Everyday Math for Real Life
Build sharp quantitative instincts for the numbers you face daily. Learn to spot deceptive percentages, evaluate risks, master interest and debt, and make smarter everyday financial decisions without reaching for a calculator.
Like Duolingo, but for Everyday Math for Real Life. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
21 levels across 4 sections, about 42 minutes end to end, roughly 8 days at five minutes a day. It moves through Estimate and Compare on the Fly; Make Financial Math Work for You; Read Risk, Odds, and Evidence; and Think Quantitatively About Life Choices. It starts from scratch.
Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android
Key ideas in Everyday Math for Real Life
- Rounding items to the nearest whole dollar or easy anchor number lets you sum in your head in seconds
- Over-estimates and under-estimates usually balance each other out across several items
- Exact arithmetic wastes time when your estimate is safely below the spending limit
- 10% is found instantly by shifting the decimal point one spot to the left
- 5% is always half of the 10% value, and 20% is double the 10% value
- 1% is found by shifting the decimal point two places left, allowing quick single-digit adjustments
- Dividing $4,800 by 40 gives $120 per boxed lunch, which is off by an entire power of ten compared to a normal ~$12 lunch
- Multiplying rough baselines (40 people × ~$10) gives ~$400, instantly signaling that a $4,000+ number has an extra zero
- Order-of-magnitude checks focus on the number of zeroes rather than exact per-item costs to catch clerical billing errors
- Bounding sets a safe 'floor' (it cannot possibly be less than this) and 'ceiling' (it cannot possibly be more than this)
- A realistic range lets you make logistical decisions (like budgeting cash or picking up supplies) before exact figures are known
- Demanding exact precision before acting causes paralysis when a ballpark range is plenty to proceed
- An intimidating total is easiest to solve by splitting it into 3 to 4 smaller, everyday estimates you can picture
- Multiplying hourly flow by total operating hours and customer habits produces a reasonable ballpark
- Individual errors in your small guesses tend to cancel out when combined
- To find unit price, divide total price by total quantity (price ÷ ounces)
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives Everyday Math for Real Life the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
When you round prices up and down on a few shopping items, what usually happens to the total?
Get it right to open this lesson and 20 more in the app.
Where Everyday Math for Real Life takes you
- 1
Estimate and Compare on the Fly
- Back-of-the-Napkin Estimation
- Unit Pricing, Ratios, and Scaling
- 2
Make Financial Math Work for You
- Percentage Traps and Multipliers
- Compound Growth, Debt, and Inflation
- 3
Read Risk, Odds, and Evidence
- Everyday Probability and Risk
- Averages, Outliers, and Misleading Data
- 4
Think Quantitatively About Life Choices
- Opportunity Cost and Trade-Offs
4 sections · 7 units · 21 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
Tomo is in ChatGPT
Tomo is also a ChatGPT plugin: the same playable courses, built and played inside your chat.
Add Tomo to ChatGPT- What to ask
- “Make me a Tomo course on black holes.” “Turn this chat into a Tomo course.”
- What you get
- Quick questions with instant feedback, hearts and stars, ready to play in about a minute.
- Where it goes
- No sign-up to start. Connect your Tomo account and your streak carries on in the app.
You pick the voice
Everyday Math for Real Life is taught in the Explain Like I'm 5 style: no big words. promise.. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
More Math on Tomo
Everyday Mental Math
Ditch the calculator and build effortless numerical intuition for real life. Learn how to mentally calculate tips, spot misleading discounts, estimate big numbers in seconds, and make smarter decisions with odds and percentages.
Everyday Mental Math
Ditch the calculator app and build instant number confidence. Learn simple mental tricks to calculate tips, spot real discounts, and estimate anything on the fly.
Math for Real Life
Stop wondering when you'll ever use math and start using it to solve everyday puzzles. From splitting a pizza to planning a trip, see how numbers make life easier.
Spotting Misleading Numbers
Cut through confusing statistics, sensational headlines, and deceitful graphs. Build practical mental checks to test whether numerical claims in daily life actually hold up.
How Math Formulas Work
Stop memorizing steps and start seeing the underlying logic of numbers. Discover how arithmetic patterns, fractions, and algebraic equations connect so you can solve problems on your own with confidence.
How Logarithms Work
Demystify logarithms by understanding them as power counters and scale shifters. Learn the mental models that make calculation rules second nature while avoiding the algebra traps that trip everyone up.
Start Everyday Math for Real Life today.
Download Tomo, search Everyday Math for Real Life, and play your first lesson in under a minute.