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What Are The Best Totes For College Students?

What Are The Best Totes For College Students?

College is a fun time where memories are made and a foundation of a student's career begins. Students oftentimes have long walked between classes and having the wrong bag can make it really tough. So what are the best totes for college students? We get asked this all the time so here are our recommendations.

Bags For College

The best possible way to plan for the best bag for college is to know what books you need and where you have to go to classes. Students learn quickly not to take all books for the entire day as oftentimes, they just don't it or it creates a super heavy bag. The best possible scenario is to take the books that you need for before lunch with you, drop off those books at your dorm around lunchtime and pick up your books for after lunch for the afternoon classes. Doing this will allow you to choose from various types of bags and put less strain on your body. We'll jump into various types of bags below.


If there is no way for you to drop off your books between classes, you have some very large books, or you have long distances to travel to classes, then the best possible bag for you is a backpack with lumbar support. The goal is to keep the pack close to your body to prevent your posture from trying to compensate for the added weight. Try not to let there be too much slack in the straps where the backpack can ride lower on the back or making the straps so tight that they pinch the shoulders.

Crossbody Bags

The crossbody bag is a great option for medium weight packs and not having long distances to walk. It's easy to spot the person who has too many books or too long of a distance to travel when they are leaning to one side with their crossbody bag on the opposite side.

Tote Bags

Tote bags with shorter straps can be a great option. College tote bags usually have a zipper top, a few pockets inside and have a wider width bottom to allow for book binds to rest nicely on the bottom. This bag usually has short straps and doesn't feel comfortable being placed on the shoulder.

It can be made of genuine leather, canvas and various types of fabric. some of the pros are that a leather bag that is good quality leather, will last quite a long time and probably last longer than one year. Other stylish bags made of fabric will likely only last one year. They give you more freedom of not having a big bag strapped to your back. There's nothing better to gal than a cute tote.

Totes With Shoulder Straps

Totes for college students that offer shoulder straps can be a great option versus a backpack. With the shoulder, you can add a little more weight than you can a tote bag that will be carried by hand. Shoulder straps that are wider distribute the weight across the shoulder, versus thinner straps. some tote bags with shoulder straps also offer padding on the straps which can go a long way for heavy loads. The straps for this type of bag are longer than a tote bag that is meant to be carried by hand.

Tote bags with shoulder straps are made in various types of materials and styles, they can also be worn like a crossbody bag where the strap is worn on the shoulder, the bag crosses the chest and the bag rests on the hip. You can always tell when someone is trying to carry too many items in a tote with shoulder straps as they swing the bag behind them and lean forward essentially lugging the bag around with them. If this is the case then the load it to large.

Transport Totes

Transport totes usually are large with a plastic or aluminum handle and wheels. They are very functional and utilitarian. They will get you and your books to your class but you likely will look like your headed to the airport.

We don't recommend these unless you truly have a heavy amount of books and a long distance to travel. They don't fit very well in classrooms which are often times auditorium style and its a big deal every time you need to open the transport tote to get out your items. We recommend a simple zipper-top bag or open style tote bag that you can easily access when you need to without a lot of disruption.

OLovesM College Tote Bags

OLovesM offers college tote bags that can be carried by hand or worn on the shoulder. The unique thing to know about our totes for college is that they are made from repurposed yoga mat bags which means the bags are waterproof. What better way to protect your books, homework, and laptops than with a super cute tote? Our totes for college students are stylish. They come in a variety of colors and patterns! Colors range from red, blue, green, purple and orange and we have a ton of prints including birds, circles, dogs, triangles and more. Can you beat stylish and waterproof? We think not!

Shop OLovesM College Tote Bags

We hope you find the best tote for college. It's a great time for students, learning, making new friends, living away from their parents. There are so many things that are different and having to do things on their own. Our goal is to make it easy selecting a tote bag for college, allowing students to focus on the more important things, all while not needing to spend a lot of time at a chiropractor's office all due to carrying the wrong bag to their classes. We wish you and your student success in selecting the right bag!


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