iNaturalist is a social network for nature observation enthusiasts. It lets users record observations of plants and animals, share them with friends and researchers, and learn about the natural world.
Purpose Record and share observations of wildlife, participate in community science, and help build a dynamic catalog of life on Earth. Users can identify plants, animals, fungi, and more in the community while contributing to science.
Main capabilities
- Photograph and upload photos of wild plants, animals, fungi, or other organisms to record observations.
- The app immediately provides species identification suggestions, and the global community of nature enthusiasts confirms or refines them.
- Observation records become open data for scientists, conservationists, and researchers around the world to use.
- When the community agrees on an identification, the observation becomes "research grade" and enters the global scientific record.
- Supports browsing and searching by species, place, project, guide, and more.
- Provides content such as the community, people, projects, journal posts, taxon information, guides, places, site statistics, help, getting started, understanding projects, educator guides, video tutorials, curator guides, and more.
- Provides a mobile app that supports real-time identification and identifying species on the go; desktop iNaturalist.org is also available.
- Users under 13 can download the Seek app to observe species through badges and challenges.
How to use Open the app and photograph any wild plant, animal, fungus, or other organism—from your neighborhood to anywhere in the world. The app will immediately suggest an identification, and the global community of nature enthusiasts will confirm or refine it. Your observation becomes open data. The platform is free, nonprofit, and community-driven. Users can log in or sign up, and donate to support the platform. Old photos are welcome as long as the approximate time and location of the photo are known. There is no need to know the species name in advance; just share the photo and get help from the community.
Use cases
- Personal nature observation and learning species identification.
- Community science projects, such as local ecological conservation actions like protecting migrating amphibians crossing busy roads.
- Discovering or rediscovering species, for example the Frosted Phoenix moth, once thought extinct, was accidentally discovered in New Zealand by a visitor; a woman in Australia discovered the new scientific mantis species Inimia nat while walking in her community.
- Researchers, conservationists, and curious individuals use open observation data to conduct ecological research.
Limitations The platform is free and nonprofit. All observations are open and freely available. Observation records become research grade after the community agrees on an identification. Old photos can be uploaded as long as the approximate time and location are known. Use iNaturalist.org on desktop, and the app is recommended on mobile devices. Under 13 users use the Seek app. Other specific limitations are not yet provided.
