote's quizzes apply this principle: pulling the answer out of your memory is what makes it stick, recognizing it on a sheet much less so.
Spacing beats cramming
In 2006, Cepeda and colleagues pooled more than 300 experiments on spacing out study sessions. Going over material several times, with breaks in between, gives better results than the same amount of study in one block. The right gap between two reviews also depends on how much time is left before the test: the further away the exam, the more spread out your reviews can be. That is the idea behind the classic review schedule: go over a course the next day, then three days later, then a week later, then further and further apart.
In 2009, Kornell looked at the effect of spacing on flashcards: it worked better for 90% of participants, yet 72% thought cramming had worked better for them. Our sense of what works is a poor judge of what we will remember.
Reading a ready-made sheet is still rereading
The sheet step is the weakest one. Dunlosky and colleagues assessed ten common study techniques in 2013: they rated highlighting and rereading among the least useful, and practice testing and distributed practice among the most useful. A well-made sheet helps you see how a course is structured, but reading it is not studying. It is a starting point; the quizzes do the work.
One more thing to watch: the sheets and questions are generated by AI. They can contain mistakes or miss what your teacher expects. Check any answer that looks doubtful against your course.
What is exaggerated: "120 pages in 31 minutes"
The most-watched videos promise you can learn 100, 120 or 150 pages in one evening, sometimes in half an hour. A simple calculation shows the problem.
In 2019, Brysbaert pooled 190 studies on reading speed, with 18,573 participants. When reading non-fiction silently in English, the average adult reads 238 words per minute. A page of course notes easily holds 300 words. So 120 pages come to about 36,000 words: more than two and a half hours of reading, just once.
In 31 minutes, you can skim a sheet or answer a set of questions drawn from 120 pages. You cannot have learned 120 pages. And feeling like you have learned it proves nothing: in Roediger and Karpicke's study, the result measured five minutes later flipped a week later. The only measure that counts is what you still know on exam day.
How to apply the Aistote method, with or without an app
The useful principles of the method do not depend on any app.
| Step | What you do | Why it works |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Start from your course | Your chapters, your slides, your past exams | You study what will come up, not generic content |
| 2. Understand before memorizing | Active reading, chapter by chapter | You struggle to remember what you have not understood |
| 3. Test yourself right away | Questions, exercises, or a blank page to write everything down from memory | Retrieving the answer makes it stick (Roediger and Karpicke, 2006) |
| 4. Go back over your mistakes | Review each question you missed, then ask it to yourself again | Mistakes show what you have not mastered yet |
| 5. Space it out until exam day | Come back to each chapter several times, a few days apart | Spacing beats cramming (Cepeda et al., 2006) |
In practice, the fifth row is where it gets hard. With six chapters and ten days to go, how much time per day, in what order, and when do you come back to what? A quiz app does not answer that question. Our guide on how to create a study plan shows how to spread the work by hand, and our guide on how to make a study guide shows how to build one that actually helps.
The Aistote method, exam edition: Fastudy
Fastudy keeps the two ideas that work, testing yourself and going back over your mistakes, and adds what the method is missing: a plan that starts from your exam date.
- You say what you are preparing for: a test, a midterm or final, an entrance exam or a resit, with the date, the subject and your chapters.
- You add your course as PDF, Word, PowerPoint or photos, plus past exams if you have them: they help aim at the format and level of your exam.
- Fastudy builds your plan: each chapter is split into lessons of a few minutes, spread out until exam day. Missed a lesson? The plan adjusts on its own.
- George writes each lesson from your course: you read it page by page, with key terms explained.
- You test yourself at the end of each lesson: multiple choice, true or false, fill in the blanks, steps to put in order. Each exercise is corrected instantly, and the ones you got wrong come back right after.
- You come back to it whenever you want: "Test myself" gives you a lesson's exercises again, in a different order.
At every step, George, Fastudy's mascot, answers your questions about the lesson and can quiz you to check you have understood. You can start for free, no card needed.
Aistote or Fastudy?
The two tools are not built for the same job. On Aistote's side, the table only includes what its App Store listing and website say as of October 2026.
| Aistote | Fastudy | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting point | An uploaded document (photo, PDF, link, Word, YouTube, audio) | Your exam: goal, date, subject and chapters, then your course |
| What you get | A sheet and quizzes for each document | A plan of short lessons until exam day, each lesson written from your course |
| Exercises | AI-generated quizzes | Multiple choice, true or false, fill in the blanks, steps in order, corrected instantly |
| Going back over mistakes | Spaced repetition | Missed questions asked again right after, "Test myself" on demand |
| Exam date | No plan built from a date on its listing or website | At the center of the plan, which adjusts if you fall behind |
| Motivation | Streaks, points, leaderboards, tournaments, duels | Exam countdown and progress by chapter |
| Price | Free to download, in-app purchases | Free to start, Pro plan monthly or yearly |
If you enjoy the game side and want quizzes on a specific document, Aistote does that job. If you have an exam on a set date, the plan is what makes the difference: knowing what to do each day, with lessons and exercises drawn from your course. That is what Fastudy does.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the Aistote method?
It is the name TikTok gives to a way of studying with the Aistote app: upload your course, read the generated sheet, test yourself with quizzes, then come back to your mistakes at intervals thanks to spaced repetition. It is not a method published by researchers, but it relies on two well-studied techniques: testing yourself and spacing out your reviews.
Does the Aistote method work?
Its two core steps do: testing yourself helps you remember better than rereading (Roediger and Karpicke, 2006; Adesope et al., 2017), and spacing out your reviews gives better results than cramming (Cepeda et al., 2006). Reading a generated sheet, on the other hand, is still rereading. As for the numbers in the videos, they are not based on any measurement.
Can you really learn 100 pages in one night?
Not in the sense of still knowing them on exam day. The average adult reads 238 words per minute (Brysbaert, 2019): 100 pages of course notes take about two hours to read, just once. One evening can be enough to skim a course or test yourself on it, but lasting memory takes several passes, spread over several days.
Can you use the Aistote method without the app?
Yes. The useful principles do not depend on any tool: start from your course, test yourself (questions, exercises, or a blank page to write everything down from memory), go back over your mistakes, and come back to each chapter several times before the exam. An app mainly saves you time on writing the questions and on the schedule.
Is Aistote free?
According to its App Store listing, the Aistote app is free to download and offers in-app purchases. What the free version includes and what the subscription costs can change: check them in the app before you pay.
What is a good Aistote alternative for exam prep?
If you are preparing for an exam on a set date, Fastudy is built for that: you enter the date, the subject and your chapters, add your course, and Fastudy turns it into a plan of short lessons until exam day, with corrected exercises and George to answer your questions. You can start for free. If you are after flashcards instead, see our Quizlet alternatives.
Useful resources
- Create my study plan with Fastudy
- Roediger, H. L. & Karpicke, J. D. (2006). Test-Enhanced Learning. Psychological Science, 17(3)
- Adesope, O. O., Trevisan, D. A. & Sundararajan, N. (2017). Rethinking the Use of Tests: A Meta-Analysis of Practice Testing. Review of Educational Research, 87(3)
- Cepeda, N. J. et al. (2006). Distributed Practice in Verbal Recall Tasks: A Review and Quantitative Synthesis. Psychological Bulletin, 132(3)
- Brysbaert, M. (2019). How Many Words Do We Read per Minute? A Review and Meta-Analysis of Reading Rate. Journal of Memory and Language, 109