At least 80 people were killed during the attack on the 1,500-seat venue during a sell-out gig by US rock group Eagles of Death Metal.
University of Nottingham student Hanna Corbett said there was blood all around and people lying on top of each other.
The student, originally from St Albans, said she thought she and her friend were about to die.
She said people inside did not realise straight away what was happening.
"It sounded like fireworks or firecrackers and it wasn't until people started screaming and the lead singer ran off stage [that people knew something was wrong].
"The lights went on and everyone just dropped to the floor," the 21-year-old history student said.
"There was blood all around and people were hugging each other."
Describing laying on the floor, with the gunmen on the balcony, Ms Corbett said: "It felt like ages but it could have been just five to 10 minutes - there was this banging which seemed like a real gun - I'd never heard one before.
"[People were] crawling over each other, just trying to climb out of fire exits. It was pretty inhumane - a nightmare.
"I thought it was like that heroic thing on the train," when a suspected radical Islamist was overcome by six passengers.
"I thought someone would just stop them - but the guns kept going and I thought 'this is the end'."
Ms Corbett said luckily she and her friend Jack Konda, 21, also a student in Nottingham, managed to get out.
He said: "We were dealt a pretty lucky hand to have been so close to it and get out pretty much unscathed."
A French journalist captured the horror of people fleeing from gunmen who stormed the venue.
Le Monde newspaper reporter Daniel Psenny was himself shot as he tried to help a man who collapsed on the pavement outside.
A student has spoken of the "nightmare" of being caught up in the attack on the Bataclan concert hall in Paris.