Five Subscriptions Your Child's School Provides for Free (That You're Paying For Anyway)

Before you renew your Microsoft 365 subscription this autumn, check your child's school account. There's a decent chance they already have full access — and have done for months.

This is one of the quietest money leaks in family budgets. Every September, households add new education apps, upgrade cloud storage, and keep paying for software tools while their children sit on school-issued accounts covering the exact same thing. With back-to-school spending now averaging $863 per family and rising 11.7% in 2026, a quick check of what the school already provides is one of the simplest ways to claw back real money this year.

Why This Keeps Happening

Schools have quietly expanded their digital tool provision over the past five years. Microsoft and Google have aggressively pursued education partnerships — often providing full licence access at no cost to institutions — and many secondary schools now have Adobe Creative Cloud education agreements as well. The problem is that schools don't always communicate this loudly. A line in the IT setup letter at the start of term is easy to miss, especially when you're also fielding 11 other letters about uniform, PE kit, and school photo day.

So the subscription renews at home. And the school account sits untouched.

The Five to Check First

1. Microsoft 365

The most common double-payment. Office 365 Education A1 is free for students at qualifying institutions — full access to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Teams, and 1TB of OneDrive storage. If your child's school is a Microsoft education partner (most are), they have this.

Meanwhile, Microsoft 365 Family costs around €100/year. If you bought it mainly so your kids could do homework, check whether they already have it through school before the next renewal date.

2. Adobe Creative Cloud / Adobe Express

Secondary schools with art, design, media, or photography programmes are increasingly running school-wide Adobe licences. Adobe Express Premium is also available free for six months directly to students, and some districts cover the full Creative Cloud suite.

If anyone in your household pays for an individual Adobe subscription, it's worth emailing the school art or IT department to ask what's available before September.

3. Google Drive / Cloud Storage

Many families pay for Google One storage (€2.99–€9.99/month) to expand the 15GB free tier on their personal accounts. Student Google Workspace for Education accounts, on the other hand, often come with substantially more storage — and the student may be uploading everything there anyway.

It won't replace a family-wide storage plan, but if your child has their own Google account they use for personal storage, the school account may already be more than sufficient.

4. Reading and Literacy Platforms

At primary school level, this one is especially easy to miss. Platforms like Epic!, myON, and Raz-Kids are widely licensed by schools, often with home access included — the student just needs to log in with a school code. Some families pay for the same app's consumer version without realising the school code their child was given at the start of last year unlocks exactly the same content.

Ask your child's teacher at the start of term which reading apps the class uses, and whether home access is included.

5. Productivity and Note-Taking Apps

Notion, for instance, offers a free education plan. Canva provides its full Pro tier free to students and teachers. Some schools even have Headspace or similar wellness apps through mental health initiative licences. These don't appear on the standard IT letter, but a quick email to pastoral or IT staff often turns up options families didn't know existed.

A Simple Three-Step Check

You don't need to do this all at once. Before September, spend fifteen minutes doing the following:

Ask your child what apps and software their school uses — they usually know more than the IT letter covers. Check the school's website or parent portal for a technology or digital learning page. And if something isn't clear, a quick email to the school office asking "does the school provide access to [specific software]?" takes less time than one month's subscription cost.

Once you've worked out what can go, add the remaining subscriptions to SubManager so you have one clear view of what you're actually paying for — and get an alert before any of them renew.

What This Looks Like in Practice

A family with two secondary school children might currently pay:

Three of those four are worth a five-minute check. If even two of them turn out to be duplicates, that's over €200 back in your pocket before the year is out.

The New School Year is the Right Moment

The start of term is when you have the most leverage to ask these questions — IT staff are onboarding students anyway, teachers are sending out app lists, and your child is setting up their devices. The same window that makes September feel expensive is also the one that gives you the clearest picture of what the school is actually providing.

Check before you pay. Most families who do are surprised by what they find.