Our Top 5 University Dorm Must-haves
There are a million and one ‘essentials’ lists out there with every item you’re likely to need in your university halls of residence or dorm room. Having skimmed most of them, they’re all pretty similar.
Toothbrush, phone charger, underwear (who’d forget their underwear, seriously?).
But what about the lesser-known lifesavers, the unreported game changers, and the ridiculously handy hacks that won’t be on any Mumsnet thread or AI-generated packing list of the painfully obvious?
Well, here they are. Five of the most overlooked must-haves that you’ll actually be glad you shoved in your holdall the night before you flew the nest. Our source? Second-year students, of course.
Sliders / Flip flops
Two words for you; shared bathroom.
You really don’t want to be barefoot in a shared toilet or shower room, and depending on your uni halls/dorm setup, you could be looking at sharing a handful of cubicles with an entire floor of people. Hairy people, messy people, people who leave puddles the size of the Caspian Sea on the floor post-shower. Shuddering yet?
Protect those feet with some sliders, you won’t regret it.
Cold & Flu Supplies
This won’t be on many ‘what to buy for uni’ lists.
But Freshers Week is a melting pot of people from all over the place, carrying who-knows-what and getting very close and personal with one another. You might have heard of the dreaded ‘freshers flu’ - and it’s no myth. Almost everyone gets poorly in the first few months of university, and if you’ve never been ill away from home before, it can be a pretty miserable experience.
One of the students we spoke to took himself to bed feeling rough on the Friday afternoon after lectures, and said no one thought to check in on him all weekend. Poor thing.
You don’t want to be dragging yourself to a supermarket for Lemsips (other remedies are available) and cans of vegetable soup when the lurg has got you on your knees.
A well-stocked drawer of cold and flu medicines and some emergency tins of sustenance are going to come in very handy should you get suddenly stricken with the party plague.
A Heated Blanket & Pedestal Fan
We hate to be the bringers of bad news, but you’re probably not going to have much control over the temperature in your dorm room. Usually, the heating or air con (should it exist) is centrally controlled by some omnipotent arbiter of the thermostat. So whether it’s absolutely Baltic in your room, or as hot and sticky as the dance floor at Popworld, you’ve really got to take matters into your own hands.
Both of these essential items will come in handy later, too, when you’re bickering with your housemates over the temperature of your shared house in second and third year.
A good heated blanket is by far the quickest and most cost-effective way to warm up when the cold gets in your bones. Like a soft towel just off the radiator after a shower, nothing quite cuts it like a leccy-b (did we just coin a new term? I think we did).
And forget all that Bluetooth, water-cooled, NASA technology, price-of-an-iPhone desk fan nonsense. You’ll never regret owning a good old-fashioned pedestal fan - the students we spoke to got theirs from Screwfix for £20, and got the job done.
If you’ve got a bit more of a budget to work with, then it’s well worth springing for a box heater that doubles as a fan.
So whether you’re recovering from a textbook case of the cocktail flu or trying to type out an essay with frozen fingers, a comfortable temperature in your room at university is going to make a big difference to how you feel.
Mattress Topper
OK, maybe this one does make its way to some of the other lists out there, but we couldn’t leave it off ours because so many students we spoke to mentioned it.
Student dorm mattresses are hard, lumpy, and rarely replaced. Best not to think too much about that last one.
Mattress toppers, however, give you a nice cosy buffer between you and the block of industrial-grade concrete you’re expected to snooze on, and most are machine washable too.
Top tip: Students we chatted to said they were surprised at how pricey mattress toppers are (£20-40 ish), so keep this one in mind should the parents ask if you need anything when they drop you off…
Legendary Laundry Hacks
In university halls of residence, student flats, and dorms, it’s rare you’ll have access to your own washing machine or dryer. That means rain or shine, in the dead of winter, you’ll be hauling two weeks' worth of garms down to the off-grid, windowless, half-lit laundry room that smells of detergent and despair.
Unless you’re one of those students who drive their dirty laundry back to Mum and Dad every weekend (smh), you’re going to have to make this clumsy pilgrimage every week or two.
Here are five top tactics from students who’ve found ways to make the whole thing a bit less traumatic.
-
Get a solid laundry bag with handles and wheels - laundry is heavy, and lifts are often out of service. Tripping over five ‘bags for life’ with your undies spilling out everywhere is not the one.
-
Laundry strips are lighter and less likely to spill than detergent bottles. Bring a few in a sandwich bag to lighten the load even more.
-
Take a big shopping bag down with you. There’s almost always someone’s soggy stuff left in every machine, and it feels too harsh to just dump it out on the floor (but way too annoying to come back later).
-
Get a mesh laundry bag for your underwear - no more vanishing socks.
-
Figure out when the quiet times are - less awkward silences with randoms, and less chance you’ll have to keep coming back.
Don’t Stress, Buy Stuff As You Need It
It’s easy to overthink things like this. Don’t stress too much about getting it all perfect from day one, half the fun of uni life is figuring it out as you go.
You’ll quickly learn what you actually need (and what just takes up space under your bed), and there’s always a nearby supermarket or charity shop waiting if you forget something. Pack smart, stay flexible, and remember, you can always grab whatever you need as and when you need it.